ghost of miles

WE FOUND HER!!! WE FOUND HER!!! I had just finished posting flyers all over the neighborhood and calling for her, sweeping the alleys with this humongous flashlight I'd purchased (looks like a regular cop-beater special) and had searched the bamboo that's spilling out of our neighbor's yard... decided to have one last look for the night in our basement with the new flashlight. We'd been leaving food and water down there--it had gone untouched, and we'd nearly given up the notion that she was down there--but I kept checking, in part because of this thread. And tonight, about 45 minutes ago, I went down there and called for her, and heard her distinct "uuuu" from the back of the earthen area of the cellar. I called my wife through the floorboards; she came down and shut the cellar door behind her, and we managed to coax Lilly down from the steep wall on which she was sitting. When we got her back in the house, we both felt like we'd won our personal Super Bowl or something (Super Bowl?? What am I saying, Conn500? Personal World Series, I mean!) ) Yet more proof that this is the best Internet community I've ever spent time in. MANY THANKS TO YOU ALL!!!

We just placed a "lost cat" ad in the Bloomington Herald-Times classified column for the next four days... and in about an hour I'm going to finish flyering our neighborhood with the photo & info sheet, covering an area about 10 blocks long and four blocks wide, hitting every telephone pole and all of those in the alley as well (a fair amount of student traffic through there). We're going to check at the Shelter as often as possible; went down there this afternoon and saw all the intake cats for today. In our first stroke of luck, the woman in charge of receiving the animals lives only one block away from us, and supposedly has quite a knack for recognizing cats. After the downtown-Baghdad theatrics of last night and the street paving this a.m., it's a nice break. So we're keeping our fingers crossed, and will stay up again tonight. It's just that this kitten was an extraordinary little bloom of love... we have some pretty spectacular cats to begin with, but she really just seemed superlative in her ability to give and receive affection. I think I'm going to put on some piano jazz--Bill Evans or Frank Kimbrough, maybe. I've been reluctant to play music since she got out, which makes the house seem even more quiet--I usually have jazz going about 6-8 hours a day. However, some quieter, lyrical jazz might make the house seem more homey if she's approaching it... she's certainly been raised as a jazz cat.

We are listing a reward on the flyer, though not a specific amount. So far we've contacted the Animal Shelter where we adopted her, the vet where we take her, and a number of other area vets with her microchip barcode #. I'll keep searching and calling around the house; we're just afraid that during her first 12 hours out a neighbor cat may have chased her off, and that she's lost. We've started hitting the whole neighborhood with a photo flyer; my wife's gone out to buy more industrial staples. It's just hard to eat & sleep, and to maintain hope while preparing for the worst at the same time. Thanks again; the comments and stories here are really helpful.

Didn't catch that recent Cole bio, but glad to hear they paid some attention to ST. LOUIS BLUES. The program is now archived.

Many thanks, guys--it's good to hear stories with happy endings. My wife & I are both out right now at 2 in the morning, calling her (supposedly there's a better chance a lost cat will come out between 1 & 5 in the morning, plus they can hear you better). Any more suggestions or advice more than welcome.

Hey all--our much-beloved, nearly-one-year-old black kitten Lilly apparently got out last night, probably while we were entering our pitch-dark house. She's never been outside before, and we spent all day looking for her in our neighborhood after we realized she was missing. We've put up some fliers and will put up more tomorrow, but it's a bad day & night to lose a cat; the shelters were closed today, and tonight the local idiots are acting like it's Vietnam with their fireworks... meaning either that she's probably hunkered down somewhere, or that she's gotten farther away. She has no tags, but she does have an embedded microchip from the shelter where we adopted her. I've been looking at pet-finding strategies on the web and wanted to ask for helpful hints and advice from other board members regarding looking for a lost pet. Much thanks in advance... she's a really sweet, loving little cat, and my wife & I are pretty torn up over this.

I'll be featuring this this coming Friday night on Afterglow, playing the bulk of it during the second hour of the program (from 11 p.m. EST to midnight)--two sets of FK with a set of Ellington's 1943 Hurricane Pastel Period broadcasts in the middle. Will up again with broadcast & archive links on Friday.

Mark, I'm so sorry to hear of your loss. It's been a crappy Fourth for us too... our one-year-old kitten Lilly somehow got out last night and we haven't been able to find her, even after searching all day.

That should help you enjoy the rest of your day! Have a great one, Clinton.

Really eager to read AMONG THE DEAD CITIES, a new book about the Allied bombing of population centers during WWII--in the meantime, alternating between CONVERSATIONS WITH NELSON ALGREN and Dave Oliphant's TEXAN JAZZ.

This week on Night Lights it’s “Nat King Cole’s St. Louis Blues.” A so-called “biopic” of the blues composer W.C. Handy’s life, this 1958 movie was Cole’s only role as a leading man, and it also included Pearl Bailey, Cab Calloway, and Eartha Kitt in its all-black cast, along with the underrated Juano Hernandez (who had portrayed the trumpeter Art Hazard in the 1950 jazz film Young Man With a Horn) as Handy’s father. Coming on the heels of Cole’s legendary but unsponsored and ultimately cancelled TV show, this film went out with high hopes on the part of its makers and stars, but it failed at the box office and is rarely mentioned in media accounts of Cole’s career. We’ll hear selections from the soundtrack album that Cole recorded with arranger Nelson Riddle, as well as music from Kitt and Ella Fitzgerald, who makes a brief appearance as herself late in the movie. “Nat King Cole’s St. Louis Blues” airs Saturday, July 1 at 11:05 p.m. EST on WFIU-Bloomington and at 10 p.m. Central Time on WNIN-Evansville. It will also air on Michigan's Blue Lake Public Radio FM 90.3 at 10 p.m. EST Sunday evening. The program will be posted in the Night Lights archives Monday afternoon. Next week: "Vibin': Roy Ayers in the 1960s."

I got both volumes yesterday and they have moved to the top of the "heap." They look wonderful, Allen, and I'm sure they're going to sound wonderful too. Taking orders for V. 3 yet?

You've been together as long as the Rolling Stones! And aged much more gracefully, I gotta say... seriously, congratulations, and thanks for posting the news here. My wife & I just celebrated our 7th anniversary (and 14th anniversary of our first date) and I surely hope we're still around for #43... only mortality's going to take us apart. We should really start a heroine thread for "jazz widows"--can you imagine being married to one of us folks?

Undoubtedly the Clash's worst album--another ill-advised comeback!

Haven't seen you around much of late (ah! unintended pun, truly), but hope there's much jazz, poetry, and happiness solid or otherwise in your life today.

Brownie, I nearly picked up a used CD of Gainsbourg's early jazz recordings not too long ago... may head back to the shop and see if it's still there. Any recommendations in that area? GOM, bear in mind that although Gainsbourg knew his jazz very thoroughly (some favorites of his were Monk, Jimmy Smith, Jackie McLean among others) he did not record any strictly jazz albums. In addition to what couw already recommended, I would suggest you check 'Confidentiel' (with backing by Elek Bacsik on guitar and Michel Gaudry on bass) and 'Gainsbourg Percussions', also some jazzy soundtracks (with very nice trumpet playing by Roger Guérin) on several items in the 3-CD anthology 'Le Cinéma de Gainsbourg' that came out this year from Universal. I've been listening to DU JAZZ DANS LE RAVIN, and speaking of Jackie McLean, who is the saxophonist on track #16, "Quand mon 6:35 me fait les yeux doux"? Sure sounds like a Jackie acolyte.. no wonder SG used him. It originally appeared on GAINSBOURG PERCUSSIONS.

Two French ones--should know these, but can't pull them out of my work-fuddled brain right now: Barney Wilen Rene Urtreger

Virgil's an Indy guy....very good player, not well known! m~ He's also on tenor saxophonist David Young's s/t 1975 Mainstream LP--was just playing most of that on the air today, as a matter of fact. Jones sounds very good there as well.

I love connections and responses like that, best reward being a radio programmer can offer.

Will Friedwald's review:

What bothers me is a between-the-lines suggestion (and actually it surfaces overtly in one instance), in spite of all the praise directed Hill's way, that Hill is a bit of a charlatan and a liar. The implication that his technique has declined didn't bother me at all; I'm sure it has, as it often does with aged musicians. The impugning of his character (which is how I read it) is what "irked" me--along with the backtrack attempt to say that, well, it's all part of jazz mythology. How many performers, jazz, rock, or otherwise, have sometimes fudged their age a bit or enhanced meaningful artistic associations as they tried to get ahead? I really didn't see the need for that crap at all, since it has little or nothing to do with Hill's music. Honest, rigorous criticism of artists whom I love is fine, but patronising insinuation just rubs me the wrong way.

Yet another 25 % off sale from Allegro on Hep titles. Some new titles, including a Charlie Barnet Town Hall concert and an Isham Jones 1933-36 collection.

Brilliant Corners Curious as to others' take on this article... it left me feeling slightly irked, for some reason.

Picked up a new DVD reissue of a film that I have fond memories of watching with my father when I was a boy: Emperor of the North Incredibly violent but compelling Depression-era train tale made in the early 1970s, with Lee Marvin as a superlative bum, Ernest Borgnine as a sadistic railroad employee, and Keith Carradine as a hobo-wannabe just bordering on punk (in the prison sense of the term).