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Sir John has a different take on the composer who said, "I have never understood a measure of music, but I have felt it."
La Cieca at Parterre.com has posted a new podcast episode of "Unnatural Acts of Opera," wherein Elenore Steber performs at the Continental Baths in 1973. The Village Voice's Arthur Bell described the performance as "an affair to rank with the coming of Christ, the death of Garland, the birth of the blues, and the freezing of spinach."
Thank you, La Cieca!
The first time I met PSB's Paul Barton, he mentioned that his love of music had been kindled by, among other things, his father building him a violin when he needed a better instrument in order to become a better player.
Holy crap, I thought to myself, how much work goes into building a violin?
Michael Darnton tells you exactly how much work goes into it—well, into building a viola.
The list of poetry editors with whom I am not familiar is not a short one, but until I read this appreciation of Al Alvarez in The Scotsman, I only knew his name from my tattered copy of The New Poetry—a book that lived on the transmission hump of my 'lime green 69 Plymouth Valiant and got quite a workout as I waited (endlessly) for my waitress girlfriend to get off shift at the IHOP.
My loss, obviously. How could I have ever lived without reading the man who could write lines like this: "There was more life and liveliness and appetite in [Sylvia] Plath writing about death than there is…
I enjoy reading science writer Carl Zimmer and browse his website The Loom frequently. The post I link to below is a great example why.
Zimmer wrote an article for National Geographic on complexity in November 2006, which has lately been the subject of criticism by a biology teacher at Liberty University (Falwell's fundamentalist school in my home town of Lynchburg). Zimmer writes about the experience of reading "such stuff."
" It's as if my words were dragged through some creationist machine and chopped up into...well, into something, although it's hard to quite see what it is…
I was desperately cruising the web looking for a final post for the day when Jon Iverson sent this tea partay.
While compiling the data for Recommended Components, I came across High Water Sound's new website. Stark, black backgrounds are broken by quiet images of strength and beauty, New York City's Brooklyn Bridge taken from so many lovely angles, presenting all of its long lines and promises. Brick walls, cold air, and hard work. 2-channel with attitude. It's always a nice surprise to find a good-looking audio website, so I congratulated High Water's Jeffrey Catalano on a job well-done.
He told me he'd been developing the site for three years. It sometimes takes that long, yes, when you've…
What a combination, as Forums participant jazzfan would say. I just discovered Destination: OUT, a website that posts MP3s of out of print jazz discs. Lots of good stuff there. Play nice.
Via be.jazz, which is a pretty cool site in its own right.
Speaking of great jazz websites, Rod from Loughborough has a dandy 'un in wordsandmusic. It's just what the title says: thoughtful words on music Rod likes, linked to examples, deep references, and videos.
In his January 24 post, he meanders through Miles Smiles, Harold Land's The Fox (Elmo Hope, yes!), Coltrane's The Believer, and trad revivalist Muggsy Spanier. Oh yes, he ends with a visit to Gil Evans' sublime Out of the Cool.
Learn, listen, enjoy.