Dear Carol: We have finally arrived and all are well. Yes, I do have the Taos flute. I borrowed it to use in radio shows in Europe. I plan to return it in the fall for I am to return to the USA in September. I hope that Mr. Whiting of the [Dartmouth College]museum would understand How important it is that I can play the flute and it must be heard and that the flute will be returned and taken care of. If necessary I will send it back immediately. Miss you all. Much love, Don Cherry June 25, 1970 [research by Mark Weiss, 2011]
This is HOW my bran works: Masahiko Sato Trio, Penetration; Evan Parker & Paul Lytton, Collective Calls (Urban) (two microphones); JR Mitchell, Byard Lancaster, Live at Macalester College 72.
Elif Batuman’sdeep engagement with Russian literature, culture, and language, detailed in her acclaimed memoir The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them, where she humorously explores her academic journey and love for Russian classics like Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, often juxtaposing grand literature with absurd reality, and more recently writing on how to approach Russian works amidst current political contexts.
One kindness that Springsteen has afforded his body is more days off, leaving time for his family, for exercise, for listening to music, watching movies, reading. Lately, he has been consumed with Russian fiction. “It’s compensatory-what you missed the first time around,” he said. “I’m sixty-some, and I think, There are a lot of these Russian guys! What’s all the fuss about? So I was just curious. That was an incredible book: The Brothers Karamazov. Then I read The Gambler. The social play in the first half was less interesting to me, but the second half, about obsession, was fun. That could speak to me. I was a big John Cheever fan, and so when I got into Chekhov I could see where Cheever was coming from.
bw
K
One reason for the explosion in the number of words is an expansion of our notion of what counts as a word. Take “K.” “K” can mean one kilometre, a thousand monetary units, one thousand twenty-four bytes of computer storage space, a strikeout in baseball, a degree on the Kelvin temperature scale, the nation of Korea (as in “K-pop”), the chemical potassium, a measure of the fineness of gold (karat), the drug ketamine, kindergarten (as in “K-12”), the king in a chess move (as in “Kd2”), a South African racial slur (as in “the K-word”), the shape of a kind of economic recovery, and a protagonist in Franz Kafka’s novels.
I just spent several hours listening to various covers of the Prince song when you were mine: by Prince Live!, and in STUDIO, by Cyndi Lauper, live and in STUDIO, by Lakeshore Drive, by Mitch Reider, by someone named Raisch,, by someone named Katie Gyom, by Har Mar Superstar, by candidates for Palo Alto city Council.
and then I sent this to a bunch of musicians as if I was asking for them to cover it.
apparently Mitch’s version is used in a ski movie called hot dog.
Including: DJ Sep, Caroline Davis, Beth Custer, David James, Keith MacArthur, Chris Grady, George Jackson, Rachel Baiman, Rabiah Kabir, Larry Ochs, Sonny Smith, Carmen Staaf, Jenny Scheinmann, Jayla Chee, Maya Kronfeld, Hannah Marks, Paul Cornish, Rachel Sage, Matt Wilson, Josh Thurston Milgrom, Bennett Paster, Will Bernard, Adam Klipple, Adam Levy, Or Baraket, Marta Sanchez, Akira Tana, Peter Barshay, Cien Mil Mangos, Jim Campilongo, Ben Davis, Noah Garabedian, Vinicius Gomes, and Stephan Crump—did I miss anyone?
There’s an article in the local papers that seems to revive an ongoing discussion about Lytton Plaza. The landlords, it could be said, react against the ongoing situation of people with nowhere else to go who congregate here. I too have observed people doing drugs. There was an overdose right in front of the bandstand once. I am deliberately framing this in awkward and crass terms. To me music is general good and not merely a cultural mouthwash.
I’m hoping to sit down with the sources in this article, the ones who hold the power.
Maybe we will work together, or maybe we’ll just bat some ideas back-and-forth.
The First Amendment (still) guarantees our rights of assembly. If someone is doing something obviously illegal at Lytton Plaza, we can intervene.
I would recommend spending $500,000 on programming rather than spending another $500,000 on bricks and mortar. [Note: after I wrote this post, I realized that what triggered the article was a $50,000 gift from a local billionaire to the Friends of the Palo Alto Parks group, and not $500,000].
I’ve donated 50 shows to the plaza in the last five years. I can poll at least 100 or so musicians who can testify about what they think the plaza is or isn’t. Meanwhile, I’ve also registered something like 500 or more attendees via EventBrite.
Earthwise is a private initiative — a sole proprietorship, a business– that showcases public facilities, public plazas and parks, mostly in Palo Alto. I do this because I think it’s important; yet I also get absorbed when the public agenda brushes against values that overlap with my motivation. So I’d love to influence what local leaders do about Lytton Plaza, or 3rd Thursday street fairs on Cali Ave, or music in the parks.
I had two conversations today on this topic. One went very well. The other was frustrating.
I will probably do between four and ten events in Lytton Plaza next spring, summer or fall; and a similar number in the parks. Plus hard-ticket events at Mitchell Park Community Center and Palo Alto Art Center (I put on-sale tickets to see Johnny A at the art center on January 4 — for only $20 – that’s practically free; I’m about to release tickets to see Corey Harris for $20 at the Mitch, a three-show residency, that overlaps with a two-day run of Gary Clark, Jr. at The Guild, for $154. I guess I’m targeting people who like country blues more than electric blues and like a bargain).
One of the things that I think is true is that you should find what calls to you. It could even be rescuing dogs, but something that is in a positive nature, has to do with kindness, empathy and all the things that they’re trying to erase. Don’t think about whether or not that will affect the bigger scene — because it probably won’t. Probably nothing I do is going to affect it, but I have to do my calling, and the sooner you find your calling, the better it is for you and everybody. It might be something that doesn’t look that important at all, but if it’s positive, and it’s kind and it affects somebody else in a good way, I say, ‘Go for it.’” — Joan Baez, as told to Elise Andrade, April 2025
Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss 