I was in a store the first part of this week that was playing a radio station devoted to Christmas music. It reminded me of just how dreadful, how dreckish far too much of our holiday music is. And, why I created the "holiday music that doesn't suck" series the last two years. Before launching two series for 2013 (one for country and one for blues/jazz/and R&B), I thought it would be nice to reprise. There are play list videos for each years selection and link to the individual posts that have a little background information.
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Saturday, December 07, 2013
Holiday Music That Doesn't Suck Retrospective
Saturday, December 08, 2012
Four Takes on American Music
1. Marc Myers, proprietor of the excellent Jazz Wax blog, has written a different kind of jazz history Why Jazz Happened (University of California Press). It the focuses on the economic and social changes that facilitated the creation of be-bop, cool jazz,hard bop and a few more styles leading up to jazz-rock fusion. I haven't read it yet, but Myers was interviewed by Jeffrey Siegel for his Straight No Chaser online jazz show (go here)
up in Massachusetts. You can listen for free to the podcast. It's a fascinating interview and there are some great tunes played.
2. Tom Hurka, a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto, writes about Rob Bowman's Soulsville, USA: The Story of Stax Records in normblog's writer's choice series. I'm an admirer of Peter Guralnik's 1986 Sweet Soul Music, which as published more than a decade before Bowman's book and with a broader focus. Hurka's mini-essay persuades me that Soulsville deserves to be read widely as well. As Hurka observes
A running theme in the book is the contrast between soul music, as at Stax, and the music of Motown. (Whereas the sign outside Stax said Soulsville, USA, that outside Motown said Hitsville, USA. Bowman thinks that encapsulates the difference.) The Motown sound was slick, northern, and urban, while Stax was rough, southern, and rural.
3. Ricky Ricardi, archivist for the Louis Armstrong House Museum in Queens, has a great blog The Wonderful World of Louis Armstrong. He's written a highly-praised book (2012) with the same title about Armstrong's later years, but the blog for the last year has been devoted to Armstrong's early and seminal Hot Fives and Hot Sevens recordings, which marked the first revolution in jazz. Ricardi did 10 blog posts on the 5 and 7s over six month period--they are listed here. Really fascinating stuff.
4. Dave Brubeck was one of the few jazz artists to achieve mass popularity in the 1950s and 1960s. Russell Fox comments here and Norm Geras here. I'm sure I heard "Take Five" and "Blue Rondo a la Turk" before I began to explore jazz in high school. A class mate, out reliable guide to what was cool in rock, was a drummer and a fan of Burbeck's drummer Joe Morello. His parents had the famous Time Out . A few years later I spent an evening hanging out with couple of Brubeck's kids who had a jazz rock fusion group and had played at a college gig in my hometown. Despite this exposure, I didn't feel a burning desire to get the album and I was well into adulthood before I got it.
Burbeck wrote some great jazz standards and I have enjoyed many of the Quartets performances, but I don't really like his playing; it seems heavy handed, lacking subtlety, and not really swinging. I prefer John Lewis and Thelonious Monk. I tend to think that the strange time signatures was a dead end.
Friday, November 30, 2012
Mickey Baker
It was announced today that legendary guitarist Mickey Baker has died. He was busy r&b and jazz session guitarist in New York in 1950s and wrote a jazz guitar instruction book series that influenced a generation or two of players. He is most famous, though, as half of Mickey and Sylvia. Their 1956 hit Love is Strange is truly a classic. Baker's guitar playing is among the best rock/r&b playing ever. Turns out though that much of is borrowed from Jody Williams playing on Billy Stewart's tune "Billie's Blues" on Chess. Chess even sued over the matter, but Williams apparently got no compensation. Another Williams piece ("Lucky Lou") was borrowed by Otis Rush for "All Your Love."
This YouTube Of "Love Is Strange" has some very nice vintage photos. Enjoy.
Thursday, October 11, 2012
Remembering Thelonious Monk on his 95th anniversary
The great Thelonious Monk was born on October 1917, 95 years ago. He was truly one of a kind. A vinyl Grdatest Hits on Columbia was among the first 10 or so jazz records I bought. I wore it out. Here's a performance of his classic "'Round Midnight" recorded in Poland in 1966 with ( in addition to Thelonious on piano)Charlie Rouse on tenor sax Larry Gales on bass, and Ben Riley on drums.
Monday, July 16, 2012
KItty Wells
It was reported today that Kitty Wells has died. Wells 1952 hit "It wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" was the first song by a female to top the country music charts. Wells paved the way for later generations of women in country music: Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, and many others owe her a debt of gratitude. Her wikipedia entry reports that she is the sixth best selling female artists in country music.
There were women stars in country music before Wells--Maybelle Carter, Rose Maddox, and Patsy Montana come to mind, but Wells was at another level and duration. I fear some obits may not get this right.
Well's defining song "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" is the greatest answer song in American popular music. It outsold Hank Thompson's "The Wild Side of Life." For a while, Wells' song was banned by the Grand Ole Opry and radio stations. That fate doesn't seem to have befallen Thompson's disc.
Here's "The Wild Side of Life" performed by Hank Thompson in a guitar shop, decades after the
western-swingish original
Both songs share a melody with Roy Acuff's 1939 "Great Speckled Bird" and the 1929 Carter Family's "I'm Thinking Tonight of My Blues Eyes.
There are at least two other country songs written to this tune: Reno & Smiley's “I'm Using My Bible for a Roadmap,” and Townes Van Zandt's “Heavenly Houseboat Blues.” Rock historian Nick Tosches say that the melody is an ancient British tune.
Friday, June 01, 2012
Best Concert Videos
Russell Fox selects his five favorite concert videos which he boldly terms the greatest ever. Russell writes that he has been on a convert video binge and discusses some very worthy videos that didn't make his cut.
Here are Russell's picks: The Last Waltz, Rattle and Hum, Shine a Light,
Stop Making Sense, and Woodstock.
I'm not prepared to put forward my five best, but there a few prime candidates that Russell missed.
Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll
a 1987 documentary film directed by Taylor Hackford that chronicles two 1986 concerts celebrating rock and roll musician Chuck Berry's 60th birthday. Interaction of Chuck and Rolling Stone Keith
Richard is a real highlight of the movie.
Jazz on a Summer's Day
Set at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island, and filmed and directed by noted commercial and fashion photographer Bert Stern and the film director Aram Avakian, who also edited the movie. The film features performances by Jimmy Giuffre, Thelonious Monk, Sonny Stitt, Anita O'Day, Dinah Washington, Gerry Mulligan, Chuck Berry, Louis Armstrong, Jack Teagarden, and others.
Jazz 34
When Robert Altman made his 1996 movie Kansas City, he did a Altmanesque creative move--he brought in 21 of the greatest young jazz musicians, recreated the ambiance of a KC jam session, and filmed them over several days. The result was several key scenes in the movie, two great CDs (soundtrack and KC After Dark) and the Jazz 34 video of the jam sessions.Wednesday, May 16, 2012
RIP Duck Dunn and Chuck Brown
Donald "Duck" Dunn, bassist for Booker T. and the MGs, Stax studio ace who played with many of the greats of rock, soul, and blues died over the weekend. He was featured in the Blues Brothers movies. One of my favorites was his playing on Fathers and Sons, the Chess double LP that featured Muddy Waters and other Chicago blues veterans with up and comers Paul Butterfield and Mike Bloomfield. Naturally, they picked Duck to play bass.
Check out his website, wikipedia entry, and allmusic.com bio.
I love this early 1960s clip of the Booker T. hit "Green Onions" espeically how animated Duck is. The camera focuses on him during Steve Cropper's guitar solo.
Chuck Brown's death, also this weekend, will attract only a fraction of the notice given to Dunn's passing. Brown, a fixture on the DC music scene for decades, was known as the "godfather of go-go" was an immensely creative musician, guitarist, singer and bandleader. I've never quite understood why "go-go" never caught on the way rap did.
Here is Brown's website (down at the moment), wikipedia entry
, allmusic.com pages, and Stephen Crocket's tribute in the Washington Post tribute.
Here is a video of his big hit "We Need Some Money"
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Levon Helm, drummer and vocalist for The Band, died today at age 71. Here is The Band performing "The Weight" at Woodstock
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Blues on a Saturday: Joe Turner Wee Baby Blues
Bill Dahl writes in his biography of Joe Turner on allmusic.com
The premier blues shouter of the postwar era, Big Joe Turner's roar could rattle the very foundation of any gin joint he sang within -- and that's without a microphone. Turner was a resilient figure in the history of blues -- he effortlessly spanned boogie-woogie, jump blues, even the first wave of rock & roll, enjoying great success in each genre.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Blues on a Saturday: Big Joe Turner with Johnny Otis
There's a great clip from the documentary Last of the Blue Devils featuring Big Joe Turner with Jay McShann and others in a lively, relaxed setting at the Kansas City Musicians Union Hall. Unfortunately, embedding is disabled. So, I've found a 1980 clip of Big Joe Turner with the Johnny Otis band.
Monday, January 16, 2012
I'm Gonna Marry a Corporation
With the second anniversairy of the Citizen's United ruling approaching, I'm planning a series of posts on the issue of corporate personhood. Let's start with something on the lighter side. This song was written by Barabara Joye and performed by Atlanta area singer Anita Paycheck.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Holiday Music That Doesn't Suck #2
Louis Armstrong, "Zat You, Santa Claus?" This tune has been covered by lots of folks.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Holiday Music That Doesn't Suck #1
There is lots of Christmas and holiday music that sucks. Sacchrin, commercial, routine are adjectives that frequently apply. . Even great artists too often make terrible Christmas albums. Bob Dylan's Christmas in the Heart is my pick for the most most disappointing holiday album, though Aretha Franklin's This Christmas is another recent effort that fell short.
On the other hand, there are lots of bargain holiday CDs in the stores and I have found some enjoyable CDs after a patient search. For 2011, I'm doing some searching on You Tube. I'll share some of my faves in the coming days.
I'm starting with a group I had never heard of--The Sonics, a 1960s Seattle garage band, contemporaries of The Kingsmen, Paul Revere and the Raiders, and others, and a influence on NIrvana and the White Stripes.
"I Don't Believe in Christmas" is a take off of Chuck Berry's Too Much Monkey Business., which was the source for Bob Dylan's Subterranean Homesick Blues
Monday, November 07, 2011
I'm Going to Marry a Corporation
Lyrics © by Barbara Joye Music and guitar accompaniment by Reid Jenkins Vocal by Atlanta country diva Anita Paycheck
Saturday, November 05, 2011
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Blues a Saturday: John Lee Hooker Boom, Boom!
This is from the mid-1960s in the UK. Not everyone seems to know how to dance to John Lee Hooker.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Blues on a Saturday: Jammin' the Blues
A 1944 short film, nominated for an Acadmey Award and decades later selected for the National Film Registry Musicians include Lester Young (tenor sax) , Harry Sweets Edison (trumpet) and Barney Kessl (guitar), Illinois Jacques (tenor sax). This was a a project of Norman Granz, a leading jazz concert and record producer. Granz was a very committed advocate for integration in an era when that took some gut.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Blues on a Saturday: T-Bone Walker with Jazz at the Philharmonic
This is rare, unexpected setting for bluesman T-bone Walker, one of the first electric guitarists and a big influence on B.B. King and an entire generation of bluesmen. This is from 1966 BBC broadcast of a "Jazz at the Philharmonic" concert. JATP was series of jazz concerts and tours organized by Norman Granz from 1944-1983.
Saturday, October 08, 2011
Blues on a Saturday: (Various) Let's Go Get Stoned
Bet you didn't know the low-down, drinking song "Let's Go Get Stoned," a number 1r&b hit for Ray Charles in 1966 was written by the Motown team of Ashford and Simspon? I didn't and the song has been a favorite of mine since I heard it on the radio not long after it came out. And I didn't know it was a hit first for the Coasters, though that version didn't get much play on white radio stations. It has become an often covered song. We'll start with a live version by the Derek Trucks band and follow it with Charles, the Coasters, and Big Mama Thornton. I'm not including Joe Cocker's version, which is already too famous.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
