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Still Life With Commentator
My review of the Vijay Iyer/Mike Ladd multimedia production “Still Life With Commentator,” which ran for four nights last week at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, is now online.
Pinochet
In this disgraceful post, Jonah Goldberg of the National Review describes himself as “basically” a sympathizer of the former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, who died over the weekend. Hitchens reminds us that Pinochet ordered the car bombing of Orlando Letelier in Washington, D.C. in September 1976. So, for Goldberg, a foreign leader who authorizes a terrorist attack on American soil
Holiday giving
The Darfur and Chad conflicts are spilling over into the Central African Republic, where Doctors Without Borders is one of the few groups attending to the beleaguered population. It’s holiday time — your contribution could make a difference.
Two more duo CDs
In my year-end summary I included a list of duo CDs. I carelessly omitted two: Dave Douglas & Martial Solal, Rue de Seine (CamJazz)Beautiful trumpet duets with the French piano maestro. Includes a dreamy solo-Solal rendition of Douglas’s “For Suzannah” — which sounded entirely different when Dave and the quintet played it this Tuesday night at Jazz Standard. It’s rare
Behearer.com
My good friend and colleague Nate Chinen has a piece in today’s NY Times about the new site Behearer.com — an interactive, alternative jazz canon-building initiative focusing on the too often ignored music of the post-Vietnam War years. The back story involves lengthy web discussions between Dave Douglas, Ethan Iverson, Darcy James Argue, Steve Smith and others. Geekdom at its
On Michael Moore
My review of Jesse Larner’s Forgive Us Our Spins: Michael Moore and the Future of the Left, for Democratiya 7 (December ’06/January ’07), is now online.
Six Picks: December 2006
My monthly list of recommended CDs, as published in All About Jazz-New York, December 2006: Hank Jones/Christian McBride/Jimmy Cobb, West of 5th (Chesky) Rob Reddy’s Gift Horse, A Hundred Jumping Devils (Reddy Music) Wadada Leo Smith & Adam Rudolph, Compassion (Meta) Dan Weiss Trio, Now Yes When (Tone of a Pitch) Wilkerson/Mitchell/Bankhead/Ra, Frequency (Thrill Jockey) Anthony Wilson Nonet, Power of
Islam and the pope — update
I remarked on the pope/Islam controversy when it first erupted in September. At the time, a friend directed me to this commentary by a scholar of Byzantine texts. I’m linking to it now that the pope’s trip to Turkey has rekindled the discussion: Contrary to many treatises of anti-Muslim polemics, which we find in Western Christendom as well as in