fasstrack

There's neither shame nor glory in being an artist-or anyway shouldn't be. It's what you are and do, like a motorman does his job. I guess this is the place to talk about it-cheaper than a shrink too. The self-absorption thing sure gets old though. Do it, don't talk about it-not incessantly anyway. Yesterday there was a NY Times show on CUNY TV. A comedy writer I never heard of-last name Cross-was interviewed. He was so self-absorbed and taken w/his cleverness that I changed the channel in frustration and out of tedium. You're a funnyman? Be funny. No oEat first, then you'll talk..

Brass Fantasy was nice. Eark Caldwell uses If You Don't Know Me by Now as in theme for his WBAI radio show. Great Pretender is good too.

The place itself is part of NY, speakeasy, and jazz history. I never ran into the Stompers but heard of them back in 1980, when I played there the only time, but for many months. Burt Eckoff, now a wizened piano man, had the gig weekends and I guess he got tired of playing solo or w/weekend warriors who literally fell asleep on the stand. So he offered me his tip money and I played whenever he did. Burt was a long term sub for singer-pianist Verna Swindell-off having a baby. I backed her some when she returned and to me she looked and sounded more than a little like Nina Simone. She was a talent but the real popular and almost famous performer there was Mabel Godwin, on a different night so I never heard her. She packed them in though. I know I also played a few times for Anne Hampton-Calloway, new in town and not playing piano-at Arthur's, anyway. I know the boss tried REAL hard to Hampton her Calloway. Not sure how he fared. I wish I listened more b/c she sure turned out great. Back then I wanted to blow and didn't give a snail's ass about a girl singer. Youth is wasted on the wrong people. Good thing I kept it to myself, as IIRC Ms. Calloway looked like she could knock me out with one punch, then order a hoagie. A very hale, robust woman! The other name I recall is Al Bundy. Just the name. The best part of the gig, though, was Burt himself. He had a resume when we met that included Howard McGhee, Sony Stitt, Archie Shepp, and a lot of singers. He was with Dakota Stanton a long time after this period. He taught me a lot about how to read and play to a room, and how to play with bad rhythm sections (one bassist dragged so much Burt started every tempo in Shirley Horn land. The guy followed the call and basically fell asleep-much better for us than him playing). Burt played A Lot of Living to Do and Billy Taylor's What it Means to Be Free-2 tunes I hated and thought were unhip. I finally got that it's hard to entertain non-jazz fans on piano w/o singing. People dug those tunes and tipped- and that was MY money. Finally, one the house broke down and bought me a drink--so they didn't hate me! Had a blackberry brandy. Regulars sat in too, with very, shall I say, 'mixed' results. Handling that was part of it. I guess they mix drinks and figure you can mix pros with 'the other'.... Feed the tip jar, say I. I went in not long ago. It was exactly the same: greasy and classic NY. With jazz! It was an all-Oriental piano trio. Arthur's Cafe is off the beaten track (one block away can be a world away in Manhattan) and doesn't get the play Smalls or even Fat Cat does now. So the crowd is way different. Just like 32 years ago!

There was a fundraiser once to get a piano so Barry Harris could teach. I think Rodney Kendrick organized it. The whole NY jazz scene turned out. I think Randy Weston was part of it too. Virgil played, and it was a day at the office-meaning he sounded great: swinging, musical, and strong. Then Wynton played-which was damn nice of him. He sounded great too, but I felt like being a smart-ass, so while Wynton was up playing I punkishly (puckishly?) said to Virgil 'how does he have the balls to play after you'? I felt ashamed the minute the words came out. But Virgil's take was to throw his head back and laugh his ass off. So I f'ed up for talking mess about Wynton, but Virgil showed me in that moment that he knew who and how good he was. BTW: on that George Kelly gig the front line was George, Benny Powell, Norris Turney, and Virgil, who tore it up every solo, then rooted for everyone else when he wasn't playing George's truwpet book like he wrote it. One guy on the gig sort of 'lest we forget' b/c he's among us still: Richard Wyands. He's known for comping, but every head on the stand turned when he soloed.Like they say: 'rats pissing on cotton. A giant IMO-and you won't hear it from him.

Sorry for all time. I only have a shit cell phone, and can't control certain things. See, I'm just an unappreciated starving artist. Hey, WAIT A MINUTE!! Um, devil made me do that... THAT'S the friggin' ticket... (A person on a PC could've transcribed the goddamn Dead Sea Scrolls in the time it took to write this).

Anybody who thinks 'artists' are in a fancy-ass special category is plain delusional. They (we) are exactly like everyone else-only more so. That's where sensitivity comes in, to give a reading on what people might be feeling/thinking but don't have the time or talent to hone in that way. Creativity is an accident of birth, like beauty, and IMO creative types are WAY too taken with themselves. Art that gets past-matures and gets past the 6-year-old 'self-expression' stage I've personally come to detest along with the elitism that grows out of it like a fungus-can actually mean something to someone else-not that the othes kind can't. But put me down as being sick to death of the cesspool of narssicism (sp) the world of 'jazz'-a once-socially viable music and many of its practitioners have become. I see these 40 smthings giving manifestos and I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Musicians=people. Art and refrigerator repair are both needed in life. But the fridge guy doesn't cry when he's not 'appreciated'. Anybody who thinks 'artists' are in a fancy-ass special category is plain delusional. They (we) are exactly like everyone else-only more so. That's where sensitivity comes in, to give a reading on what people might be feeling/thinking but don't have the time or talent to hone in that way. Creativity is an accident of birth, like beauty, and IMO creative types are WAY too taken with themselves. Art that gets past-matures and gets past the 6-year-old 'self-expression' stage I've personally come to detest along with the elitism that grows out of it like a fungus-can actually mean something to someone else-not that the othes kind can't. But put me down as being sick to death of the cesspool of narssicism (sp) the world of 'jazz'-a once-socially viable music and many of its practitioners have become. I see these 40 smthings giving manifestos and I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Musicians=people. Art and refrigerator repair are both needed in life. But the fridge guy doesn't cry when he's not 'appreciated'.

It's. Only. Fucking. Music. To quote that old guy from Moonstruck 'Somebody make a joke'.

Ecch. I knew he was sick, but still. We worked at the West End w/George Kelly a million years ago and I tried to hire him more recently. I thought he was one of the best-any kind of music he was down. Seemed an unpretentious, regular guy the little bit I knew him. Fun on the stand, too. Almost NO Mohecans left now. Out...

More like 'on bored' I think he renounced the serialism, albiet quietly. He didn't cause the stir of, say, David Del Tredici-who just plain ignored it, and caught mad heat from almost everyone. I'm beginning to wonder if serialism wasn't a bad dream Milton Babbit had after those bad anchovies. Bartok managed to stay away and pieces like Concerto for Ochestra starts out w/4ths the way Schoenberg and Berg did pre-serialism-but staying tonal and with modes goes places Sbhoenberg never dreamed about. I don't know about that period. Maybe Schoeberg was a little nutso. Can't blame him for trying. But Berg and Webern IMO made more lasting music, and Bartok and Kodaly did work both 'modern' and based on real traditions (as did (Copland) If you birth a movement in a test tube it damn well better be better than what preceded it. And, oh yeah, it doesn't hurt to have it SOUND GOOD...

Gee, my face is red. I'll have to send his wife, J. Edgar Hoovere, a note... Seriously, my whole life I thought it was Copeland. It just looks right. And I wondered why he always called me 'mud'...

I saw this today on CUNY TV, w/host James Day. Sorry, no link, and I'm limited w/the cell phone. But Copeland came across as an uncompromising advocate for (then) modern music, fresh ideas and serious listening. He talked about studying w/Boulanger in Paris, bristling w/youthful energy-and took me there. It must be on video somewhere.

There is no such thing. Anyone can have a bad day, and Pres was human. That was his genius: unique yet approachable poetry that was so human. And even when he was supposed to be 'washed up' there was a bend in the road every solo-a note or rhythm so CONTRARY... I'd grab anything. The live stuff w/Jesse Drakes and co. is worth it-from the same pd. Is the great Vic Dickenson on some of those?

Jimmy Raney loved Hall and always talked about him. I never heard HIS music, just his orchestrations for Monk, which were tremendous and insightful, and some comping for Jimmy on 'A' that I frankly thought a little weak. He must've recorded his orchestral music. Is it available? While we're at it can I vote for John Carisi, and the great Bill Finegan and Eddie Sauter, perhaps the genius of geniuses? Billy Strayhorn (still under-appreciated), Oliver Nelson, Benny Carter, the forgotten Jimmy Jones? And a giant still among us creating and breathing fire while hardly noticing jazz-and ya gotta love it-Stephen Sondheim. Benny Golson.

It's an important question for anyone-especially musicians. What really makes HH tick and whether he's sincere or not-it ain't my thing, it's his. Or a priest (Nicheran Buddhist) or shrink. I like almost all the services provided myself. Not nuts about the last few years-but I didn't listen that close either.

I can't tell on a cell phone who said what on the last one. But I remember a special on WKCR here on HH's elec. stuff ca. 70s on. It had an interview where he said his (complex and intellectual) music was fun, but not reaching anyone. I remember him remembering asking himself 'am I performing a SERVICE with this music?' Now doubters will doubt, groaners will groan-but if people want to get inside the guy's cranium I wouldn't refuse a tour guide's rope. Not THAT tour guide.

Jim, I hate to break it to you. But SEINFELD WAS CANCELLED. In other news: Lucky Lindy made it!! Now to this Hancock guy. Like I mentioned back in this thread's Bronze Age, all was cool by me until Rockit and Rock School. And statements like 'I don't make albums anymore, I make EVENTS! Still, he did more than most ever will. The 70s funk stuff was deep, and hard to do-especially from whence he came musically just prior. AND he never fucking named a tune Captain Senor Mouse...

I can't see. Did he have his Spaceman suit on? Then why, Mommy? Why?

I apologize for the double posts. And Jim, I have no clue as to your references. Like Perky in The Fortune Cookie you're too smart for me...

You guys are losing me. Take pity on the addled brain of an old Jew-and carefully explain that sharp right to SC. As if I was Hal the Computer fresh from singing 'Daisy, Daisy-give me your answer do...' Or as G-d is my witness I'll retrieve 2 members of Firesign Theater and a nice glrl from Ace Trucking Company that I stored in my Norge fridge directly after the Hamburger Sketch ca. 1968. I'm grabbing them, Tanya, amd to be safe Louise Lasser-and I swear I'm NOT FUCKING RESPONSIBLE!! This ir WAR!! What? Meds NOW? Alright, alright. (Sighs, drools) They don't let you LIUE. Bastards.. You guys are losing me. Take pity on the addled brain of an old Jew-and carefully explain that sharp right to SC. As if I was Hal the Computer fresh from singing 'Daisy, Daisy-give me your answer do...' Or as G-d is my witness I'll retrieve 2 members of Firesign Theater and a nice glrl from Ace Trucking Company that I stored in my Norge fridge directly after the Hamburger Sketch ca. 1968. I'm grabbing them, Tanya, amd to be safe Louise Lasser-and I swear I'm NOT FUCKING RESPONSIBLE!! This ir WAR!! What? Meds NOW? Alright, alright. (Sighs, drools) They don't let you LIUE. Bastards.. Shit. I don't get the double posts. I'm sorry for it.

That's why they paid him the Big Money and bubkis to schmoes like you and me, thank you very much-with a rabid stray with yellow duct tape over his eye like a fucked-up Pete howling in a bleak, unvegetated landscape-one neither Tom Waits nor Fakey Foont would wipe their asses on. What? Er, OK. My attendant 'Cuddles' said something about 'too much excitement'. And to get my ass back to my room. NOW...

There's one born every minute....

Now that Dick Clark's gone... Would it be in bad taste to say he was an opportunist and bullshitter that made me ashamed of our dumb-ass culture? I guess I just did. Sorry for the lousy timing and I know I yell at others when they do this 'cause it's just not nice. I know a lot of people liked him and I'm sorry he died and was sick and all, but guys like Clark, Kasey Kasem (or however you spell it this week).....Matt Lauer, anyone?...everyone who looks to stupidity, laziness, and arrested adolescence, especially of the intellectual ilk to climb usually gets there and rakes it in in the US. As Bill Finegan said, we're 'a nation of Barbarians'.

I had a problem writing from my cell phone. Didn't mean to do it. Besides, everyone here knows I don't need triplicate to annoy you. 'Singlecate' will do fine Do you think we could co-host a show a la Tavis and Cornel? Two Pissed Off Middle-Aged (Oh screw it, Old) White Guys That Like Jazz (One who Thinks He's Funny). Hosted by Geritol? I'll drink it on the air, you don't have to.... Scratch that. Um, Chuck and Joel's Dance Party?

Allen: School still off and the kids away, are they? Say no more. Wink wink. Nod nod........