Sunday, March 19, 2017

Chuck Berry: 1926-2017

›
Chuck Berry, who, in my opinion. did as much or more than anyone to make rock 'n' roll what it is, and whose inspiration was essent...
Thursday, March 16, 2017

A "Celtic Appalachian Celebration."

›
On Saturday evening, March 11, my wife and I attended a concert billed as "A Celtic Appalachian Celebration" at Symphony Space ...
Tuesday, March 14, 2017

Another remembrance I missed: Mose Allison (1927-2016).

›
I first heard of Mose Allison during my college years. I had a copy of Johnny Rivers' album Meanwhile Back at the Whiskey à Go Go , w...
Friday, February 24, 2017

Baseball is back! Mets win spring training opener from Red Sox.

›
The Mets opened their Grapefruit League pre-season with a 3-2 win over the Red Sox today. This makes me happy, but my wife, most of her r...
Sunday, February 19, 2017

Remembrances--an addendum: John Glenn

›
When I had finished my Remembrances post, I had a feeling that I'd left out someone very significant. I had noted the death of John G...
Sunday, February 12, 2017

Al Jarreau, 1940-2017

›
Al Jarreau, whose syncretic style bridged jazz, mainstream pop, and rhythm 'n' blues, died today at 76. In the clip below, he doe...

Remembrances, 2016

›
Back in January I posted my "Look Back" at 2016 . I noted that past New Year's posts had included remembrances of those frie...
Monday, January 16, 2017

Morehouse College Glee Club: "We Shall Overcome"

›
The video clip below is of the Morehouse College Glee Club singing "We Shall Overcome" (arranged by Wendell P. Whalum ) at the 2...
Monday, January 09, 2017

2016: a look back.

›
Marsh, Orleans (Cape Cod) Massachusetts, January 1, 2017 For some years I've posted (with a few days' delay) a "New Year...
Monday, December 26, 2016

The Roches, "Good King Wenceslas", and the Feast of Stephen

›
Good King Wenceslas looked out, On the Feast of Stephen, When the snow lay all about, Deep and crisp and even.... So begins what is, ...
Thursday, December 22, 2016

Alison Krauss and Yo-Yo Ma, "The Wexford Carol"

›
Bluegrass great Alison Krauss here joins with cello virtuoso Yo-Yo Ma to perform one of my Yuletide favorites, "The Wexford Carol...
Thursday, November 10, 2016

Leonard Cohen (1934-2016), "Suzanne" solo and with Judy Collins

›
Leonard Cohen, songwriter, singer, novelist, and poet--probably best known for those talents, in that order-- died today at 82 . Was he Ca...
Sunday, October 23, 2016

The Repast Baroque Ensemble, "Queen Christina's Musical Realm"

›
On Friday evening we went to a performance by the Repast Baroque Ensemble . In the photo above they are, left to right: Katie Rietman, bar...
Saturday, October 22, 2016

The Cubs win the pennant! The Cubs win the pennant!

›
As I've written before: how could I resist (given that my Mets are out of the picture) rooting for a team that hasn't won a series...
Friday, October 14, 2016

Bob Dylan, "Blowing in the Wind"

›
My first Dylan album was The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan , his second after his eponymous debut, which I acquired shortly after. Freewheeli...
Tuesday, October 04, 2016

Mets vs. Giants: shades of 1951?

›
On a July afternoon in 1985 I was in the stands at Shea for the first time, courtesy of Pat Carroll, a Brooklyn native then living in Lond...
Saturday, October 01, 2016

Welcome back, Wavertree!

›
In my last post I bade farewell to the bark  Peking , which had been a feature of the South Street Seaport Museum for over forty years,...
Friday, September 09, 2016

Auf wiedersehen, Peking!

›
As I noted here last year , the barque Peking , launched in Hamburg, Germany in 1911, will return to her birthplace and original home por...
Sunday, September 04, 2016

Idris Davies' "The Bells of Rhymney" by Pete Seeger and by the Byrds

›
Idris Davies (1905-1953) was the son of a Welsh coal miner who followed his father into the mines after leaving school at fourteen. He lo...
1 comment:
Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Happy 71st, Van Morrison!

›
You've known gladness and sadness in the year since you celebrated your 70th birthday . In February Prince Charles dubbed you a knight...
Monday, August 29, 2016

240 years ago: Washington's "great escape" from Brooklyn.

›
It was at about the time I'm writing this, the evening of  August 29, 1776, 240 years ago, that General George Washington began moving...
Friday, August 12, 2016

S.S. United States won't sail again. Can she be saved?

›
I had a feeling it was too good to be true. As I noted in my earlier post , the cost of making the S.S. United States suitable for use ...
Thursday, August 04, 2016

TBT: Tony Bennett, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco"; happy 90th!

›
Tony Bennett , born Anthony Dominick Benedetto in Astoria, Queens ninety years ago yesterday, will appear on stage with Lady Gaga at Radio...
Thursday, July 28, 2016

Tom Kibble, physics pathfinder, 1932-2016

›
In a 2012 post about the then discovery of the Higgs boson, a particle the existence of which was first theorized by several groups of ph...
1 comment:
Thursday, July 14, 2016

Do the Mets suffer from the Avis syndrome?

›
Back in the day, Avis Rent-A-Car tried a lemonade-out-of-lemon advertising tactic based on their being the second largest company in their...
Thursday, July 07, 2016

Happy birthday, Ringo!

›
Paul McCartney posted this photo of himself and Ringo taken at AIR Studios on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, probably in 1981 dur...
Sunday, July 03, 2016

The Mariners, handsomest of cargo ships.

›
In July of 1954, my father, mother, and I boarded the USNS Geiger at Southampton for our return voyage to the U.S. following Dad's th...
3 comments:
Sunday, June 12, 2016

Guy Clark, "Texas 1947" and "Let Him Roll"

›
Guy Clark (1941-2016), who died on May 17 , was a songwriter and singer from Texas. Although he was a very good singer, he's better r...
Saturday, May 14, 2016

It's Spring Astronomy Day, and here's the Ring Nebula

›
Today (Saturday, May 14) is Spring Astronomy Day . I almost missed it. There's also a Fall Astronomy Day--this year it's Saturday, ...
Sunday, April 24, 2016

April 24, 1916: a day to remember.

›
April 24, 1916 was Easter Monday that year. On that day members of the Irish Citizen Army, a volunteer force led by James Connolly and Pat...