Scott Sandell is my Dartmouth classmate. Not a close friend, but I always thought of him as a nice guy. From Connecticut, I think, the Coast Guard Academy base, Dartmouth, crew at Dartmouth –see the recent book on 11 ’86 rowers and their business prowess, by coach Whit Mitchell — Stanford GSB and now a bit of a VC legend here “with several billion dollar exits”.
This looks like an old and beachy picture of the Dartmouth Sandell
There’s also a Scott Sandell printmaker, with works at a whaling museum.
Some connection to Dylan and “Don’t Look Back” film
There’s also a Scott Sandell at the LA Times, covering Oscars.
“I was feeling it,’’ Abdulrasul told Glen Reeves of the Merc. “My last game, got to go out with a bang.’’
It was the second 40-point outing for the 6-1 guard (No. 5 in file photo) in the past two weeks. He had 44 against Wilcox last week.
“That was a quiet 42,’’ Fremont coach Jason Townsend said. “His level of efficiency is so fantastic.’’
Abdulrasul made 14 of 21 field-goal attempts and was 7 of 11 from 3-point range.
“He works so hard,’’ Townsend said. “He leaves here and goes to 24-hour Fitness. I worry about him going too hard, but he wants to get his 200 free throws in. They say practice makes perfect. He puts in an awful lot of practice and tonight was darn near perfect.’’
Abdulrasul had 14 in the first half, 15 in the third quarter and 13 in the fourth quarter.
MOERAW for 3
Earlier Terry and I had a toast at O’Malleys the former Francesca’s then she went to a chick-flick and I went to the game. We noticed the moon:
Peter Kageyama’s workshop for Palo Alto was like the Coen Brother’s movie “O Brother” the part about the candidate for governor, representing the little guy, who hires a midget with a broom only to have the bad guy incumbent get an even littler guy with a broom, which yields a search-able aphorism, something about “Well, it’s a pretty good gimmick, the midget with the broom”. He says Denver has a blue bear, but if we got a blue bear we’d be redundant or worse.
I did get a couple ideas personally out of it, maybe I will act on, and I enjoyed myself but frankly most of what was said goes on deaf ears.
I think we or someone could do something with Perry and Miner or Niner.
I had a simple t-shirt design of a green arrow in an up position. Sort of phallic, sure, but references the tree and the high tech world of charts and successful exits. I wasn’t so psyched on the staff member who wanted to put the famous garage on a shirt. That’s a corporate asset, not much in it for us.
I’ve produced a lot of $500 events, so I know the size of it. With a $150 million budget, it’s ludicrous to green light a set of $500 projects that come out of 10-minute workshops.
What was Peter’s fee? Five grand?
What did we spend to amend our Comp Plan? Two million?
I’ve seen Jim Keene throw around ten or twenty grand on studies hand over fist. Not to mention some dubious hires.
The Peter Kageyama show is like a cooking show that looks good on tv but hard to make at home. He’s kind of like The Music Man. The public sector –demorcracy, lo — is at a nadir and this is more of a parasite that sets in than a cure. It’s like promising methadone addicts that cola will cure them; it works for about a half hour.
And yeah I’ve got about a dozen dead ideas in my portfolio that City of Palo Alto let die on the vine. Most recent: I wanted to put Curtis McMurtry, the grandson of a famous novelist, to sing in the new library, Mitchell, but was told that the soft opening would not welcome bookings until a month later. Then I field for Stern Ballroom and actually got no response. So I put it in a cafe, in Menlo Park.
I like the idea of hiring Ralph Carney to serenade the mules at Bol Park, as they roam, in honor of music professor Malcolm Smith.
I did throw down $20 to get both his books, a discount. Won’t read them, likely. Skim.
and1: I found an article that cites both Blue Bear and Blue Mustang, famous Denver public art pieces.
I thought about deleting every photo of high school basketball on my smart phone, and counting down how many. There are 1,858 photos, I’m guessing 200 plus of hoops. (and another 200 or more of Gunn football).
I almost posted O.J. Simpson circa 1970 to my non-post, meaning more like an outline, even more like a rough draft than finished prose directly above, but thought it pretty creepy. So it gets its own post, here, or non-post.
Wiki has interesting articles if one wants to compare Sic transit gloria mundi, which dates from Papal coronation of 1409 thru 1963?!, and “this too shall pass” and in Hebrew, from centuries before.
There should be a Jake Hegge or John Adams opera about O.J. I was just discussing this with Brandon Ward, I think his name, a backup QB from Paly I shot around with at Johnson Park. Do athletics breed character or corruption?
and1:
and in related matter: I have some photos of City College of San Francisco Junior College football workouts, at their stadium, from August, 2014, i.e. last week. I went in to the City for a client meeting, or potential client meeting — a former Ivy Athlete turned activist and artist — and stopped by the besieged school to see the famous Diego Rivera murals, at their theatre. That was closed, but I shot some footage and stills thru the window, to amusing effect and tantalizing. The school has a sign about national champions there, recent, post-WWII and during the O.J. Simpson year or years, I am pretty sure, plus a list of two former NFL/CCSF players, who paid for the billboard. Also, being not a sportswriter (perhaps not even in the Richard Ford sense, talk about something long in my que), I met: an Asian professor and activist, a British emigre visual artist, a Guarani / Honduran musician — drummer, likes Andy Palacio RIP; I am jonesing to go back to shoot the mural or see it, for real. Rivals the Orozco mural of our beloved Dartmouth.
The world is expanding and unpredictable. We like it like that!
1. something about Paly basketball, and Mu v. Mo*
2. something about “State of the City Palo Alto” and Mountain View Voice news reporting the hard to measure role of the builders and realtors role in that election; how is that like our “push poll” here? (Keep in mind that Mountain View Voice is the Palo Alto Weekly, meaning strong pro-developer bias).
3. I read the NYT Mag story about the Palantir dude and his affair with a Stanford undergrad. Reminds me of Tom Wolfe “I am Charlotte Simmons” (Let’s keep in mind that in Tolkien the palantir were used for evil not good). Emily Bazelon on Joe Lonsdale or what I call “bazelonsdale”.
Cannot really think of the joke linking this case to Palms, although I’ve never had a taste for palm.
I was on my way to checking if anyone else has thought of the Joe Lonsdale-Ellie Clougherty case in terms of “Charlotte Simmons” when I ran across his site which explains his point of view. It references her interest, before the split of “branding” their relationship, I guess that means with a cute hyphenated version of their two names, like in the celebrity gossip pages. I don’t know, like Angelia Jolie and Brad Pitt, I cannot think of one. Is it Bradjolina? His quote: She told friends that she might not need to work because of her plans to marry me, and she emailed me about “branding” our relationship with a name. First thing I thought of was that it was like the Midas Myth only its not that you cannot eat, you cannot get laid because your dick has turned into money, or something. A weird new type of gold-digger you lure. Yeah, I’m a hater. And I’d definitely never heard of either of them until first the student daily and then the New York Times wrote of it. And to be fair, jokes aside, all I know is the Times version of it, what I call Emily Bazelon on Joe Lonsdale, or “Bazelonsdale” I am linking the journalist and her source or subject. And it is kinda weird that the lady’s family is from Virginia and this gets linked in with the Rolling Stone’s false report on rape their. There’s also, comes to mind, something about the editor of the Daily Dartmouth, 10 or 15 years after our directorate who had to resign over being accused of rape or date rap by something that happened in Richardson Hall, in the men’s room, “a two-holer” the room, in Harper’s or something. I guess I would say personal relationships are difficult enough but if you add millions or billions of dollars into the equation, it gets even trickier. Plus as a Luddite I would add that all these 1s and 0s mess with their ability to function as humans.
4. Ceramics: Stephen A. Stephans circa 1976 w. “Art Today” by Ray Faulkner and Edwin Ziegfield, 1969, Holt, pp 181-213 and I have a photo of 1981 late Peter Voulkos at Anderson Stanford just yesterday.
and1: “O.J. The Education of a Rich Rookie” by O.J. Simpson and Pete Axthelm, 1970, I bought for $10 at an a quality book store, not sure why I bought it, or pulled it. when 6 was 4: i also have something about Nicki Minaj and the ARB, but got there a minute late but wanted to read into the record something about fill my glass, turn them out and fido sit fido guzzle at 429. I would bowdlerize “higher” for “hotter” et cetera. This piggybacks to 3.
*A Los Gatos rooter or dad yelled “Give him a T” meaning technical foul because Paly star Kevin Mullin had been trying to convince the refs that he was being fouled. I countered, “M.I.T!”, to mock him, the first heckler then said in a slightly lower tone “He’s supposed to be smart. He’s applying to M.I.T”. The couple next to me, on the other side, Mr. and Mrs. DeForest Tovey, parents of #10, Dana Tovey, covering Mullin said “Our son is applying there, too!”. So if Kevin Mullin and Dana Tovey are someday teammates and friends, at MIT, you read it here first. I also noted that the Merc had “highlights reel” of area athletes away at college and said that Geoff Parker’s son Sam Parker ran 1:18 800 at a big meet in Boston. The Mullins apparently know the Parkers, as well. I am curious to see CCS scoring leader Mo Abdulrasim, if I’ve spelled that correctly
edita: I’m a little off on Sam Parker of MIT, whose dad Geoff Parker was all league in tennis and soccer at Paly and All America in Rugby for Dartmouth, my classmate, and teammate of my roommate Teddy Conway: 1:53.07 was good for 11th in the NCAA 2014 indoors, and he is now a senior. That would be 4-minute mile if he could do two consecutively. Good on Sam, future Maccabbi champ? [the next day i found the clip and it lists Sam as down to 1:51:98; for reference, only 16 Dartmouth –sic– men have done better since dad’s days]
edit to add: I’m Kidjo here, but jest for yucks I searched “nina” + “fela” to find that Ronald K. Brown /Evidence dance in Brooklyn BRIC did a piece in 2003 Come Ye that featured music of Fela Kuti and Nina Simone. There are a plethora of tributes to either or but not really both. And do note that despite knowing next to zero about Afro-Pop or Africa generally I did bring Femi Kuti and a crew of about 10 to Cubberley Center. I bring that up in dozens of cab rides. And Ms. Somi is Ugandan and Rwandan, it says. (Not sure the credentials of the person whose line I stole).
The evening will also include Come Ye (2003). Inspired by the music and sociopolitical legacies of artists/activists Nina Simone and Fela Kuti, this multimedia work utilizes Mr. Brown’s signature style of kinetic storytelling through African, Caribbean, modern, ballet and social dance styles to summon warriors, angels and activists dedicated to the pursuit of liberation and peace amidst the struggles of human conflict. Come Ye includes music by Nina Simone and Fela Kuti, and a video collage by Robert Penn.
Meklit “The Nile” was at Stanford just last nite, Aleta Hayes and I texted over it; I was watching Talisman quoting Peter Gabriel (but not the nut graph of “police room 609”) about Biko at the time. And I did shout to my Ghanian friend Nya Jade, Ghana by way of Belmont University. Darius Rucker meets Makeba?
One people, one source.
and1: if I make it to Somi at UCLA it would be 2/26 Thursday, guesting (she) with Monk Institute players.
Excellent reporting and curation by Craig Matsumoto aka Wedge. And it may, as I promise in the comments, send me to LA on SWA to check out Somi. Meanwhile, I missed Alli Miller somewhere in the East Bay. I don’t get out much anymore…
Threadgill at Yerba Buena. Via fullyaltered on Instagram.
Henry Threadgill didn’t play a note at his recent Yerba Buena Center for the Arts performance, but the audience didn’t mind. He was rewarded with enthusiastic applause before and after his performance as he grinned ear-to-ear.
Threadgill can still play, of course. It’s just that his new septet, Double-Up, puts him in he role of composer and director rather than sax player. It’s not much different from the concert I saw with The Dreamers, a John Zorn band where Zorn composes and conducts, rather than playing.
In concept, Double-Up (two pianos, two saxophones, cello, tuba, and drums) is a tribute to Butch Morris, a friend of Threadgill’s who pioneered conduction, the shaping of orchestral improvisations into cohesive, on-the-spot pieces. But as Threadgill pointed out to journalist Andrew Gilbert, Double-Up isn’t meant to be conduction. Threadgill provides composed…
Wedge Matsumoto wrote a nice piece about Henry Threadgill at YBCA recently but homey that I am, I skimmed the article for mention of Bay Area guitarist Liberty Ellman, who plays or did play for years in Thread’s sextet, Zooid.
Liberty lists about a dozen upcoming gigs with Somi (a vocalist, and please note there was once a Bay Area fixture called Liberty and Ledisi), Joe Lovano and Myra Melford, side work but pretty high end stuff.
Liberty has 3 cd’s as a leader but also mixes and produces for others and put out, for instance the first Vijay Iyer on his Red Planet label. That, plus he was on the team at Blue Note that made Norah Jones a star — he has a platinum record in his Brooklyn office, or did — most of my Liberty news is somewhat dated.
I’ve raided his photo gallery for the following:
by Alan Nahigian
This one is by Liberty himself, on tour with Threadgill, called “threadblur” and I admit before five minutes ago I never called Henry Threadgill “thread”. When I went to Brooklyn on sabbatical in Jan-Feb 2001 I asked Hans Wendl what I should try to see and he said “Henry Threadgill”.
photo by Liberty Ellman, guitarist, producer, lover fighter, mensch
Liberty also went to Sonoma State – I didn’t know him then but my ex SS and her friend CL new him there, as well as Larry Allen of the Cowboys — and also composed and performed for SFMT. Here he is with Zooid in Austria, back in the day:
Also by Liberty, of Dana Leong, Threadgill, George Lewis, Muhal Richard Abrahms, Roscoe Mitchell. Doesn’t say whether he was in the band or just cooking for them in the literal sense. I’m kidding, he was in the band. Reminds me of the time that I met Eddie Gale thru Mimi Dye, at yoga class, her. And I set up a meeting with Eddie but got distracted chatting up Liberty about how I might deal with an elder and legend like that — Eddie was on Blue Note back in the day — and I got so far down that rabbit hole that by the time I got to Gale’s digs near SJSU he had left and sent his sister to tell me that I had blown my op. Oops.
thread mue etc, by Lib
It would be good to see Liberty Ellman out here on the West Coast.
Meanwhile this Somi is in residence at UCLA, might be worth a trip to check her out (or maybe that’s where Lib is today?):
and1: Threadgill was born Feb. 15, 1944 in Chicago. So we have that much in common: Aquarius, from the South Side. To the extent that for 20 years now I have been obsessed with black musicians, jazz and blues and am from Chicago, I wonder how close my dad or grand pops came to meeting or interacting with legends; we had a business, from 1919 to 1968 that sold to the black community, Chevys, but my dad’s tastes are more like Keely Smith than Muddy Waters or AACM. My grandfather, Morton B. Weiss, was a U Chicago 1919 and was in Blackfriars which means he cross-dressed and wrote bad Cole Porter rhymes. If I have my way — and dad is doing great — I will try to direct some of his estate to the Alton Abraham File set up by John Corbett, if that is not too big of a digression, even in a Threadgill Liberty joint. At least I remember that I started as a Liberty Ellman joint, and I just may make it to UCLA to meet this Somi. I’m sure men have gone further. Helen of Troy by way of East Africa. If not a thousand ships, then one more seat on SWA.
I haven’t finished my David Carr tribute, but am re-routing to post a quickie about Paly Campanile, the venerable publication still helmed, 63 years later by Esther The Woj Wojcicki, and its butt-rap correspondent, a kid named Bo Filed. Maybe its a typo and he is writing about bubble-rap.
Major labels’ old sales model hasn’t been completely unsuccessful in the modern age. Their marketing departments, A&Rs and financiers are all adapting to try and mirror the grassroots fame attained by independent artists, by spending lots more to try and play catch-up. An example of an artist cashing out on this is Harlem’s A$AP Rocky, who capitalized off the success of his first mixtape by signing a $3 million deal to Polo Grounds Music and RCA Music. A$AP used the label’s funds, influence and connections to drop his debut, “Long.Live.A$AP,” which strayed from his butt rap roots musically but brought in major revenue for his labels from hits like Wild For The Night with Skrillex and F****n’ Problems with other heavyweight rappers Drake, Kendrick Lamar and 2 Chainz. It’s unclear whether Rocky and the rest of the A$AP crew would be having the same kind of mainstream success today if not for Polo and RCA’s help. – See more at: http://www.palycampanile.org/archives/4884#sthash.8IEtNf17.dpuf
He also agrees with the big boys that Giraffage aka Charlie Yin of San Jose is the bomb. Booked by Evan Hancock of Windish. Sold out at Noise Pop. Am I the last to note
Windish>Windy City?
I also should not ASAP Yams aka Steven Rodriguez untimely demise.
And what was the bit that KFOG’s Renee botched confusing “All About the Bass” for something darker? And funkier. I’m kind of a Michael Franti 2006 guy myself. (edit to add: it’s hard to see how this fits, but Meghan Trainor of “AATB” is from Nantucket but her manager Troy Carter is Erving Wonder co-founder from West Philly)
And not to run too far out of bounds like Jim Harbaugh 1981 but Derek Carr is the Raiders’ QB, with a 76 rating and 21 TDs while his brother David Carr is like him a Fresno State but not the media critic of the New York Times.
and1: I watched one minute of this and did not see any butts. Saw a lot of shoes. Saw young men dressed in black. (see Derek Carr, above). May have to update this, to conforming.
also: It would be fitting if there was a successful rapper who is black and named Rocky in that the Stallone creation is rather white supremacist in that it is basically about the wonder of Chuck Wepner a Jersey moke going the distance with Ali in his prime. Jersey-Philly better check that. Yup, Bayonne, NJ. But it sells better in Hollywood as Rocky Balboa from Philly.
Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss 