Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss

PHOTO BY JAY BLAKESBERG

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RALPJ

Memorial thoughts from Charlie Haden’s extended family of musicians, including Ralph Alessi, Geri Allen, Reid Anderson, Joey Baron, Django Bates, Tim Berne, Matt Brewer, Alan Broadbent, Chris Cheek, Greg Cohen, Stephen Crump, Benoit Delbecq, Mike Formanek, Bill Frisell, Larry Goldings, Jerome Harris, Billy Hart, Tootie Heath, John Hébert, Mark Helias, Fred Hersch, David King, Frank Kimbrough, Guillermo Klein, Joe Lovano, Tony Malaby, Branford Marsalis, Joe Martin, Brad Mehldau, Ben Monder, Jason Moran, Sam Newsome, Matt Penman, Chris Potter, Tom Rainey, Joshua Redman, Eric Revis, Jorge Rossy, Kenny Werner, Jeff Williams, Matt Wilson, and Ben Wolfe.)

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RALPH ALESSI:

I was deeply saddened at hearing about Charlie Haden’s passing. It’s actually a nice opportunity for me to write about him at this moment. In the mid-Eighties I attended California Institute of the Arts and played trumpet in Charlie’s ensemble. Most of those rehearsals started with Charlie walking in and making a beeline for the stereo to play some music for us that he couldn’t wait to share. One time he played “Lonely Woman” (the Horace Silver tune) and was directing every note and inflection of Horace’s piano solo, obviously knowing it like the back of his hand. After every phrase, he would let out a huge “woohoo!” sound, not able to contain his giddiness for the music. That enthusiasm for music was infectious and can’t be underestimated for its lasting effect on all of us who were fortunate enough to be there. Then we’d play music that mostly consisted of Charlie Parker and Ornette Coleman tunes. He would offer comments, oftentimes having to do with abstract concepts like “Play music as if you’ve never heard it before” and other things of this nature I know I wanted to grasp, but really couldn’t at the time. Invariably he would also play with us and that’s when the real lesson began. I heard him play on numerous occasions and every time there was a moment when my jaw would literally drop struggling to come to grips with how he was doing it: it seemed like magic to me. These simple melodies were being spun in an almost predictable way, yet they sounded like a symphony every time because of his impeccable voice leading, his rich sound, and amazing use of dynamics. He could shape dynamically at such a quiet volume and then could make a note “growl,” almost knocking you off balance.

I have two more fond memories of Charlie as a teacher.

One was a road trip that we all took to the Notre Dame jazz festival in which our group performed. We traveled the day before and spent a night in Chicago because Charlie wanted to meet our pianist David Ake’s parents. Then there was a concert with Charlie’s ensemble at Cal Arts in which Charlie was in the audience making sounds of approval that were at times drowning out the music. Charlie really loved teaching, and from what I heard he was still making it up to Valencia in recent months to teach despite being severely weakened by his illness.

He really loved his students.

But after years and year of reflection, my thoughts are that Charlie was all about music, which deeply emanated from every fiber of his body, mind, soul and most specifically his ears. His bass sound was literally channeling what he really was: a singer. Maybe the most powerful evidence of this is from his record Rambling Boy in which we hear a two-year-old Charlie yodeling with his family and then a seventy-year-old Charlie singing Shenandoah with his family. If you haven’t heard it, it’ll bring tears to your eyes. He truly was one of the most soulful musicians that I can think of and he is one of the main reasons I have embraced improvisation to the extent I have. He and his music will live on forever.

as recorded by ethan iverson ie EI, KOTFTT

night of the funky turntable

Feb 22 Jim Campilongo Adam Levy Duo P  7:30 

Feb 28 Edward Simon Trio f Adam Cruz Or Bareket, Stephan Crump M 8 pm

March 17 Edu Ribeiro Noah Garabedian Vinicius Gomes trio, Murray Low M

March 23 Ralph Alessi Quartet P

April 4 Realtime Collective Tammy Hall Sylvia Cuenca Kristen Strom Ruth Davies, Rabiah Kabir  Quartet M 8 pm

April 17 Mads Tolling Sam Reider Duo, Larry Ochs Ben Davis Fred Lonborg-Holm Trio TBA

May 1 Never Come Down, Hannah Mayree J 6:30

May 15 Caroline Davis Quartet M

May 22 Lily Finnegan Gaby Fluke- Mogul Duo, Jordan Glenn Flatways Trio M

June 6 Emi Makabe Quartet f Thomas Morgan Kenny Wolleson Vitor Gonćalves M

Sept 18 Splash Myra Melford Michael Formanek Ches Smith M

J = Johnson Park (free)

M = Mitchell Park Community 

Center

P = Palo Alto Art Center

$20 

😎 ⛄️ 🐍 

the little 🐍 has to do with St. Patrick’s Day

First Gunn grad since Tony Bower to play for Stanford.

Marta Sanchez played a week of solo prepared piano at Earthwise at The Mitch in April, 2024 directly before going into the studio in Oakland.

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OTOH

Kudos to Danielle Wertz the vocalist and arranger, for winning a share of the Grammy for the best instrumental performance, in the project led by Remy LeBoef. Remy plays reeds, Pascal plays piano: they are the first twins to win Grammy’s in successive years. From Santa Cruz. Danielle is from DC area; she performed in Earthwise new music series in the Raffi Garabedian project; came thru recently with her Joan Mitchell Leonard Cohen project with Eddie from Ohio; said hi to me in New York Winterjazzfest at Matt Merewitz’ Fully Altered showcase that included Carmen Staaf, Adam O’Farrill, Ben Goldberg, Hamir Atwal, Dillon Vado and Todd Sickafoose, and Josh Roseman. At Loove Labs sick.

Regarding Dean: she is playing two nights this summer at the Warriors arena. She looks healthier seven years ago in a video doing “Natural Woman”. She went to the same performing arts school as Imogene Heap.

Edit to add or ad: Oivia Dean is booked by Jenna Adler of CAA so will be just fine.

and1– I deserve the MacFound grant for running a post about Olivia Dean, Hattie McDaniel and Jenna Adler

AO Scott in NYT:

‘Spectres of the Spectrum” is a sci-fi thriller about a renegade scientist named Yogi and his daughter, Boo Boo, a psychic media terrorist, who set out one day in the year 2007 to disrupt a magnetic pulse that threatens to erase the memories of everyone on the planet. Wait, that’s not quite right. Let’s try again.

”Spectres of the Spectrum” is a documentary collage, composed of scraps from 1950’s television shows, defense department films and an obscure educational docudrama on the life of Alexander Graham Bell, among other things. It marshals a great deal of evidence to support many provocative arguments about technology, the media, electromagnetism, the science of cosmography and the spirit world, none of which, sadly, can be reconstructed here, owing to limitations of space and comprehension.

Of course, there may be other reasons. It may be that I can’t tell you what this movie is about because ”they” — meaning, as far as I can tell, a collection of people including David Sarnoff, Admiral Nimitz and L. Ron Hubbard, as well as the suspiciously affable Dr. Herald, host of the now forgotten program ”Science in Action” — don’t want me to.

Because if the truth about this stuff ever got out, boy, it would blow the lid off the whole thing. (You know, the whole electromagnetic media-monopoly military-industrial complex orgone box Tesla coil thing. Do I have to spell it out for you?) Because I have a tiny chip implanted in my left rear molar that tells me to say just what they want me to. You think I’m paranoid? That’s what they want you to think.

Steve Cohen and I visited with Craig Baldwin last week in his mission Street outpost storefront. He said, like Mark Twain, that the rumors of his demise are greatly exaggerated.

but he is looking for a successor. Not sure if that means running ATA, owning the building, intellectual property and storage ship of the Films, 1000 steel canisters of cellulite or what. Maybe someone should make a film about that.

I shot Craig Baldwin in his pajamas. how we got into his pajamas is none of my beeswax.

And1 or A1:

Lockhart arrived in the National Basketball League with the Eastside Spectres in 1989 – impacting immediately, averaging 28.8 points and 6.6 rebounds to earn All NBL First Team and NBL All Star selections. The Spectres failed to make the Finals that year, but Lockhart helped catapult Eastside into contention the following year, eventually dropping the Semi Finals to the Brisbane Bullets.

TIME OUT— I said his pajamas or how he got into his pajamas, but AI changed it to our pajamas or how we got into his pajamas get it got it good but not would or wood

In 1991, Lockhart helped guide the Spectres into the NBL Grand Final Series against the Perth Wildcats, where Eastside lost the series 2-1. Kent Lockhart was briefly inspector and he is now a legend. Craig Baldwin is real and the legend, but as they say print the legend or strike a new print or preserve an old print in a steel canisterLockhart arrived in the National Basketball League with the Eastside Spectres in 1989 – impacting immediately, averaging 28.8 points and 6.6 rebounds to earn All NBL First Team and NBL All Star selections. The Spectres failed to make the Finals that year, but Lockhart helped catapult Eastside into contention the following year, eventually dropping the Semi Finals to the Brisbane Bullets.

In 1991, Lockhart helped guide the Spectres into the NBL Grand Final Series against the Perth Wildcats, where Eastside lost the series 2-1. of celluloid not cellulite what would I know?

I have no idea what just happened. I knew here. I am new here. Last York, I knew hear well. Alas Yorick I new here well. Try the fish. And lichen on greenland tastes like chicken to polar bears who enjoy all the changes at The North Pole.

I got two cookies and a carry bag out of the deal. Cookies I can eat not cookies I can accept or reject..

I don’t know NFTs other than it seems like it’s a pyramid scheme involving crypto.

Ribbit is a VC firm above CVS where for a while a homeless lady now dead would sleep in front of their door. They have $12 billion AUM. My inference after reading Wikipedia is that their founder is a Venezuelan Jew and that the name is phonetic for the Hebrew word for interest or vig.

We the people the ones still on the gold standard also got a rogue mural out of the deal that is one building down from the public arts commission mural by Mona Caron.

The retail site is facing Lytton Plaza— maybe they will join my effort to bring Music to the plaza. Resale site formally had a Ross store during the time the Bay Area action would meet in the basement. It had TCV above for a while. The landlord, therefore is the rower guy with the Scottish name. it was also West Elm.

the best I can do to explain it: crypto is a thing made up that was worth $10. Some people bought it at 10 and now it’s worth 1000. So the millions they put in are now worth billions. meanwhile, the president is considering getting rid of paper money altogether and just doing block chain. so some people with this new script invested in in a new type of art called NFT.. but even if you fall in love with the punks, want one on your wall or on your phone or whatever you still have to turn real money into crypto. Which is good if they replace or the whole $10 becomes $1000 thing. And about the time that the Tesla founder becomes a trillionaire.

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I track the music scene which means in theory I should be watching the Grammys. Here are some images of the best new artist candidates:

My favorite new artist is geese or goose I forget which. Or Lily Finnegan Gaby Flukes Mogul duo.