Two to Tango w/Pablo Ziegler@Doctorow CPA, Hunter, NY 2014.08.31
Had a wonderful Labor Day weekend in the Catskills performing with Tango master pianist, composer and arranger, Pablo Ziegler, at the gracious invitation of the Catskills Mountain Foundation. Pablo has been an idol of mine for decades, ever since I first heard him as long-time pianist of Astor Piazzolla‘s New Tango Quintet. Back then, if…
Catskill Foundation interviews with Pablo and Me
Here are two wonderful interviews prefacing our concert together at the Doctorow Center in Hunter, NY in the Catskills. Great job, Vicki! (mp3 of my live performance of Pablo’s Milonga del adios at the bottom of the page) Pablo Ziegler Speaks to the Journey behind the Nuevo Tango and More! Posted on August 21, 2014 by…
Madison Smartt Bell ~ All Souls’ Rising
Just finished reading the massive and magnificent first volume of Madison Smartt Bell‘s trilogy of novels illuminating the Haitian Revolution, All Souls’ Rising. We who ignore history are doomed to repeat it: while essentially a narrative of the development from slave, Toussaint-Louverture, to General of the largest and most disciplined force of the uprising, of…
Haruki Murakami ~ Colorless Haruku Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage
Haruki Murakami‘s latest is valedictory testament to and distillation of his prevalent themes (witness the brilliant graphic below) but withal the courage to make empathy itself the magic, rather than keenly imaginative quantum leaps of intuition or hyper/alternative-reality; evil is not a faceless nightmare figure, but the lies we tell our closest friends, ourselves; no…
Anthony Neil Smith ~ All the Young Warriors
I’ve enjoyed all the Anthony Neil Smith crime novels as I could put my hands to: Psychosomatic, The Drummer, the Billy Lafitte series–Yellow Medicine (my first experience of Mr. Smith’s work), Hogdoggin’; haven’t read the third in that series, The Baddest Ass. His latest work of Minnesota noir I’ve read is All the Young Warriors,…
Madison Smartt Bell ~ Save Me, Joe Lewis
Continuing my Summer of Bell, traversing the complete published works of Madison Smartt Bell, I just finished reading his novel, Save Me, Joe Lewis (last words of a deathrow inmate prior to his execution), which follows the criminal path of serial muggers Macrae (the lanky one, always recognizable as our author) and Charlie, with the…
Patti Smith ~ Woolgathering
This slim volume, part of Francesco Clemente‘s Hanuman Books series, little volumes like prayer books, is a gem of Patti Smith’s journal entries, poems, lyrics, and photographs. It is a rarified and luminous precis of her gem-like prose and meditation. My friend Jack Regan recommended it to me quite a while ago, and I finally…
Lucius Shepard ~ Beautiful Blood
I’ve read all the published work of Lucius Shepard, and now have, sadly, read the last of him; his novel, Beautiful Blood, came out just a few months after his passing. Beautiful Blood is the first novel-length excursion through Lucius’ mythology of the Dragon Griaule. First invoked in The Man Who Painted the Dragon Griaule…
Cyril Scott ~ Lotus-land 2014.08.04@Aspen Music Festival
On Gunther Schuller‘s recommendation, I’ve been making my way through some of the more exquisite character pieces of Cyril Scott. I’ve performed a number of them as break-pieces on From the Top broadcasts, all of which are available at other posts on this site. I was saving Lotus-land for Aspen, as I’m sure it counts…
Two Novels by Madison Smartt Bell: Soldier’s Joy and Doctor Sleep
Thanks to Stona Fitch and his Concord Free Press publication of Madison Smartt Bell’s latest book of short stories, Zig Zag Wanderer, I hoarded all his published work and am making my way through them over the course of the summer. Two of his early novels, Soldier’s Joy and Doctor Sleep, I’ve just finished reading….