Hot Links: Autumnal Equinox Edition
Writings here, there, and everywhere. Plus, Communists in the family! And a special offer.
September Musings:
My column this month at the Red Hook Star-Revue is on the RogueArts release with Joëlle Léandre’s entire Lifetime Achievement concert from the 2023 Vision Festival—and the unique experience of hearing a recording of a concert you were at.
In The Brooklyn Rail, a look at the great Terry Allen through the lens of Brendan Greaves’ new biography on the musician and artist.
At the Financial Times, a review of the New York Philharmonic’s season opening concert, with Michael Tilson Thomas conducting Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 14—played by Emanuel Ax—and Mahler’s Symphony No. 5 (might be behind a paywall).
For the New York Classical Review, a review of Taka Kigawa playing three of Stockhausen’s Klavierstücke and Kontakte at (le) poisson rouge.
An earlier review of mine is quoted in this story at VAN, which is fundamentally about how money and prestige destroy culture.
At Bandcamp, my new Constellations column follows a line from the Belgian punk band Cocaine Piss to Guillaume de Machaut.
Finally, I want to link back to something I recently published here, my article on Paul Robeson. After that went out, one of my sisters reminded me of the connection between Robeson and our Grandmother, Josephine Nordstrand who was an important member of the Communist Party USA in the middle of the 20th century. They knew each other, and our mother used to tell us how Robeson was at their house often, and that there was a photograph somewhere (as yet undiscovered) of Robeson and Josephine together. (There’s even a Josephine Nordstrand Fan Account with the excellent tagline: “Milwaukee. History. Labor. Communism. The Popular Front.”)
Josephine was part of the Civil Rights Congress, a front organization of the Communist Party (that was investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee). The Congress organized Paul Robeson’s famous outdoor performance in Cortlandt Manor, NY, in 1949, after which the concertgoers had to run a gauntlet of premature-MAGA types who beat them as they left the event. One of those, I discovered in reading Philip Freeman’s It is in the Brewing Luminous, was Cecil Taylor (I’ve written a review of this for the October issue of The Brooklyn Rail). I’m not trying to associate myself with the glow of people who did a lot for others in this country’s history, but show how if we are active in what we do in society, we’re all a part of a greater context, and the promise of greater things. If we can do anything to make those happen, even get out and walk in the streets, we’ll find our place.
Special Offer
I need more full, paid subscribers! No lie, I need you! Many, many more of you! And I have a special offer for new yearly subscribers. Each new paid yearly account is eligible for a random drawing with a couple neat prizes.
One new subscriber will get a brand new copy of LIFETIME REBEL, the new 4CD/1DVD release from RogueArt that captured Joëlle Léandre’s full Lifetime Achievement concert at the 2023 Vision Festival. You can read my longer look linked above, but it’s excellent, a best-of-year entry and just superb free and creative jazz, from the opening Tiger Trio with Nicole Mitchell and Myra Milford to Léandre’s duet with the great poet Fred Moten.
Two other picks will each get a brand new copy of the latest Can archival concert release, Live in Aston 1977. I included this in my Bandcamp guide to the band and it’s the best so far of their new series of live albums:
Every new paid yearly subscriber (including current monthly subscribers switching to yearly) will have their name entered into the drawing—get two subscriptions, you’re entered twice, etc. Entries will close at the stroke of midnight PST, November 1, and I’ll run a randomized drawing later that day.
(One more excellent reason to get a paid subscription now is that I’m going to have to raise the subscription rates, before the end of the year—amount and date TBD because it all depends on the success of this offer.)
Good listening to all, please subscribe, and good luck.