Take 86

Mainstream breakthrough jazz legend Dave Brubeck died yesterday at age 91.  I was lucky enough to see him perform live in the mid-1970's, already gray-haired and with at least one of his sons in his band.  He had tremendous graciousness as well as grace, and his music was surprisingly accessible, per this Ashley Fetters post in The Atlantic today:

There's another reason why the popularity of "Take Five" is remarkable: It's performed in a musical structure that people in the Western world often show cognitive resistance to.

Most Western music is dependent on a structure with two, three, or four beats in a measure—or some multiple of those—with even spaces between the emphasized beats.

...

"Take Five," though, is written and performed in a 5/4 time signature, as my jazz-fan colleague David Graham mentioned yesterday—meaning there are five beats per measure. (Hence the title.) When there are five, seven, eleven, or almost any number of beats in a measure that doesn't divide evenly into twos or threes, the beats can become non-isochronous—meaning the emphasized beats, the ones you would tap your foot along with, aren't evenly spaced. For example: Try clapping along with the intro to the Mission: Impossible theme, which is also in a 5/4 time signature.

Time signatures like these are often known as "irregular," "complex," or "asymmetrical" time signatures.

Here's that very number, performed in 1966, seven years after it's initial release.  Brubeck had a relatively early racially integrated combo as well.  Right on, Dave:

Timeless cool.

Duck Down

Another great musician has been taken from us, Donald "Duck" Dunn, legend:

Donald “Duck” Dunn, the bassist who helped create the gritty Memphis soul sound at Stax Records in the 1960s as part of the legendary group Booker T. and the MGs and contributed to such classics as “In the Midnight Hour,” ‘’Hold On, I’m Coming” and “Sitting on the Dock of the Bay,” died Sunday at 70.Dunn, whose legacy as one of the most respected session musicians in the business also included work with John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd’s Blues Brothers as well as with Levon Helm, Eric Clapton, Neil Young and Bob Dylan, died while on tour in Tokyo.News of his death was posted on the Facebook site of his friend and fellow musician Steve Cropper, who was on the same tour. Cropper said Dunn died in his sleep.
...
Cropper left to become a session player at Stax, the Memphis record company that would become known for its soul recordings and artists such as Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Isaac Hayes and the Staples Singers.
Dunn soon followed Cropper and joined the Stax house band, also known as Booker T. and the MGs.
It was one of the first racially integrated soul groups, with two whites (Dunn on bass and Cropper on guitar) and two blacks (Booker T. Jones on organ and Al Jackson on drums), and was later inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
...
“I would have liked to have been on the road more, but the record company wanted us in the studio. Man, we were recording almost a hit a day for a while there,” Dunn said.
...
Dunn once said that he and Cropper were “like married people.”
“I can look at him and know what he’ll order for dinner,” he said. “When we play music together we both know where we’re going.”

Condolences to Cropper and to Dunn's family.  Thanks, Duck, for all the unforgettable baselines we danced to.

As for the Lord above, Dunn might as well be playing along to, "Hold On, I'm Coming."  R.I.P.

Levon Gone

A great has gone. From Rolling Stone:

Levon Helm, singer and drummer for the Band, died on April 19th in New York of throat cancer. He was 71.

...

Born May 26, 1940 in Arkansas, Helm was literally a witness to the birth of rock & roll; as a teenager, he saw Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis in concert and was inspired to play drums after seeing Lewis' drummer, Jimmy Van Eaton. (Helm went on to play mandolin and other stringed instruments as well). In 1960, Helm joined the backup band of rockabilly wildman Ronnie Hawkins – a group that would eventually include Robbie Robertson, Richard Manuel, Rick Danko and Garth Hudson, all future members of the Band.

The musicians broke from Hawkins to form their own group – their names included the Crackers and Levon and the Hawks – but it was their association with Bob Dylan that cemented their reputation. After Dylan saw the group in a club (either in Canada or New Jersey, depending on the source), he invited Helm and guitarist Robertson to join his electric band...Robertson and Helm were in Dylan's electric band for his controversial, frequently booed show at New York's Forest Hills Tennis Stadium. Afterward, various members of the Band played on Dylan's Blonde on Blonde and toured with him in 1966. (Helm left temporary in 1965, tired of the ongoing hostility from Dylan's folk fans.)

Recuperating in Woodstock after his 1966 motorcycle accident, Dylan again hooked up with the band that would soon be the Band. Before Helm rejoined them, they recorded the landmark Basement Tapes, and the Band's crackling, homespun take on American roots music began to take shape. Rechristening themselves the Band, they signed to Capitol Records and released two classic albums, Music From Big Pink (1968) and The Band (1969). Although Robertson was the Band's principal songwriter, it was Helm's beautifully gruff and ornery voice that brought the Canadian Robertson's mythic Americana songs to life. He was also one of rock's earliest singing drummers.

...

The Band continued for a while after Manuel's suicide by hanging in 1986, but Danko's death in 1999 of heart failure ended the Band once and for all. By then, Helm was dealing with throat cancer. After his recovery, he began holding intimate concerts in his combination barn and studio in Woodstock, called the "Midnight Ramble," in part to pay his medical bills. The low-key, woodsy performances became must-see shows and attracted a rock who's who; Elvis Costello, Natalie Merchant, the Grateful Dead's Phil Lesh and Donald Fagen were among the many who joined Helm and his band. The Ramble shows led to two acclaimed Helm solo albums – 2007's Dirt Farmer, which won a Grammy in the Best Traditional Folk category, and 2009's Electric Dirt, which resulted in a Grammy for Best Americana album. "This go-round has been a lot more fun," Helm told Rolling Stone in 2009. "Now I know I've got enough voice to do it."

I was lucky enough to attend a Midnight Ramble in January last year thanks to my friend and Ramble saxophonist, Erik Lawrence. It was a magical night, the beautiful interior of the barn/studio a warm and cozy respite from the freezing winter air outside. By tradition, attendees brought food to share in the downstairs area at intermission, in keeping with the spirit of the whole event.

I had a standing position behind the band, looking down at my buddy and across at Levon. When he entered, the band assembled and playing him in, with his jacket over his shoulders, long and gaunt and smiling ear-to-ear, the audience members (all ages, some from other parts of the world) shook his hand, thanked him, loved him.

As my father used to say, "Last of the good guys." And a hell of a drummer as well.

Rest in Peace, Levon Helm.

Haley Freed

Love the retro outfits, hair, locale and sexiness. Love the massive replayability:

Love that a year after Idol, Haley's out there and free to be herself, album coming late May.

Elise 2012 = Haley 2011

Last night on American Idol, a rock star was born. If you haven't been following, meet 20-year-old Elise Testone originally of Kinnelon, New Jersey:



She's twelve years older than the youngest female contestant and not only has a woman not won for the past five years straight, the oldest woman to win was Carrie Underwood at a mere 22-years-old. What chance does Elise have against all the young and old female votes for the male cuties?

On the other hand, like Haley Reinhart, Elise could win by losing. She builds the core fan base that's all the more adamant due to any injustice in the voting and gets the make the record she wants. Like Haley, she does so many interesting things with her voice, makes great choices, and records just as well as she performs live. Like Haley, she's got the blues in her and a rock & roll heart.

Because I'd be hella surprised if people aren't paying to see her sing within the next 24 months.

Vienna Waits for You

An extraordinary week on American Idol - the theme was The Billy Joel Songbook, and it didn't end up feeling dated. Several contestants really made the songs their own, including my three top favorites.

Elise Testone is the oldest contestant -- 28 -- and easily the most sophisticated. She's my favorite for her bluesy rasp, her unbelievable musicality, her range and passion, and her tremendous sense of rhythm. And watch/listen how beautifully she works her voice with the piano -- seamless, touch of swing -- to make the best-ever version of "Vienna":



Phillips Phillips is just so his own, excellent man. At age 19 his voice sounds eight to twelve years older, but his energy and edge is for real. His radical re-making of "Movin' Out" is the coolest this song has ever, ever been:



At age 16, Jessica Sanchez is a phenom. Yes, she has crazy range, (clearly) great training and God-given vocal chords, but she also has a surprising bluesy/urban strain in her and it belies her age. She's clearly the most marketable of the three, ready to be a young fashion icon as well as a musical one. Will the pop world accept a young Filipino-Mexican American in the footsteps of Celine and Whitney? She does wonders with "Everybody Has a Dream"?



Sorry, haters. It's an incredibly gifted cast of contestants this year, #11. And any of the Top Ten Finalists this year would have knocked out all but winner Kelly Clarkson in Season 1. Justin Guarini would have been lucky to be #8. And it's a tribute to the show that they can have a performer as individual as Phil or Elise on the show, making it so their own.

Yes, some real, serious talent.

The Ghost of Sam Cooke

I like the song "When a Man Loves a Woman" as much as the next guy, but I've never loved it like I did when Joshua Ledet performed it on Idol this past Wednesday night:

He took it to church, but when he drops his jacket, it's Jackie Wilson, Sam Cooke, Percy Sledge all rolled up in one extremely powerful, soulful, gospel trained voice. It's the right kind of throwback -- same training, lots to draw on both gold and contemporary.

Want to see what Josh does next. Because I've never seen that song done so well as that young man just did.

P2

19-year-old Phillip Phillips is worth posting every week:

Max R&R, pls.

Best So Far

This is easily my favorite performance from the first live week of American Idol, onstage in Hollywood. Say hello to Skylar Lane. She's just turned 18, but I think she's going to be around for awhile:

What an excellent song choice to introduce yourself to America. Note not changing the gender -- hot. I'm not a big country music fan, but this was rock & roll -- and the only R&R of the night, better not be of the competition.

Tina Turner meets Reba. A star is born.

Haley's Coming

Haley Reinhart, my favorite American Idol contestant to date, has her first album coming out in March. In the meantime, she's singing "Wild Horses" to Muhammad Ali on his birthday with Slash and Myles Kennedy:



Talent?

This One Goes to 11

My favorite reality show has returned and it's loaded with talent. And there's even a contender for personal favorite this year like Haley Reinhart was for me last year, only this time it's a young dude with a very unusual energy and a killer rasp in his voice named (I kid you not) Phil Phillips.

This past week the contestants sang 50's and 60's tunes in groups in Las Vegas and these were the four that stood out to me, with annotations on my emerging faves. By standing out, I mean that I've listened to these versions numerous times since Thursday night, like released music. Roughly in order of overall quality (IMHO), they are:

Sealed with a Kiss, with harmonies right out of The Mamas and the Papas, sounds like a professional recording act already:



Jen Hirsh is the one to watch for top four honors as the season progresses. She clearly has range and when she goes big, it's still in control, while hinting at awesomeness to come. Creighton Fraker is unusual and powerful in his own right.

I Only Have Eyes for You feels like a 1950's act come back to life. The early part of the song, their movements and the sway, it feels like water lapping the shore:



Neco Starr is perfect as Little Anthony and the unfortunately (and, I think, erroneously) cut Jairon Jackson is flawless and mellow in tone as well. But it's the other two guys that are breaking out bigtime.

Yep, Heejun Han could be the first Asian-American Idol, so strong is his tone and the crazy surprise of the polished voice that comes out of him, when he's very drily humorous in accented English offstage. And then there's Phil Phillips, who doesn't get very much solo time on this number but it's timed for maximum impact, as if a little of his personality-rich voice goes a very long way. He's the first one this season who's music I could see actually purchasing...like Haley last year.

I Really Doesn't Matter Anymore: Has anyone ever done a Buddy Holly song as a slow-but-hard-driving blues grinder before?



Crazy, unusual harmonies. Again, an African-American cut (in the end-of-episode paring down, not this clip) that feels unfair and unwise, as Candice Coleman does a great job. Deandre Brackensick has the sick high-end vocals that impress as well.

But it's Jessica Sanchez who just made a name for herself this week. Did anyone expect a Jennifer Hudson-sized voice to come out of this girl? With such soul. At age 16. A star may have just been born.

The Night Has a Thousand Eyes: This was an early performance for this batch and the only one I saw that received a standing ovation from the judges. Whether that was due to the early spot or the high-quality revision of this '50's classic into a jazzy 1970's SoCal groove, you be the judge.



Eban Franckewitz is Idol's shot at a Justin Bieber but he doesn't seem to have the full control yet and could use a year or two. Chances are he'll be in the top 12 anyway. Haley Johnson is strong as well but, to my mind, the other two are the standouts.

Reed Grimm is this year's Casey Abrams, extremely musical, improving any group he's in, a good part showman, quite an instrument. He's got a signature bent-leg dance posture and even did one his Hollywood Week solo performance behind a drum kit. Could be the guy to watch for a top four spot.

Then there's Elise Testone. I'm not sure if her breaks on the top notes are planned or not, but she's got a crazy amount of soul and guts, and I love her style of singing. Some funk to come, perhaps? Some hard blues? A Janis number should she make the Top 12?

There you go: Jen, Creighton, Phil, Heejun, Jessica, Reed and Elise are my faves, as in I'm very interested to see what they do next. Others may emerge -- I want to hear more from Hallie Day, in particular. In early seasons sometimes it was a question of whether the top contestants could even stay on pitch, so that picking the final few was easy. Since last season it's felt like pitch talent isn't a problem, so what's going to make the difference is something distinctive in the voice, the musical choices and the personality that comes through.

It's way too early but let me make my prediction:

Phil Phillips FTW.

Catchy

I'm liking the way Joseph Gordon-Leavitt is making his choices:

Go, Vermin!

It's That Time Again

Yes:



Happy Holidays!

Wild Monday Roundup

Amanda Knox should never have been tried in the first place, and the prosecution's allegation of motive was Medieval and misogynistic, literally something out of a 14th Century witch trial. I'm sure it must be as hard to believe that she's finally free after nearly four years - 20% of her life -- but the relief must be epic as well. Great thanks to the Italian legal system, where the appeal is something more of a do-over than here in the U.S. Of course, in Rick Perry's Texas, she'd be executed already:

As one of the prosecutors in the case, Manuela Comodi, no friend of Knox, implied last week in his remarks: were Knox being tried in the United States, she might well be on her way to an execution. The case of Troy Davis, killed by the state of Georgia last month despite the fact that most of the witnesses in his case later recanted their testimony, should linger as the Knox saga is reviewed.

Speaking of Gov. Perry, I don't think the news about the name of the ranch leased by his family means that he's a racist. As our President would say, it's a distracting sideshow. But it does reinforce my prediction that an Obama-Perry duel would look very much like the aged battle for Abolition, and would expect to see rhetoric surrounding the candidates on all sides that mirrored that. I do like the discussion of language that's sprung up around this, like a rather unusual and admirably frank discussion today on The View.

What I do think is that he's a mindless corporatist who, like Bush from Texas before him, thinks the government treasuries are meant for the rich. Which takes us to Wall Street where a very articulate young man, Jesse LaGreca, makes the #occupywallstreet viral video of the day as he takes down Fox News to its face and lays out the real issues:

For example, the ultra-Right Koch Brothers seem to be getting away with having violated the Iran trading embargo. Because they can? Isn't that...treason?

And want to see the opposite of the guy in the above video? Isn't rich, aggrieved, entitled Hank Williams, Jr., born lucky like the Koch Bros albeit with less talent, just the Id of their rightwing Super-Ego:

Ha ha ha his theme song was cut from Monday Night Football tonight and hopefully forever.

Turn, tide, turn.

The Silence of 9/11

Best tribute I've found yet, a New York City man filling that amazing monument and tying us together again in honest grief, with a song nearly 50 years old:

Unifying, as America was on that day and the first few weeks, months that followed. And then this.

Tight

No doubt American Idol graduated this year, with a hard-rocking barnstorming U.S. tour (then to the Philippines, I believe) and at least five record deals. The 9th place finisher, Pia Toscano, has a hit single already, f'goss sakes. And, of course, the incomparable Haley Reinhart, the jazz improviser with a rock & roll heart, no two performances exactly alike.

One of the best new twists is the proliferation of user videos from the live shows, which tell a narrative tail of 13 kids going from fire-tested amateurs to confident pros in dozens of cities, now second nature playing in front of huge, filled arenas.

The Manchester, NH performance last night benefitted from the best (a.k.a. closest) UGC video I've seen yet. Check out how Haley and Casey have grown, bringing Art Blakey to all-age audiences all across America:

Hard to believe that earlier this year when they performed it together, on national television, for the first time, they were just kids.

But by far my favorite clip, from every show where there's a UGC version to be had, is when four of the women - Pia, Haley, Naima and Thea, do their house-shaking collaboration on Janelle Monae's already classic Tightrope. You can't get too high; you can't get too low:

I love how 16-year-old Thea gets nicely featured in starting the verses, love how Naima takes over when they start moving, it's noce to hear Pia harmonizing with the women since she left the show so long before they female duets as the cast got whittled down.

And then there's Haley, go-go chick playing her part so happily throughout, then taking it all home in the end.

I believe there will be a lot of people looking forward to her first album, hoping it's really good.

Songwriters

Just lost two, Jerry Leiber of Leiber & Stoller, rock & roll, and Nick Ashford of Ashford & Simpson, Motown/soul. I love great songwriters, this hurts.

Leiber:

Jerome Leiber was born on April 25, 1933, in Baltimore, where his parents, Jewish immigrants from Poland, ran a general store. When Jerry was 5, his father died and his mother tried, with little success, to run a small store in one of the city’s worst slums. When he was 12, she took him to Los Angeles.

It was while attending Fairfax High in Los Angeles and working in Norty’s Record Shop that he met Leonard Sill, a promoter for Modern Records, and confessed that he wanted to be a songwriter. After Sill urged him to find a pianist who could help him put his ideas onto sheet music he met Mr. Stoller through a friend, and the two began writing together

“Often I would have a start, two or four lines,” Mr. Leiber told Robert Palmer, the author of “Baby, That Was Rock & Roll: The Legendary Leiber and Stoller” (1978). “Mike would sit at the piano and start to jam, just playing, fooling around, and I’d throw out a line. He’d accommodate the line — metrically, rhythmically.”

Ashford:

Nickolas Ashford was born in Fairfield, S.C., and raised in Willow Run, Mich., where his father, Calvin, was a construction worker. He got his musical start at Willow Run Baptist Church, singing and writing songs for the gospel choir. He briefly attended Eastern Michigan University, in Ypsilanti, before heading to New York, where he tried but failed to find success as a dancer.

In 1964, while homeless, Mr. Ashford went to White Rock Baptist Church in Harlem, where he met Ms. Simpson, a 17-year-old recent high school graduate who was studying music. They began writing songs together, selling the first bunch for $64. In 1966, after Ray Charles sang “Let’s Go Get Stoned,” a song Ashford & Simpson wrote with Joey Armstead, the duo signed on with Motown as staff writers and producers.

They wrote for virtually every major act on the label, including Gladys Knight and the Pips (“Didn’t You Know You’d Have to Cry Sometime”) and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles (“Who’s Gonna Take the Blame”).

While writing for Motown, Ashford & Simpson nursed a desire to perform, which Berry Gordy Jr., the founder and patriarch of the label, discouraged. They left the label in 1973 and married in 1974.

God bless the creators.

Hollywood Riot

This is why traffic was so horrific on Highland just before Hollywood Blvd when I was heading up to the 101:



A modern day rock & roll riot:

The premiere for a movie about a music festival with a controversial past got out of hand itself late Wednesday when thousands of people attempted to crash the Hollywood event, police said.

Crowds spilled into the street around Grauman's Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard, with some people throwing bottles at police. Witnesses said others were dancing on a police car, taunting officers and "planking" — lying down in the street. There were also sporadic fights among people in the crowd.

Police in riot gear shut down streets around the theater, and dozens of other officers in police cruisers responded to the disturbance.

Awww. Give peace a chance.