Evans, his pain, and the music: “I have always preferred playing without an audience.”
Continue reading...Song Of the week
090: The Cyrkle, ‘Red Rubber Ball’
1966–when Paul Simon mistook Jeff for Art and gave away that unforgettable, bouncy ‘Red Rubber Ball’.
Continue reading...097: Mstislav Rostropovich, ‘Cello Concerto Opus 43, Adagio’ (Mieczyslaw Weinberg)
On Holocaust Day we remember the incomprehensible persecution suffered by Moldovan/Polish/Russian Jewish composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg (1919–1996) at the hands of both the Nazis and the Soviets.
Continue reading...080: Tim Ries w. Norah Jones, ‘Wild Horses’
A fetching beauty with a catchy rock song in a first-rate jazz context. What more could one ask for?
Saxophonist Tim Ries toured extensively with The Stones, who sponsored his very fine, very varied Rolling Stones Project.
044: Paul Robeson, ‘Go Down, Moses’
It’s Passover! Let’s sing a song of slavery!
Paul Robeson brought the Spiritual to the concert hall, singing the suffering and indignity of his own father in slavery. A remarkable life any standards.
106: Joni Mitchell, ‘Cactus Tree’
Most of the little I understand of the female psyche I’ve learned from Joni Mitchell.
Continue reading...176: Chuck Berry, ‘Too Much Monkey Business’ (Bob Dylan, ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’)
Who da daddy of rap?
Who da grandaddy?
085: Randy Newman: ‘I Think It’s Going to Rain Today’
Randy Newman’s first album sold numerous dozens of copies and remains almost unheard of even today.
I’ll tell you what I think of the album. I think it’s one of the greatest works of art to arise from the ‘rock’ idiom.