John Lennon at 70

Google had this doodle on its home page yesterday and today in tribute to Lennon.

John Lennon would have turned 70 on Saturday, and the anniversary has occasioned a flood of events and releases to commemorate the songwriter and his work. In a way, Lennon’s stature — the reason for the celebrations — makes some of them seem beside the point. Since he was murdered outside the Dakota, 30 years ago in December, Lennon has remained a powerful presence in the culture, both for his songwriting and performances as a Beatle and for his post-Beatles life as a peace crusader, born-again feminist and alternately strident and affecting solo artist. Do we really need to be reminded about John Lennon? 

An iconic picture.

Numerous concert tributes will celebrate Lennon too, including a concert by the surviving members of his first band, the Quarry Men, at the Society for Ethical Culture on Saturday night.

In search of Beethoven

Genius explored. Some interesting scenes with Gianandrea Noseda, Emanuel Ax, Hélène Grimaud. Lots of talk, some rapture. In one set of scenes Maestro Noseda conducts Filarmonica della Scala in Beethoven's Opus 55, Symphony no.3 in E flat major "Eroica" with vim and vigor; when the work ends he kisses the score with Mediterranean passion. In fact, I noted that Mediterraneans showed more passion than others: Hélène Grimaud, playing Opus 73, Piano Concerto no.5 in E flat major "Emperor" shows amazing emotion, near rapture, as she interprets the work.


 Satisfying. Of course, it has a website.

Ismael Rivera

Found him whilst listening to Héctor Lavoe radio on last.fm website. Born in Saturce, PR, 5 October 1931.

In 1952, Rivera joined the U.S. Army but was quickly discharged since he didn't speak English. When he returned to Puerto Rico he went to work as a lead singer with Orquesta Panamericana, thanks to the recommendation of his friend Cortijo.

How did he get in, in the first place?

Cortijo's Combo continued to gain fame and so did Rivera's reputation as a lead singer. Benny Moré visited the island and was so impressd with Rivera's voice and skills that he baptized him as "El sonero mayor". The band went to New York City and played in the famed Palladium Ballroom, where the orchestras of Tito Rodriguez, Tito Puente and Charlie Palmieri also played.

What amazing music that must have been.

Rahsaan Roland Kirk

Recently I've been listening to Anything goes: the Cole Porter songbook instrumentals. One of the cuts on it is Get out of town, by the Roland Kirk Quartet. I have become utterly fascinated by it, and, of course, by Kirk himself. I remember seeing him in the Fillmore East. An Internet gave me a website that lists the Fillmore East shows.

There it is: 1, 2 & 3 April 1971 Santana, Tower Of Power, Rahsaan Roland Kirk & Vibration Society.

Foolish and intoxicated, we booed him; we were there to see and hear Santana, not this weird music. He got pissed off, and broke the wooden chair he had on stage. Later, off the rock and roll bandwagon, learning about jazz, I began to appreciate him.

 This picture well illustrates his style.


For Rashaan Roland Kirk
Gerald Majer
Callaloo, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Spring, 1999), pp. 333-334


Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3299453

For Rashaan Roland Kirk, by Gerald Majer © 1999 The Johns Hopkins University Press.

This is the first of two pages; Callalloo is "A journal that reports on African and African American arts for the general audience."

This is one of several videos on the Web. Check out Quincy Jones's 'fro.

Django Reinhardt, Omnipresent Icon

When Apple Inc. announced the iPad last month, CEO Steve Jobs demonstrated the device with a surprising choice of music. The first notes publicly heard on the new device were not a snippet of cutting-edge contemporary pop—not Radiohead or Norah Jones—but a jazz classic recorded in Paris 73 years ago. It was "Swing Guitars" by guitarist Django Reinhardt and violinist Stéphane Grappelli, with the Quintette of the Hot Club of France.

 

Possibly Mr. Jobs was mindful that the Reinhardt Centennial had occurred on Jan. 23, just a few days before the iPad presentation. But probably not. The legacy of Django Reinhardt enjoys a currency that those of comparable jazz icons do not. In recent months, the centennials of both Lester Young and Art Tatum came and went almost unnoticed, but Reinhardt is omnipresent—more so than during his lifetime. Tribute concerts have been a way of life in New York and around the world for the past decade. There are also new tribute albums and a new book.

Prez and Tatum, alas, are popular only with a minority of music fans. Then again, they are remembered, and so many other musicians are not.

The past few years have been good ones for Reinhardt's legacy: The French label Fremeaux finished its epic "Intégrale Django Reinhardt" series, which ultimately consisted of more than 800 tracks contained in 20 double-disc CD sets; Oxford University Press published Michael Dregni's definitive biography, "Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend"; Tony Bennett sang his own lyrics to "Nuages," Reinhardt's most famous melody, calling the result "All for You"; and Woody Allen lovingly mythologized Reinhardt in his 1999 film, "Sweet and Lowdown."

Listen to clips of songs by Django Reinhardt:

• Swing Guitars, with Stéphane Grappelli
• Limehouse Blues
• Minor Swing

Within a few generations, jazz improvisation would become a given, but back then, soloists like Reinhardt refused to take it for granted. Every solo he played sounds like he's battling to justify the very concept of improvisation. Reinhardt was never completely removed from his beginnings as a street musician, and he always sounds like he's trying to entertain an audience, rather than just to amuse his fellow musicians. He knew how to make an entrance and he knew how to leave us laughing. If we're still using the iPad, or its spiritual descendants, even for half as long as we'll be loving the music of Django Reinhardt, Mr. Jobs will have really accomplished something.