seeline

I really like the 1st album in that series! The 2nd one is good, too, but (I think) a little too heavy on vocals.... most choros are instrumental. But yeah, the playing is brilliant, and so are many of the singers. Covers -

It's an early Gilberto Gil album... Edited to add: Discos do Brasil is a good place to check for info.

This New Yorker article deals with all that in some depth - I had no idea (until this evening) that the company had been in existence for so long, nor any idea of what it does today... it's fascinating stuff. What did you do when you worked for them?

Well hey, they took it seriously enough to dine by it, boat by it, play it during fireworks displays, and who knows what all else... But it does strike me as slightly ironic that a lot of these pieces are performed as center-stage productions today, rather than as incidental music. But that whole train of thought leads to something quite different than supposed open hostility to jazz...

True enough - but I still have to wonder why we now take that music so "seriously," so to speak. (Me, too.) On the Muzak (etc.) thing, this looks interesting... (I haven't read it yet, though.) and I'm no fan of Muzak or "easy listening" radio stations, either.

About recorded "background music": that's been going on for a long, long time now, so there's nothing new (IMO) to rail about. (I'm in my 50s and can remember it from when everyone called it "Muzak," after the corporation that more or less branded the contemporary idea of "background music.") Besides, though a lot of us keep saying "nobody pays any attention to it," we're just throwing our ideas about it out on the table. It's not as if I (or anyone else here) really knows these things, in terms of hard factual evidence. I think I'm going to order a copy of this book. An ironic thing: a *lot* of pre-19th c. classical music was actually written with the express goal of being "background music" - Telemann's Tafelmusik, for example. But we now listen to a lot of these works as concert pieces, which makes me think ???

Yes - like the scene in Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" where one of the characters asks to be allowed to live one day of her life over... and can't, because it's so overwhelming. (And because we're all so blind to the beauty of the everyday.) Some of the people whose portraits are posted on the site spoke about this; seeing transcendent beauty in so many things, people and places that they would otherwise have missed. For me personally, that is encouraging... and something that I hope I will be able to experience. Here's a quote from Wolfgang Kotzahn - "'I’m surprised that I have come to terms with it [my illness] fairly easily. Now I’m lying here waiting to die. But each day that I have I savour, experiencing life to the full. I never paid any attention to clouds before. Now I see everything from a totally different perspective: every cloud outside my window, every flower in the vase. Suddenly, everything matters.'"

As MG pointed out, jazz serves as background music - and is accepted as such. You could say much the same for many other genres of music, including classical. there's nothing "wrong" about that per se. (I think, anyhow...) At least Starbuck's has been making an effort to sell the music, in addition to playing it in their shops!

You know, this hits very close to home for me, too - one of my brothers died of cancer last fall. Which is why - in a sort of paradoxical way that I can't easily explain - I found the excerpts from this book (portraits of the subjects and interviews with them) to be comforting. Part of that comes from the words of many of the subjects, but it's also related to what can happen in a good hospice situation. I'm not getting any younger, either, so... many of the models' observations on facing death, and on living while facing death, are encouraging to me.

True. I hear uncompromising jazz all the time over the sound system at Starbucks and at Barnes & Noble--but how many people are actually taking note of it and listening with any awareness. Probably very few. I don't think that matters. I think it's good that jazz can form part of the background to people's lives. It means that people can pick up on it, if they want to. And not, if they don't want to. Surely that's all anyone could ask. I can't really see why anyone would want anything more; there's no special virtue about jazz, apart from the fact that we like it. Well, bollox to us! I think that the fact that places like Starbucks can put "uncompromising jazz" out in their coffee shops is a direct counter to Pat Metheny's initial comment that the culture was "openly hostile". Were that so, people would walk out of Starbucks when they heard it. That doesn't happen, because if it did, Starbucks would play something else. MG Good points, MG! As Teasing the Korean said earlier, Metheney's remarks might apply more to his own music than to jazz in general.

My educated guess is that all of the people who were photographed were aware of - and chose to participate in - the project. At this point in time, I can't imagine a proejct of this kind being allowed to go forward unless the subjects were actively involved in the work. There were some cases here in the US (60s and 70s) that established precedents for these kinds of works. (Frederick Wiseman's film Titicut Follies is one of the most well-known, with good reason, I think.) I think the whole notion of being diagnosed with a critical illness is hard for anyone to contemplate, let alone dealing with the thought of one's death. The thing that really stood out for me (in looking at the site that Van Bastien linked to) was the place of peace - and of outright joy in small, everyday things - that many of the subjects spoke of.

Thank you, Mike! Unfortunately, German has always been a very difficult language for me, so my reading ability is just about nil. (Though I can understand a tiny, tiny bit.) I hope that arrangements can be made for the book to be translated into at least one other language, as it seems that it would be helpful to many, many people. And, like you, I've been moved by the facial expressions shown in the photos. In some cases, it appears that the people suffered terribly up until the actual moment of death, though I may be guessing all wrong. (I'm thinking especially of the man with a beard and glasses who lived at the hospice for nearly two years...) I think in his case (and maybe one other?), there is a sense of relief...

I would really like to find a copy of this... having lost some family members and friends over the past few years, I think it actually might be a kind of "healing" thing, in many ways. And those portraits - of living models as well as the post-mortem shots - are really beautiful and sensitively, respectfully done. (I used to have to deal with post-mortem portraits on an irregular basis, for a job I once had, and believe me, the ones shown on the website are light years better than the kinds of paintings and photos that were common at one time - though in many cases, these images were the only likenesses *ever* taken of those who had died.) And Mike, your wife's thesis sounds very interesting.

I think you've got it!

Believe it or not, I'm a sucker for Yiddish theatre music and history... Here's a funny album (with lots of parody stuff, including nifty spins on stereotypes) that I really like - Of course, the fact that most of the people involved are doing parodies of parodies (and gently making fun of themselves in the process) is one of the things that I like most. "Pesach in Portugal" might be my fave cut. (You Europeans know the song being parodied as "Coimbra," I think - it got renamed "April in Portugal" for the US. The lead singer here is openly gay, which is part of the "gently making fun..." concept.) My taste for lighter-hearted humor is showing, I think...

I do agree with you there, Allen and, like a lot of what you say on historical fronts, it makes a lot of sense. But I wonder to what extent, in either case (ie gangsta rap or Jewish jokes), the oppressed group were REALLY taking control of the message. I think that most of it is accepting the role assigned. I know little about Jewish music, but there are periods in the early development of Rap, and most other kinds of black music I feel, that the singers/musicians/audiences really did take control of the message but they were soon stamped out by the industry and only those who accepted the lesser role got a look in. So I'm still suspicious. MG Like you, I agree on Mel Brooks and The Producers... and I know that you're coming from an "inside" POV re. Jewish jokes and so on. But the larger problem (or one of them) may lie in the way - at least partly - we in the US seem to accept a lot of things as givens, like intentionally cruel "humor." (Again, Sacha Baron Cohen comes to mind, though I realize he's from the UK.) Just my personal take on it... nothing definitive. Edit: Oh, as for the old stereotypes supposedly being dead, I've heard plenty of them, and some of my friends and their parents have had plenty directed right at them, so... I realize this is 3d-hand info. at best, but I do think it's worth some consideration.

Fair enough, as far as what you're saying, but I think statements like "openly hostile" set up an Us vs. Them dichotomy that doesn't really serve his cause - especially when he's doing HS education gigs. I can see why he might try to appeal to the kids on the basis of "If you do this, you're so cool that nobody else gets it except for other people who play this stuff," but... To my mind, it seems to be creating barriers where none have to exist. I guess I'd like to see a more nuanced explanation from Metheny himself. As is, "the culture" reminds me way too much of the use of this phrase - "the gay lifestyle" - by a lot of people who are upset and (maybe) threatened by the idea that gay people exist. Yes, there's a stereotypical gay subculture, but there's no single "gay lifestyle." (I'm not meaning to get on a religious or political tangent here; it's the 1st comparison that came to mind, in terms of how language is being used.) It seems to reduce "pop culture" to being all bad, and making jazz into some sort of all-good, "high culture" pursuit that's only going to be grasped or enjoyed by a select handful of initiates - kinda like the Masons.

I'm now living in a very small town, and I hear you... Because without the internet, i think I'd go completely bats. (And not just from lack of live jazz + other kinds of music I like.)

There's a group of people there who tend to focus on how bad off they are because nobody listens to jazz, or likes it, etc. "Here" is a far better place to discuss, I think!

Which is exactly where these kinds of posts show up on an all-too-regular basis. One of the reasons I'm saying that: I was banned permanently less than 2 weeks ago, partly for making some noise about this kind of narrow-mindedness.

No, I'm not missing the point, I'm making one of my own. I understand that some Jewish people will find these old stereotypes to be amusing when they're the ones calling the shots, but a lot of others will never be comfortable with it... Just as a lot of black people hate the n-word. Anyhow, Henry Sapoznik (Yiddish Radio Project, with its onsite Yid-O-Matic translator) is also Jewish... and he's *not* playing around with loaded stereotypes. I get queasy when Sacha Baron Cohen is up to his "Throw the Jew Down the Well" act as Borat, too - seems like the people who need to get the point don't, you know? But that's a whole 'nother topic. Edited to add: *all* of the early vaudeville (etc.) songs and routines that trade on ethnic stereotypes are what they are - a product of their time. That doesn't mean anyone has to like them! Like I said in an earlier post, I think the world would be just fine if a lot of those recordings, pieces of sheet music, etc. disappeared forever... though hopefully, they will serve as reminders of how not to think and act toward other people. (Just my opinion - no intentions of getting on a soapbox, though I guess I did... )

"The culture is openly hostile to jazz." I wonder if he gave any examples to back up this statement? Looks like he could have worded it better... For one, I'm genuinely puzzled by his use of "the culture." What culture (or sub-culture) is he referring to? Seriously. Edited to add: this sounds a lot like some of the recurring posts on another board...

Yes, but.... the cover ("Heavenly Hebe," etc.) is a mess. I have no problem with "zany zaftig maidele" or "the leading Yiddish warblers," but ... if someone did a "coon songs" comp. with a cover akin to the Reboot disc, I'd be reacting in pretty much the same way as I am to this one. (Cover photo, etc.) Also, I think "From Avenue A to the Great White Way" is a better bet, based on the material alone - 1 disc with European/early Yiddish theatre stuff, 1 disc with American material (Yiddish and English lyrics). There are some stereotypical lyrics there, but nobody's trading on offensive caricatures or worse... (in packaging, title, etc.). Edit: FWIW, I'm a gentile. Which is also true of prewar Germany and anti-semitic cabaret (etc.) material, but does that legitimize it?!

Yes, it does. Henry Sapoznik (who produced the Yiddish Radio project shows for NPR) also did this comp, which was released in 2002 - Complete track list here. I wish this release would get the attention that's being given to the Reboot disc... the comp he did for the YRP is also very nice (includes some commercials and spoken-word material) -

I'm with you on this one, MG - there's loads of music in the same vein that's about Irishmen, Italians, etc. from that era... and I'd be happier if it was all forgotten. OTOH, there's some wonderful material out there, via The Yiddish Radio Project and organizations like YIVO.