At The Habit, York
Pocahontas
Love Song (debut performance)
Cotton Fields/Homegrown
Falling
Traces
Mind Your Own Business
Very +ve reaction to the new song from the punters. Will give it an airing at the Earl Grey, Gosforth on Sunday night and see how it goes down.
Wednesday, 24 March 2010
Spector 'Assaulted' in Jail
Phil Spector 'beaten up' in prisonLegendary music producer reportedly loses teeth and suffers bruising in fight with fellow inmate
Sean Michaels
guardian.co.uk
Tuesday 23 March 2010 11.03 GMT
Jailed producer Phil Spector is reportedly nursing his wounds after being beaten up by a fellow inmate. Although the music legend's wife maintains "Phil was not assaulted", other sources say Spector was given a thrashing after cracking a joke at a "big guy's" expense.
"Phil has quite a mouth on him," long-time friend Steven Escobar told the New York Daily News. "Not everyone understands his humour. He said the wrong thing to the wrong inmate in the yard." Although Spector initially claimed "he fell down a flight of stairs", Escobar said the producer finally admitted what had happened. The result of his wisecrack? A bruised nose, a black eye and the loss of two dental caps.
A representative for Rachelle Spector, the producer's 29-year-old wife, reportedly confirmed the incident. "There are still safety concerns," the spokesperson said. "We don't want the people who put him in this position to retaliate." But Rachelle later insisted that her husband was "absolutely not" attacked.
"My husband's safety is the prison's number one priority," she said. "They have him segregated in a sensitive-needs ward. All his health concerns are being taken care of." A spokesperon for California's Corcoran prison said officials had no reports of any "altercations" involving Spector.
Escobar suggests Spector's wife is simply protecting him. After the producer criticised the jail in a letter to Escobar last year, describing his neighbours as "lowlife scumbag gangsters", Spector reportedly suffered retaliation.
There are indeed records of a dental visit in December, but Rachelle Spector said it was because "he had an abscess and issues with crowns and implants". "Anyone who meets Phil loves him," she insisted. "He's so freakin' funny. He's an idol to the other inmates. They look out for him. They also know he was wrongfully convicted."
Spector was sentenced last year for the murder of actress Lana Clarkson in 2003. Earlier this month, lawyers launched his appeal, citing judicial error and prosecution misconduct. He is "fragile," Rachelle said, but "very upbeat". She seems much the same. The former Playboy model will release her first album on 8 June, with production by, er, guess who. "I do lead vocals," she said. "My husband is so proud of me, and I'm so proud of him for withstanding what he's withstanding."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/mar/23/phil-spector-prison
Rufus Wainwright in The New Yorker
Onwardby Jim Windolf
March 29, 2010
At nine-thirty one recent morning, Rufus Wainwright was sitting, rather stiffly, on a couch in the back room of a television studio in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. He was flanked by a publicist and two managers, and he looked terrible. He was supposed to perform in a few minutes, but he didn’t seem to be in the mood. A couple of weeks earlier, at Notre-Dame Basilica in Montreal, Wainwright, who is thirty-six, had sung at the funeral service for his mother, the singer-songwriter Kate McGarrigle. She had died, at sixty-three, after a long struggle with clear-cell-sarcoma cancer. Now her son had to get back to business, to start promoting his upcoming album, “All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu.” In Williamsburg, his task was to play the affable guest for a taping of an Independent Film Channel cooking-and-music show called “Dinner with the Band.”
The cameramen set themselves up in a small room occupied by a grand piano. A producer brought in an audience of twenty or so attractive young people. One of them looked like Bob Dylan circa 1966. Another had on a red top hat and sunglasses with red lenses. The show’s co-director, a spiky-haired man named Luke Riffle, led Wainwright to the piano and told his audience, “I want to see smiles. This one is going to be the first song of the season, and we’re going to need big smiles. Just remember: smiles translate to happiness.”
“But this is a very sad song,” Wainwright said into the microphone. He got ready to play “Zebulon,” a drifting, dirgelike number from the new album. It was a favorite of his mother’s, and he had sung it at her funeral. He played the opening chord. The director waved a sign with the word “Smile” written on it. As the song unwound, the audience members remained stone-faced.
Next, Wainwright joined Sam Mason, the chef, in the TV kitchen and tried to act game for some cooking-show shenanigans. The main course was rabbit. Wainwright said that he was considering becoming a vegetarian and mentioned that his pet name for his boyfriend, Jörn Weisbrodt, is Bunny. The chef squawked during the retakes.
By the time Wainwright made it back to his apartment, on West Twenty-third Street, he wanted to lie down. “I can definitely function in that mode,” he said. “Then, once it’s ended, I’m kind of wildly swimming to the surface again and getting ready to tread water. It’s a way of soldiering on. But it’s also somewhat brutal. I’m, like, ‘Mom? Can we switch places?’ It’s such a circus. A dark, brooding, Kurt Weill circus.”
The phone rang. It was Weisbrodt. “I just can’t go to a party tonight,” Wainwright said into the receiver. “I’m hitting a block in the road. I just need to lie down for a while. I’ll see you at the ballet, Bunny.”
They had tickets for “Swan Lake,” but Wainwright was wrapped up in thoughts of his mother. “She didn’t want to talk about her death,” he said. “I was prepared for the big conversation about the afterlife. You know, the hand-to-breast admissions, and forgiveness, but we just sat on the couch together watching television, and she started kissing me with her toes.” He took a foot out of his clog and made a little toe-kiss gesture. “She did not falter in her personality.”
He got up and went over to his laptop, on a table. He started clicking through photographs. There was his mother, looking healthy during trips she had taken to Israel and Italy. And there she was, looking weak, at her Laurentian Mountains country house. And there, paler, in her Montreal apartment. Another picture showed a dozen or so people at her bedside—various relatives and her good friend the singer Emmylou Harris. Also, holding a guitar, Loudon Wainwright III, her ex-husband and the father of Rufus and his sister Martha.
“There’s my dad. He played ‘Out of This World.’ And that’s Emmylou, singing. Maybe Mother hated this, I have no idea. Maybe this is what quickened her death.” He laughed and started to make tea. In a couple of hours he would be at Lincoln Center, watching “Swan Lake.”
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/2010/03/29/100329ta_talk_windolf
Tuesday, 23 March 2010
New Bogart Book from Faber
Tough Without a GunHumphrey Bogart, Men in Movies, and Why it Matters
by Stefan Kanfer
A Humphrey Bogart comes along only once in a century: someone who isn’t conventionally handsome or particularly versatile, but who can convince an audience that whatever character he’s playing is of great importance, because he represents something vital about themselves and their time.
He honed his craft for years in the theatre, only becoming a star at the age of 42 as Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon. In the sixteen years that were left to him, he made an indelible mark on movies – such that film-makers as diverse as Woody Allen and Jean-Luc Godard paid homage to him in their films.
At the heart of this biography is Bogey’s love affair with the 19-year-old Lauren Bacall, who stole To Have and Have Not – and his heart – by lolling in a doorway, tossing insolent remarks and teaching him to put his lips together and whistle.
Stefan Kanfer is the author of Ball of Fire: The Tumultuous Life and Comic Art of Lucille Ball and Somebody: The Reckless Life and Remarkable Career of Marlon Brando. He was a writer and editor for Time magazine or more than twenty years. He lives in New York and on Cape Cod.
Hardback
£20
04/11/2010
978 0 571 260720
352pp
Bye-Bye Byers (and the rest)
Labour suspends former ministersThree former cabinet ministers have been suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party over claims they were prepared to influence policy for cash.
Stephen Byers, Patricia Hewitt and Geoff Hoon were secretly filmed as part of an investigation by the Sunday Times and Channel 4's Dispatches.
All three deny any wrongdoing and Mr Byers has referred himself for a parliamentary standards inquiry.
Gordon Brown has dismissed calls for an inquiry by the top UK civil servant.
'No truth'
The decision was taken after Channel 4's Dispatches programme aired, showing undercover footage of various politicians who were approached by a fictional US firm looking to hire them for lobbying work.
It is understood it was taken by chief whip Nick Brown, in consultation with the chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party, Tony Lloyd, and Labour's general secretary, Ray Collins.
In a statement confirming their suspension, a Labour Party spokesman said: "The Labour Party expects the highest standards of its representatives and believes that they have a duty to be transparent and accountable servants to their constituents at all times."
Three other politicians featured in the programme - Labour's Baroness Morgan and Margaret Moran and Conservative John Butterfill.
It is understood that Mr Butterfill has referred himself to the standards commissioner, Baroness Morgan had already referred herself to the sub-committee on Lords' interests and Mrs Moran - who had already been deselected by Labour over her expenses claims - has also been suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party.
Mr Hoon told the BBC on Monday evening he had not been told that the Labour whip was being removed and did not know why.
LOBBYING RULES
•Sitting MPs are not banned from working for corporate clients but the practice is controversial
•They must declare any payment in the register of members' interests
•Any paid work taken by an ex-minister within two years of leaving office must be cleared by a panel - the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments
•They are not allowed to table amendments or vote on bills in exchange for payment
•They are normally banned for 12 months from becoming lobbyists in their specialist fields
•Labour, the Tories and the Lib Dems all say they want the rules tightened to prevent ex-ministers exploiting their contacts for private gain
But he said he had been called by the prime minister to tell him that his unpaid work with Nato, on the PM's behalf, would now have to cease.
Under Commons rules MPs can work for companies, but must declare payments and may not lobby ministers directly.
Mr Byers, a former transport secretary, was filmed saying he was like a "cab for hire" who would work for up to £5,000 a day and claimed to have saved millions of pounds for National Express, which wanted to get out of its East Coast mainline franchise.
He also said he had spoken to Business Secretary Lord Mandelson about getting food labelling proposals delayed, on behalf of Tesco.
Earlier in the Lords, Transport Secretary Lord Adonis told peers there was "no truth" in claims he came to "any arrangement" over National Express with Stephen Byers - claims he dismissed as "pure fantasy".
The business department also denied the claims - as did Tesco and National Express - and Mr Byers said later he had overstated his case and had never lobbied ministers.
Lord Mandelson confirmed to the BBC's Newsnight programme that he had no contact with Mr Byers on the subject of food labelling.
He added: "What is so ghastly about this is that somebody like Stephen Byers feels it necessary to make completely untrue, unfounded boasts to these people in order to get himself future business.
"It's extremely disappointing and it's very sad and altogether rather grubby".
Code of conduct
Mr Byers, the MP for North Tyneside and also a former trade and industry secretary, said: "I have this morning referred myself to the standards commissioner, John Lyon, and asked him to investigate my actions.
"I am confident that he will confirm that I have complied with the MPs' code of conduct and have fully disclosed my outside interests."
Former Defence Secretary Mr Hoon was filmed saying he wanted to make use of his international knowledge and contacts in a way that "makes money". He said he charged £3,000 a day.
Following the reports, Mr Hoon said he had made clear during an "informal chat" with what he assumed was "a reputable American company" that he would not lobby government or "attempt to sell confidential or privileged information arising from my time in government". He said he had not broken any rules.
Ms Hewitt, a former health secretary, said she "completely rejected" the suggestion she helped obtain a key seat on a government advisory group for a client paying her £3,000 a day.
BBC political editor Nick Robinson said the three former ministers were not popular among Gordon Brown's team - not least because Mr Hoon and Ms Hewitt had tried to lead a coup against his leadership in January.
Mr Byers was close to Mr Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair, and has also criticised Mr Brown's leadership. All three are due to stand down as MPs at the next election.
The Conservatives say Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O'Donnell should hold a formal inquiry into the claims.
But earlier, Commons leader Harriet Harman told MPs the heads of each department had looked into the claims and had "assured the cabinet secretary that they are satisfied that there has been no improper influence on government policy or ministerial decisions".
Downing Street said the prime minister was "satisfied" with the assurances by the permanent secretaries and saw "no need" for an inquiry.
But Conservative Party chairman Eric Pickles said there increasingly appeared to be "a cover-up at the heart of government".
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8582093.stm
Monday, 22 March 2010
'Arry Carpenter RIP
Former BBC boxing commentator Harry Carpenter has died at the age of 84.
Carpenter was the BBC's voice of boxing for almost half a century after joining the corporation in 1949, when he first began commentating on the sport.
Known for his double act with British boxing great Frank Bruno, Carpenter also presented Sportsnight, Grandstand and Sports Personality of the Year.
He retired in 1994 and died in his sleep at King's College Hospital in London in the early hours of Saturday.
His lawyer David Wills said: "He had been unwell since last summer when he had a minor heart attack.
"The funeral has not been arranged but will be a family funeral, to be followed by a memorial service in London."
Carpenter became closely identified with Frank Bruno, whose catchphrase "Know what I mean, 'arry?" featured in their post-fight interviews.
The former world heavyweight champion, 48, was said to be "very upset and shocked" by the death.
"He [Carpenter] was obviously part of Frank's up-and-coming career from the early days when Harry used to commentate, particularly at the Royal Albert Hall, on Frank's boxing," said a spokesman for Bruno.
"Then they became a bit of a double act with the 'Know what I mean, 'arry' thing. From there they went on to do appearances together almost like a little cabaret act."
He also referred to the moment during Bruno's world-title fight against Mike Tyson in 1989 - which the American won - when Carpenter forgot his impartiality for a moment and cried out: "Get in there, Frank."
"The most exciting time was probably the Tyson fight when even Harry Carpenter, who was quite a cool man, sort of lost his cool," the spokesman added.
Former world heavyweight title challenger Sir Henry Cooper said Carpenter was "a lovely guy" who was "never flash".
He added: "If you were good then he'd give you a good write-up and if not, he told you one or two truths.
"I always enjoyed his company and enjoyed talking to him. And he knew the game."
Promoter Frank Maloney also paid tribute to Carpenter, describing him as "probably one of the greatest commentators of all time".
He added: "His voice was so distinctive and I remember all those Ali fights and Bruno fights he commentated on.
"It's like a piece of boxing history has been taken away."
And former world light-heavyweight champion John Conteh said Carpenter had an "outstanding passion" for boxing.
"We in this sport, including people like Muhammad Ali, can intuitively tell when someone loves boxing - and he was steeped in it," added Conteh.
"I remember watching and listening back to some of my fights that he commentated on and there was always constructive, not destructive, criticism from him."
Former world featherweight champion Barry McGuigan also paid tribute to Carpenter, telling BBC Radio 5 live: "This guy was a legend. Harry Carpenter was an amazing man with an amazing voice."
Carpenter worked for the Greyhound Express and Daily Mail in the early years of his career before joining the BBC.
He commentated on major sporting events including Wimbledon and the Boat Race.
But it was as the public face - and voice - of the corporation's boxing coverage that he became best known.
Carpenter was on air for the "Rumble in the Jungle" between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) in 1974.
He labelled the end of the contest - underdog Ali won by knockout in the eighth round to reclaim the world heavyweight crown at the age of 32 - as "the most extraordinary few seconds that I have ever seen in a boxing ring".
Of Ali himself, Carpenter said: "He is not only the most remarkable sports personality I have ever met, he is the most remarkable man I have ever met."
Carpenter also had the privilege of presenting Ali with the BBC's Sports Personality of the Century award in 1999.
A year later, Carpenter recalled: "It was a wonderfully poignant moment. I was very flattered and pleased that I was asked to do the tribute to him.
"It was such a shame to see the old boy tottering about, but we had a chat afterwards and he is still very, very sharp. He remembers all those old days."
Carpenter was a regular Sports Personality of the Year co-host throughout the 1970s and 1980s, having first worked on the programme in 1958, and also covered a wide range of sports for the BBC, including rowing, tennis and golf.
His immediately recognisable, warm broadcasting style earned him plaudits outside the United Kingdom, too.
In 1989, he received American Sportscasters' Association and International Sportscaster of the Year awards.
Director of BBC Sport Barbara Slater also paid tribute to Carpenter, describing him as "one of the standout voices of sports broadcasting".
She said: "Harry's passing is a huge loss to the world of sports broadcasting. His journalistic credentials, professionalism and presence marked him out as an inspirational figure for a generation of aspiring presenters, commentators and producers.
"He will be sorely missed by all those who had the good fortune to work with and learn from a master."
Presenter Des Lynam added: "Harry never yelled or screamed - he was a great wordsmith.
"He was modest, humble and never starstruck. He travelled to Television Centre by tube.
"He will be very missed."
Tony Jeffries, Britain's light-heavyweight bronze medallist at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 , said: "He was a brilliant man and his knowledge of boxing was second to none."
And former GB Boxing coach Terry Edwards said Carpenter and fellow commentator Reg Gutteridge, who died in January 2009, were "monumental people" in the sport.
He stated: "Their commentary was so great, detailed and passionate that you remember their voices as much as you remember the bout.
"If you were to ask me now who would take Carpenter's place, there is nobody who could truly take his place - not with the same passion and professionalism."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/front_page/8580058.stm
Charlie Parker Sculpture
Charlie Parker: a genius distilledCharlie Parker lived hard, played hard, died young. Now an uncanny sculpture of him in his last months has resurfaced. Richard Williams on a story of jazz, art and devotion
Richard Williams
guardian.co.uk
Sunday 21 March 2010 21.30
The last time Julie Macdonald saw Charlie Parker, he was catching a flight home from Los Angeles to New York for the funeral of his three-year-old daughter, Pree, who had died in hospital in the early hours of 6 March, 1954 after a long illness. Two nights earlier, Parker had been fired, for the second time in a week, by the owner of the Tiffany Club in Hollywood after behaving erratically and arguing with the management. He was staying at the Pasadena home of Macdonald, a sculptor, when he received the news of Pree's death.
His immediate reaction, in Macdonald's recollection, was to drink heavily and send a series of increasingly desperate telegrams to his wife, Chan. The fourth and last read: MY DAUGHTER IS DEAD. I KNOW IT. I WILL BE THERE AS QUICK AS I CAN. IT IS VERY NICE TO BE OUT HERE. PEOPLE HAVE BEEN VERY NICE TO ME OUT HERE. I AM COMING IN RIGHT AWAY TAKE IT EASY. LET ME BE THE FIRST ONE TO APPROACH YOU. I AM YOUR HUSBAND. SINCERELY, CHARLIE PARKER. Then he poured a bottle of scotch down the toilet, gave away his remaining supply of heroin, and Macdonald drove him to the airport.
Some time later, Macdonald began work on a sculpture of Parker's head, for which she had been making preparatory sketches during his visits. Then 28 (five years younger than Parker), she was the daughter of an impressionist painter and had studied at the Chouinard Art Institute in LA. She had met Parker during one of his earlier visits to California, probably in 1952. It seems likely that they were a part of a gathering of artists, intellectuals and scenemakers who met at the Altadena ranch of the Turkish-born painter and sculptor Jirayr Zorthian in July that year, a short drive from Macdonald's home. Zorthian's guests had indulged in a collective striptease while Parker played; a surviving home recording of the event reveals the sound of the saxophonist – apparently fully clothed, despite voluble entreaties – playing Embraceable You, the Gershwin ballad emerging above the noises of ribaldry. At any rate, Parker and Macdonald became close friends and enjoyed long conversations as she took him to art shows around Los Angeles.
After leaving to bury his child that Sunday morning in 1954, Parker would never return to California. He had only 12 months left to live, a year in which he and Chan attempted without success to create a quieter life for their family outside the city; in which his drinking worsened; in which he almost succeeded in killing himself by swallowing iodine; in which he committed himself to the psychiatric ward at New York's Bellevue hospital; and in which he made his last recordings and played his final gigs, before dying of an accumulation of symptoms while watching television in the Fifth Avenue apartment of the Baroness Pannonica de Koenigswarter. Within days his followers were scrawling "Bird Lives!" on Manhattan walls.
Stravinsky and a heroin habit
When William Dickson, a retired architect living in Edinburgh, got in touch last month to tell me that he was the owner of a stone head of Charlie Parker, I knew exactly what he was talking about. It had to be Macdonald's carving, which appeared on the cover of Down Beat magazine in 1965, an issue that commemorated the 10th anniversary of the saxophonist's death. That black-and-white photograph had showed the head to be a work of great distinction, capturing the contradictory elements of Parker's character. Macdonald carved a face which could be that of a child or an old man, simultaneously illuminated by innocence and exuding wisdom. Once seen, even in a reproduction, it was not easily forgotten. And here it was, 5,000 miles and 55 years from its point of origin, with a back-story that demanded to be told.
A few years after Parker's death, in a brief memoir of their relationship, Macdonald wrote warmly of his "ability to perceive" and of an intellect which, although untrained, was "prodigious". "He listened to Shostakovich, Stravinsky and Bartók; looked at art from Egyptian sculpture to Picasso with the same intensity; and he remembered! Bird's memory was uncanny. With that combination of perception and memory he translated experience through his horn. He caught the pulse of our times, the pressure, confusion and complexity, and more: sadness, sweetness and love."
That complexity is distilled in her rendering of Parker's head. Carved out of pale, lightly striated sandstone from a nearby Pasadena quarry, it is a little less than twice life-size, weighs 275lb, and is pinned to a cube of polished black granite. Its individual features – the sightless eyes, the shapely nose, the slightly pursed mouth, the neat ears – are finely executed. The back of the head, covered with carefully worked hair, is distended like that of a newborn baby. It bears a striking resemblance both to an Egyptian head of the 15th dynasty, which Macdonald had showed Parker, and to the carvings made by the Yoruba people of West Africa between the 14th and 16th century, currently on show at the British Museum.
Parker was capable of extremes of behaviour and appearance. Emerging from a midwestern background of no particular distinction, he became the second of jazz's great instrumental soloists (after Louis Armstrong) to change the way music was played, engendering a cult which endures more than half a century after his death, continually refuelled by what the American critic Gary Giddins called "the relentless energy, the uncorrupted humanity of his music".
A man of vast and undiscriminating physical appetites, Parker could quote from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and planned to study composition with Edgard Varèse. Unreliable in every aspect of his life except the quality of his playing, he attempted to dissuade younger musicians from copying his heroin habit, but succeeded only in fostering a generation of imitators who thought that living the way he did would help them play like him, too – before discovering that no one could do that. The physician who signed his death certificate estimated his age to be between 50 and 60 (he was 34).
From LA to Edinburgh
Macdonald made at least one other sculpture of Parker, a full-length figure carved from lignum vitae, a dark hardwood. On 1 March, 1955, two weeks before his death, she wrote to jazz critic and historian Marshall Stearns mentioning a possible sale of the wood figure and offering to have it transported for viewing to the New York studio of the blind pianist and teacher Lennie Tristano. "I trust the price mentioned did not discourage you," she wrote, adding a poignant postscript: "I would naturally be happy beyond words for Bird to see the carving if at all possible." According to Peter Ind, the British bass player who lived in New York in the 1950s, studying and playing with Tristano, the piece remained in the East 32nd Street studio for some time, given "pride of place".
The stone head remained in Macdonald's keeping until 1961, by which time the wood figure had passed into the possession of Robert Reisner, a New Yorker who had promoted Parker during the last phase of the saxophonist's life. Reisner was compiling stories for a book titled Bird: The Legend of Charlie Parker, and Macdonald was among his contributors. When she indicated an interest in selling the stone head, Reisner put her in touch with another jazz fan, a wealthy Californian named George E Geisler. "It turned out," Geisler later remembered, "that she had a chance to get a good deal on a Ferrari, and could use the money." The piece remained in Geisler's ownership for four decades.
Macdonald went on to create around 400 other works, including many pieces based on animal figures. Her stone rendering of The Three Graces was installed outside the Downtown YMCA in LA, and she exhibited at the Pasadena Art Museum, the San Francisco Museum, and the LA County Museum of Art. She married twice and had two children; but by the end of the 1970s she was heavily addicted to cocaine and died of cancer in 1982, aged 55.
When Geisler began to disperse his possessions in 2000, Macdonald's stone head was sold to one of the world's leading experts on Parker memorabilia. From there it passed into the hands of Dickson, who had returned to his native Edinburgh after retiring from his London practice several years earlier. Now 67, Dickson works as a photographer, surrounded by his own sizeable collection of material – records, concert posters, books, night-club handbills – from jazz's post-war era, with Macdonald's majestically resonant work as its centrepiece.
Never shown to the public, the head has been seen only three times in photographic reproductions since it took shape: first in 1962 as an illustration in Reisner's book, then on the cover of Down Beat, and finally in Esquire's World of Jazz book in 1975. Dickson believes it deserves to be seen by a wider public but is uncertain of its appeal and value to institutions – or, indeed, what sort of institution would guarantee it an appropriate setting.
Meanwhile, it sits in the unlikely surroundings of an Edinburgh studio, radiating its subject's unique charisma, a direct physical link with one of modern music's most remarkable figures.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/mar/21/charlie-parker-julie-macdonald-sculpture/print
J. D. Salinger: A Life Raised High - Review
From The Times March 20, 2010J. D. Salinger: A Life Raised High by Kenneth Slawenski
(Pomona, £20)
The first J. D. Salinger biography since his death reveals the stench of mortality that haunted his writing
Peter Ackroyd
Certain writers are thrilled at the prospect of biography; it ministers to their vanity and confirms their selfimportance. Others panic. They write precisely in order to exorcise the burden of personality, not to have it reinforced. T. S. Eliot forbad his estate to countenance any idea of an authorised life. He was on a bus when a fellow passenger asked him if he was indeed Mr Eliot; he left his seat and fled.
Jerome David Salinger, known to friends as Jerry, had the same aversion to being known. In a writing career of almost 70 years he rarely gave interviews and was photographed on only a handful of occasions. Upon his death this year, a great many columns of newsprint were devoted not to his work — for all that was discussed — but to his silence and reticence.
His publishing history confirms that reticence. His first novel was published in 1951, and was succeeded by three volumes of long and short stories. His last work to find its way into print appeared in The New Yorker in 1965. And the rest is silence. He carried on writing, as far as is known, for the next 45 years, but he refused to allow any publication.
The silence and the secrecy were confirmed in 1985 when Ian Hamilton, the English poet and critic, submitted a typescript titled J. D. Salinger: A Writing Life (1935-65). At once Salinger pounced, accusing Hamilton of illegally quoting from unpublished correspondence. He took Hamilton from court to court and eventually obtained the victory. Hamilton was obliged to rewrite his book. Fifteen years later Salinger’s daughter, Margaret, published Dream Catcher, a memoir in which she described “a world that dangled between dream and nightmare on a gossamer thread my parents wove, without the reality of solid ground to catch a body should he or she fall”.
There now appears a biography of Salinger, completed and published only three months after his death. It is not “authorised” and cannot have been written with Salinger’s permission or compliance. The author quotes no letters directly and is very sparing of indirect quotation. He also restricts his use of Salinger’s published work to what is generally considered to be “fair usage” in a critical context. Yet the book suffers nothing from the enforced self-censorship. It is well written, energetic and magnificently researched; a true picture of Salinger emerges from its pages.
He was born in 1919 to a private and self-contained New York family. His father had grown rich manufacturing tinned pork, and Salinger was brought up in affluent circumstances. He went to a variety of schools but was not a good student. He had a passion for acting, however, and it may be that this stayed with him for the rest of his life.
As a young man he was known for his “biting wit”, according to Slawenski; his contemporaries at college recalled that he was “caustic” and could be “nasty”. He talked in what was considered to be a pretentious manner, “as if he were reciting something out of Shakespeare”; but he was only acting, and he used that “pretentious manner” in several of his longer stories. He seems always to have wanted to write and told his friends that he would soon create “the Great American Novel”, the holy grail to which all young novelists of that country aspire.
Salinger’s first stories appeared in popular magazines known as slicks. From the beginning he was ambitious and tenacious. He was self-possessed and had what one contemporary described as “an ego of cast iron”. In spring 1942 he volunteered for the army, but he took his small typewriter with him. He spent his days on army duties and his nights on his stories. He was caught up in the events of D-Day and the landing in Normandy introduced him to a landscape of hell that never left him. Almost two thirds of his regiment died during the campaign and he once remarked that “you could live a lifetime, and never get the smell of burning flesh out of your nose”. Here lies the key to much of his work. He could smell the burning flesh even as he walked the streets of New York. It is the source of Holden Caulfield’s anger at the “phoney” adult world, and of Salinger’s mordant dissections of modern American life.
On his return to civilian life in America he took up the threads of his writing career. He had been writing sections of a novel concerning a young man — Holden Caulfield — and composed several short stories simultaneously. When one of them was published in The New Yorker, it could be said that his real literary life had begun.
In the autumn of 1950 he completed The Catcher in the Rye, the novel of Holden Caulfield, having worked on it sporadically for ten years. It had in some ways a difficult birth. Salinger did not want his photograph taken for the dust-jacket; he did not want portions of his biography to be released to the public; he did not want advance copies of the novel to be circulated; and he definitely did not want to see the reviews. All this, of course, was the machinery of self-protection. But there was another explanation. He said once that he had no “literary ego”, yet surely this was another form of pride, the pride of seeming not to care.
The success of the novel was instantaneous, but fame seemed to embarrass Salinger. One of his characters, in the short story Franny, declares: “I’m sick of myself, and everyone else that wants to make some kind of a splash.” He did not like to leave his small apartment for fear of being watched. By 1952 he had retreated to a village in New Hampshire, where he had bought a red barn on a property of 90 acres. He lived there for the rest of his life.
When an article appeared in a local newspaper soon after his arrival, he pulled down the shutters and refused to answer the door. He was soon consoled by a young woman who became his wife. They had two children. But there is always trouble in paradise. Salinger built a studio or bunker some way from the red barn, and stayed there for 16 hours at a time. He did not need, or want, the company of any other human being; his fictional characters are himself.
His real fame arrived in the late 1950s, when he became identified against his will with an alienated and angst-ridden generation who also admired Jack Kerouac and James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause. Yet still Salinger refused to be interviewed or photographed. He became one of the most famous non-persons in the world.
His final book, consisting of two long stories, was published in early 1963. He released another story in 1965 and never published another book. The last 40 years of his life are covered in less than 40 pages of this biography. He slowly became enveloped in his isolation. “There is a marvellous peace in not publishing,” he said. “I just write for myself and my own pleasure.” There may be another explanation. His last two long stories were met with incomprehension and derision; he did not wish to expose himself again. But he never stopped writing and Slawenski speculates that there may be 15 novels ready for publication.
At times Slawenski seems to overinterpret and over-praise his subject, but that is the way of the enthusiast. If we step back we see that Salinger created a small body of good and even great work. Yet there is no doubt that he possessed genius rather than talent. The voice of Holden Caulfield has joined those of Tom Sawyer and David Copperfield in praise of human innocence and affection.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/book_reviews/article7067661.ece
Sunday, 21 March 2010
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers352pp,Hamish Hamilton,£17.99
Dave Eggers's account of one man's ordeal at the hands of US military officials in the wake of hurricane Katrina is a grim indictment of the Bush regime
Valerie Martin
The Observer, Sunday 21 March 2010
On 19 September 2005, Kathy Zeitoun answered the phone at her friend Yuko's house in Phoenix, Arizona. The caller identified himself as an official in the Department of Homeland Security. He informed her that her husband, Abdulrahman Zeitoun, was a prisoner at the Elayn Hunt Correctional Centre in St Gabriel, Louisiana.
"He's fine, ma'am. We have no more interest in him."
"You have no interest in him? Is that good or bad?"
"That's good."
Dave Eggers's latest book, Zeitoun, patiently unravels the harrowing tale of how Kathy Zeitoun, a Louisiana native who grew up in a southern Baptist family in Baton Rouge, came to be on the other end of that phone call in Phoenix, where she learned that her husband, who had been missing for two weeks, was still alive, and not, as she'd feared, murdered or drowned in the floodwaters still inundating the city of New Orleans. She had last seen him on 27 August, when she and their four children evacuated the city before the approaching hurricane. Zeitoun insisted on staying behind to look after their various properties. As the children waved to their father, Kathy experienced a sense of déjà vu.
A dozen times they had lived this moment, as Kathy and his children drove off in search of sanctuary or rest, leaving Zeitoun to watch over his house and the houses of his neighbours and clients all over the city. He had keys to dozens of other houses; everyone trusted him with their homes and everything in them.
The hurricane, as everyone knows, was Katrina, and it battered the city with the expected wind and rain, while Zeitoun and many thousands of his fellow citizens – some jammed into the comfortless shelter of the Superdome, some in their own beds – stayed awake and listened. His house sustained minor leaks he contained in buckets. Electrical power went out. The next day passed quietly, as did another night. On 30 August, Zeitoun woke to the sound of running water, which he first took to be a broken pipe.
His ordeal had begun.
Zeitoun is an odd book, not beautifully written and not always entirely credible. It was produced with the assistance and approval of the Zeitoun family, and all author proceeds go to the Zeitoun Foundation, which is dedicated to rebuilding New Orleans. David Eggers is a serious good-doer, a writer of enormous energy, determined to make the world better by virtue of the stories he investigates and puts forward. He first read a short version of Abdulrahman Zeitoun's story in a collection titled Voices from the Storm, part of the Voice of Witness series published by McSweeney's, the publishing company Eggers founded and directs.
Zeitoun's account so fascinated Eggers that he met the family and persuaded them to undertake an expanded treatment of their experience. In a print interview, Eggers confessed that he "fell in love with the whole family", which accounts for the queasy-making hagiographic tribute that occupies the first 80 or so pages of the book. The style is cloying. Reading it is like being fed spoonfuls of sweetened condensed milk, but if you just keep swallowing, you'll get some interesting family background, useful information about Islam, and a fair idea of what daily life for a Syrian painting contractor and his family in New Orleans is like.
Once the family is separated and the waters rise, the story takes off, and even the style improves. What happens to Zeitoun in the days after the flood is spellbinding, and gradually you see what Eggers is after – nothing less than an indictment of the entire Bush era, of its whole xenophobic, anti-Islamic, militaristic, and belligerent take on the world beyond our sacred shores.
Zeitoun, a devout Muslim who spends the first days after the flood rowing around in his canoe rescuing people in distress and feeding dogs left trapped inside flooded houses, feels he is called by God to do this good work. Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: "God has a plan." As the waters turn toxic and the city empties out, a group of heavily armed men burst through the door and arrest Zeitoun for looting his own house. After that, things get much worse for him, and for his family, who are condemned to getting news from the media, which is spewing exaggerations, falsehoods and paranoid fantasies with the concentrated force of, well, a hurricane. A war-crazy populace is encouraged to believe a drowned city is a war zone. The governor goes on TV to inform the miserable survivors who may consider looting that she has called in more National Guardsmen, and that "they have M16s and are locked and loaded. These troops know how to shoot and kill and I expect they will."
In a Salon interview, Eggers described the descent of the armed upon a suffering population as "a legacy of the war on terror, this mentality that an overwhelming military response was the solution to a humanitarian crisis". At one point, poor Kathy desperately searches the internet to find out how many gun-toting law enforcement officials have been turned loose in a city in which perhaps 30,000 people are left, struggling to survive. The figure Kathy comes up with is 28,000.
I thought her figure might be a little high, so I did a bit of internet research myself. Between 29 August and 10 September, the number of National Guard troops sent to manage the chaos in New Orleans went from 7,841 to 46,838. This doesn't include the scores of privately hired Blackwater mercenaries, as well as an Israeli commando group called Instinctive Shooting International. It wasn't a rescue operation the government was running; it was an invasion.
As for Zeitoun, he roasts for awhile in a Guantanamo-style cage behind the bus station, where the guards inform him that he is al-Qaida. When he is finally returned to his family he has lost 20 pounds and looks to his wife like "a sad old man". He's still convinced God had something to do with it. "It was a test," Zeitoun thinks. "Who among us could deny that we were tested?"
He's right about that. Hurricane Katrina was a test. But it wasn't sent by God to test the devotion of a Syrian painting contractor in New Orleans. It was a test of the ability of a nation to protect its people, and that nation failed the test, big time. Abdulrahman Zeitoun's grim saga is a testament to this disturbing and depressing fact.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/mar/21/zeitoun-dave-eggers-book-review
Salinger Letters
JD Salinger comrade recalls 'emotional and warm' friendAlison Flood guardian.co.uk
Friday 19 March 2010 16.00
Werner Kleeman, 91, who fought alongside the writer in the second world war, reveals hitherto unseen letters
JD Salinger's austere public image has been belied by the memories of an old comrade from the second world war, who has been reminiscing about their friendship after unveiling a hitherto unseen correspondence.
Werner Kleeman met Salinger in March 1944 while they were stationed in Devon with the 12th infantry regiment of the 4th infantry division. Kleeman, 91, told Spiegel Online that on meeting the late author he "saw right away that [Salinger] was a bit of an eight-ball. He refused to tie the straps of his helmet. He did what he wanted to do."
"We became grown-ups together, we had to," Kleeman continued. "I knew Jerry like not many knew him ... We both went through hell. That binds you together." Questioning Salinger's reputation as standoffish and unfriendly, Kleeman said the author was "very humble [and] emotional and warm".
After Salinger died in January, Kleeman dug out the letters the author had sent him over the years. The correspondence sees Salinger describing himself as "a perennial sad sack" and telling Kleeman about his new husky puppy, as well as reminiscing about the pair's meeting with Ernest Hemingway during the war; Kleeman told Spiegel Online that they drank champagne from plastic cups and listened to Hemingway, then working as a war correspondent, tell his adventure stories.
He visited Salinger's New Hampshire home twice, where the two "spent hours on the balcony chatting", and where Kleeman says he was shown "the room where he kept all his manuscripts". The reclusive author, whose last published work was Hapworth 16, 1924 in 1965, is said to have left a cache of around 15 novels that have never been published.
The typewritten letters, signed "Jerry," "Yours, Jerry" or "Best always, Jerry", are currently kept in a bank by Kleeman, but New York museum the Morgan Library said they could be worth $60,000. "Through them Salinger comes alive," curator Declan Kiely told Spiegel Online. "We would love to have those."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/mar/19/jd-salinger-comrade-emotional-warm-friend
And a letter from Salinger!
Inside the Mind of a Young J.D. Salinger
The late author's second short story for Esquire appeared in the October 1945 issue and so did this brutally honest letter in which he questions his ability to write a novel.
J.D. Salinger writes: "I am twenty-six and in my fourth year in the Army. I've been overseas seventeen months so far. Landed on Utah Beach on D-Day with the Fourth Division and was with the 12th Infantry of the Fourth until the end of the war here. The Air Corps background for This Sandwich Has No Mayonnaise comes naturally because I used to be in the Air Corps. Have also been in the Signal Corps. Am also a graduate of Valley Forge Military Academy. After the war I plan to enlist in a good, established chorus line. This is the life. I've been writing short stories since I was fifteen. I have trouble writing simply and naturally. My mind is stocked with some black neckties, and though I'm throwing them out as fast as I find them, there will always be a few left over. I am a dash man and not a miler, and it is probable that I will never write a novel. So far the novels of this war have had too much of the strength, maturity and craftsmanship critics are looking for, and too little of the glorious imperfections which teeter and fall off the best minds. The men who have been in this war deserve some sort of trembling melody rendered without embarrassment or regret. I'll watch for that book."
http://www.esquire.com/the-side/feature/young-jd-salinger-letter-012810
Saturday, 20 March 2010
Friday, 19 March 2010
Alex Chilton RIP
Photo from http://www.danielcostonphotography.com/main_whatsnew_archives04.htmlMemphis music loses ‘Big Star’ — singer, songwriter Alex Chilton dies at 59
By Jody Callahan, Bob Mehr
Originally published 07:31 p.m., March 17, 2010
Alex Chilton, the pop hitmaker, cult icon and Memphis rock iconoclast best known as a member of 1960s pop-soul act the Box Tops and the 1970s power-pop act Big Star, died Wednesday at a hospital in New Orleans.
The singer, songwriter and guitarist was 59.
"I'm crushed. We're all just crushed," said John Fry, owner of Memphis' Ardent Studios and a longtime friend of Chilton's. "This sudden death experience is never something that you're prepared for. And yet it occurs."
Chilton had been complaining about his health earlier Wednesday, Fry said. He was taken by paramedics from his home to the emergency room but could not be revived.
Chilton and Big Star had been scheduled to play Saturday as part of the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. The band was also scheduled to play at the Levitt Shell in Memphis on May 15. It's unknown what will happen to those shows.
The Memphis-born Chilton rose to prominence at age 16 when his gruff vocals powered the massive Box Tops hit "The Letter," as well as "Cry Like a Baby" and "Neon Rainbow."
After the Box Tops broke up in 1970, Chilton had a brief solo run in New York before returning to Memphis. He soon joined forces with a group of Anglo-pop-obsessed musicians -- fellow songwriter/guitarist Chris Bell, bassist Andy Hummel and drummer Jody Stephens -- to form Big Star.
The group became the flagship act for Ardent's Stax-distributed label. Big Star's 1972 debut album, #1 Record, met with critical acclaim but poor sales.
The group briefly disbanded, but reunited without Bell to record the album Radio City. Released in 1974, the second album suffered a similar fate, plagued by Stax's distribution woes.
The group made one more album, Third/Sister Lovers, with just Chilton and Stephens -- and it, too, was a minor masterpiece. Darker and more complex than the band's previous pop-oriented material, it remained unreleased for several years.
In 2003, Rolling Stone magazine named all three Big Star albums to its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.
"It's a fork in the road that a lot of different bands stemmed from," said Jeff Powell, a respected local producer who worked on some of Chilton's records. "If you're drawing a family tree of American music, they're definitely a branch."
In the mid-'70s, Chilton began what would be a polarizing solo career, releasing several albums of material, including 1979's Like Flies on Sherbet -- a strange, chaotically recorded mix of originals and obscure covers that divided fans and critics.
Chilton also began performing with local roots-punk deconstructionists the Panther Burns.
In the early '80s, Chilton left Memphis for New Orleans, where he worked a variety of jobs and stopped performing for several years.
But interest in his music from a new generation of alternative bands, including the Replacements and R.E.M., brought him back to the stage in the mid-'80s.
He continued to record and tour as a solo act throughout the decade. Finally, in the early '90s, the underground cult based around Big Star had become so huge that the group was enticed to reunite with a reconfigured lineup.
The band, featuring original member Stephens plus Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow of the Posies, continued to perform regularly over the next 16 years. Big Star became the subject of various articles, books and CD reissue campaigns, including the September 2009 release of the widely hailed box set, Keep an Eye on the Sky.
"I played with Alex for eight or 10 years regularly, and he was one of the best musicians I ever knew," said Doug Garrison. "That's what really locked the first time I played with him, this feel on the guitar. He just played flawlessly. He had a limited technique, but he did what he did really well."
Chilton was often described as "mercurial," but those who knew him well described a man with a keen sense of humor, a tremendous musician and a generous friend.
"He was the only person on a record I've ever worked with where you'd come up with a horn arrangement, and he'd say, 'Look, I'm going to make you guys a co-writer on the song now,'" said Jim Spake, who played sax on the most recent Big Star record.
Chilton is survived by his wife, Laura, a son, Timothy, and a sister, Cecilia.
"When some people pass, you say it was the end of an era. In this case, it's really true," said Van Duren, a fellow Memphis musician who knew Chilton for decades. "It puts an end to the Big Star thing, and that's a very sad thing."
-- Bob Mehr: 529-2517
-- Jody Callahan: 529-6531
Alex Chilton, 1950-2010
— Born December 28, 1950, in Memphis
— Was the lead singer for the Box Tops in the 1960s; recorded "The Letter," which hit No. 1 on the pop charts
— Formed Big Star in 1971 with guitarist/singer Chris Bell, bassist Andy Hummel and drummer Jody Stephens
— Big Star put out two albums -- #1 Record and Radio City
— Group broke up in 1975 while working on a third album, which was eventually released overseas called Third/Sister Lovers
— Moved to New Orleans in early 1980s and released some solo albums on Ardent label
— Reunited with Big Star in the mid-1990s
— Rhino Records released a four-disc, 98-song retrospective in September 2009 called Keep an Eye on the Sky
— Band had been scheduled to launch the spring 2010 season at the Levitt Shell at Overton Park with a benefit concert on May 15
What they're saying
“I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately, because I heard he just got married. I’d been thinking about stopping by, but I just didn’t have time. I certainly didn’t think I needed to hurry and do that.”
— Doug Garrison, a member of Chilton’s band from 1984-92
“He graciously said, ‘Man, I want to make you a co-producer and give you a point on the record. That’s unbelievable. That’s never happened before.”
— Jeff Powell, who engineered and mixed some of Chilton’s records
“He changed music. There’s no other way to say it. It’s just true.”
— Steve McGehee, former owner of the legendary Antenna club
“(He was) really talented in ways you might not expect. I remember sitting at Ardent with him one time, when I was auditioning with him as a fourth member of Big Star. I remember him sitting down at a piano, and just playing ragtime piano for about 10 minutes just flawlessly.”
— Memphis musician Van Duren
“He was a little quirky maybe. He didn’t care what people thought. He just did his thing.”
— Saxophonist Jim Spake, who played on several Chilton records
“It’s obvious to anybody that listens to his live performances or his body of recorded work, his tremendous talent as a vocalist and songwriter and instrumentalist.”
— John Fry, owner of Ardent Studios
"Alex Chilton always messed with your head, charming and amazing you while doing so. His gift for melody was second to none, yet he frequently seemed in disdain of that gift,"
— Brent Gulke, creative director of South by Southwest music festival in Austin.
http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2010/mar/17/memphis-musician-alex-chilton-dies/
Thursday, 18 March 2010
Fess Parker RIP
Fess Parker, TV's 'Davy Crockett,' dies at 85By JEFF WILSON Associated Press Writer © 2010 The Associated Press
March 18, 2010, 5:23PM
LOS ANGELES — Fess Parker, a baby-boomer idol in the 1950s who launched a craze for coonskin caps as television's Davy Crockett, died Thursday of natural causes. He was 85.
Family spokeswoman Sao Anash said Parker, who was also TV's Daniel Boone and later a major California winemaker and developer, died at his Santa Ynez Valley home. His death comes on the 84th birthday of his wife of 50 years, Marcella.
"She's a wreck," Anash said, adding Parker was coherent and speaking with family just minutes before his death. Funeral arrangements will be announced later.
The first installment of "Davy Crockett," with Buddy Ebsen as Crockett's sidekick, debuted in December 1954 as part of the "Disneyland" TV show.
The 6-foot, 6-inch Parker was quickly embraced by youngsters as the man in a coonskin cap who stood for the spirit of the American frontier. Boomers gripped by the Crockett craze scooped up Davy lunch boxes, toy Old Betsy rifles, buckskin shirts and trademark fur caps. "The Ballad of Davy Crockett" ("Born on a mountaintop in Tennessee...") was a No. 1 hit for singer Bill Hayes while Parker's own version reached No. 5.
The first three television episodes were turned into a theatrical film, "Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier," in 1955.
True to history, Disney killed off its hero in the third episode, "Davy Crockett at the Alamo," where the real-life Crockett died in 1836 at age 49. But spurred by popular demand, Disney brought back the Crockett character for some episodes in the 1955-56 season, including "Davy Crockett's Keelboat Race." In reporting this development, Hedda Hopper wrote: "Take off those black armbands, kids, and put on your coonskin caps, for Davy Crockett will hit the trail again."
But just as suddenly it had taken the country by storm, the craze died down.
Parker's career then leveled off before he made a TV comeback from 1964-1970 in the title role of the TV adventure series "Daniel Boone" — also based on a real-life American frontiersman. Actor-singer Ed Ames, formerly of the Ames Brothers, played Boone's Indian friend, Mingo.
After "Daniel Boone," Parker largely retired from show business, except for guest appearances, and went into real estate.
"I left the business after 22 years," Parker told The Associated Press in 2001. "It was time to leave Hollywood. I came along at a time when I'm starting out with Gary Cooper, John Wayne, Sterling Hayden and Gregory Peck."
"Who needed a guy running around in a coonskin cap?" he said.
Parker had made his motion picture debut in "Springfield Rifle" in 1952. His other movies included "No Room for the Groom" (1952), "The Kid From Left Field" (1953), "Them!" (1954), "The Great Locomotive Chase" (1956), "Westward Ho, the Wagons!" (1956), "Old Yeller" (1957) and "The Light in the Forest" (1958).
Several of Parker's films, including "The Great Locomotive Chase" and "Old Yeller," came from the Disney studio.
It was Parker's scene as a terrified witness in the horror classic "Them!" that caught the attention of Walt Disney when he was looking for a "Davy Crockett" star. He chose Parker over another "Them!" actor, James Arness — who became a TV superstar in the long-running "Gunsmoke."
After departing Hollywood, Parker got into real estate with his wife, Marcella, whom he had married in 1960.
He bought and sold property, built hotels (including the elegant Fess Parker's Wine Country Inn & Spa in Los Olivos and Fess Parker's Doubletree Resort Santa Barbara) and grew wine grapes on a 2,200-acre vineyard on California's Central Coast, where he was dubbed King of the Wine Frontier and coonskin caps enjoyed brisk sales.
After its inaugural harvest in 1989, Parker's vineyard won dozens of medals and awards. The Parkers' son, Eli, became director of winemaking and their daughter, Ashley, also worked at the winery.
Parker was a longtime friend of Ronald Reagan, whose Western White House was not far from the Parker vineyards. Reagan sent Parker to Australia in 1985 to represent him during an event, and when Parker returned he was asked by White House aide Michael Deaver if he was interested in being ambassador to that country.
"In the end, I decided I'd better take myself out of it. But I was flattered," Parker said.
Parker also once considered a U.S. Senate bid, challenging Alan Cranston. But Nevada Sen. Paul Laxalt said it would be a rough campaign, and a key dissenter lived under the same roof.
"My wife was not in favor," Parker said. "I'm so happy with what evolved."
Fess Elisha Parker Jr. was born Aug. 16, 1924, in Fort Worth, Texas — Parker loved to point out Crockett's birthday was Aug. 17. He played football at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene but was injured in a nearly fatal road-rage knifing in 1946.
"There went my football career," Parker had said.
He later earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Texas.
Parker was discovered by actor Adolphe Menjou, who was Oscar-nominated for "The Front Page" in 1931 and who was a guest artist at the University of Texas. Menjou urged him to go to Hollywood and introduced Parker to his agent.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/top/all/6919813.html
"Some chav in McDonalds..."
"The Wigan debacle followed that when he rowed with Big Sam and then some chav in McDonalds and then he ended up doing porridge because of it."
Ah-hah...
Chronic sports writer Lee Ryder blogs about the trials and tribulations of Joey Barton.
http://www.blogonthetyne.co.uk/2010/03/one-more-for-the-road-with-joe.html
Standards of journalism have slipped a long way since the days of Hildy Johnson and Terry Kelly.
Ah-hah...
Chronic sports writer Lee Ryder blogs about the trials and tribulations of Joey Barton.
http://www.blogonthetyne.co.uk/2010/03/one-more-for-the-road-with-joe.html
Standards of journalism have slipped a long way since the days of Hildy Johnson and Terry Kelly.
Charlie Gillett RIP
Charlie GillettRadio DJ, champion of world music and author of a major history of rock'n'roll
Richard Williams
guardian.co.uk
Wednesday 17 March 2010
Few people can have opened so many ears to such a variety of music over the last four decades as Charlie Gillett, the author and radio disc jockey, who has died aged 68 after a long illness. Charlie wrote the first serious history of rock'n'roll and went on to become a central figure in drawing together the confluence of international sounds that became known, to the benefit of many artists whose work might otherwise have remained in obscurity, as world music.
The radio was Charlie's medium, and from Honky Tonk, his 1970s Radio London show, to his weekly BBC World Service broadcasts in recent years, he nurtured an audience whose loyalty to him and belief in his integrity were unshakeable. He was never polished in his presentation – "I'm not very good at reading scripts," he once said, "and I wouldn't be very convincing introducing a record that I didn't personally like" – but his listeners knew that if Charlie had chosen to play a piece of music, it would be worth hearing.
His discoveries were numerous, from Johnnie Allen's Cajun version of Chuck Berry's Promised Land in the early 1970s, through Youssou N'Dour and Salif Keita to Mariza, the young singer of Portuguese fado music who went from appearances on Charlie's show in 2001 to sellout concerts at the Royal Albert Hall, London. Throughout the last decade he compiled CD anthologies, presenting the best of new music from around the world. The most recent, last year's Otro Mundo, included contributions from Armenia and Mallorca.
The best-known story, however, concerns a recently formed south London group who approached Charlie with their demo tape one day in 1976. He liked what he heard, and chose one of the songs, Sultans of Swing, to play on Honky Tonk that Sunday. By the time the tune had finished, his little studio had taken calls from half the A&R men in London. Dire Straits were on their way the global success, and they never forgot their debt to his willingness to trust his instincts.
Charlie was born in Morecambe, Lancashire, and brought up in Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, where, at the age of 16, he saw Buddy Holly and the Crickets on their only British tour. Educated at Grangefield grammar school, he excelled as a quarter-miler on the athletics track and as a footballer, and his love of sport never left him. While camping in north Wales one summer, he met Buffy Chessum, then 15. Some years later, after he had studied economics at Peterhouse, Cambridge, they made contact again, and in 1964 they were married.
They spent the following year in New York, where Charlie studied for his MA at Columbia University. The history of rock'n'roll became the subject of his thesis, long before popular music became an acceptable topic for academic study. Returning to England in 1966, he taught social studies and film-making, another lifelong enthusiasm, at Kingsway College of Further Education, now Westminster Kingsway, in central London, while Buffy gave birth to their two daughters (followed later by a son) and he spent the evenings turning his thesis into a book.
Attempting to find a niche in journalism, he wrote for New Society, Anarchy and the soul music magazine Shout before securing a column in Record Mirror, in which he could express his enthusiasm for rhythm and blues and early rock'n'roll. But it was when The Sound of the City was published in the US in 1970, to great acclaim, that his reputation was established. The book looked beneath the surface of the first 15 years of rock'n'roll, tracing its antecedents and making thoughtful, typically unpretentious assessments, not just of the musicians but of the fledgling industry and its visionary hustlers. Its avoidance of received wisdom inspired countless authors to pursue its themes in the subsequent decades.
Four years later Charlie produced Making Tracks, a serviceable history of Atlantic Records. But writing books, it turned out, was not his true vocation. Honky Tonk was heard for the first time in 1972, and over the next six years it became compulsory Sunday listening for the kind of music lover to whom the intimate music of JJ Cale or Bobby Charles spoke louder than the pumped-up sounds of Led Zeppelin or Yes, and who were thrilled when Charlie played demos by Elvis Costello or Graham Parker.
Wisely, he turned down an offer to present BBC2's The Old Grey Whistle Test, realising that he would have little to say to musicians for whose work he cared nothing. The intimacy of radio suited him better, and he became a series consultant to Radio 1's well-received The Story of Pop. In 1972 he was also part of the writers' collective that founded Let It Rock, a monthly magazine.
It was in the mid-1970s that he and his dentist, Gordon Nelki, formed a partnership which led them to manage Kilburn and the High Roads (whose lead singer was Ian Dury) and to start a label and publishing company, Oval Music. Their successes included Lene Lovich's Lucky Number, Paul Hardcastle's 19 and Touch and Go's Would You...? Later he acted as a music consultant to film companies and advertising agencies.
In 1979 he moved from BBC Radio London to Capital, the city's commercial station, and began to feature music from around the world. Sacked in 1983, he was brought back by public demand and stayed until 1990. In May 1995 he returned with a show on GLR, Radio London's successor, and began his World Service series in 1999. He was also a regular presenter of Radio 3's World on 3.
In recent years he contracted a disease of the autoimmune system that forced him off the air and finally ended his Sunday-morning kickabouts on Clapham Common with players from an assortment of African and South American countries. It was followed by a stroke and, last week, a heart attack outside his home. He is survived by Buffy, their daughters Suzy and Jody, their son Ivan, and two grandchildren.
• Charles Thomas Gillett, radio presenter, author and music publisher, born 20 February 1942; died 17 March 2010
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2010/mar/17/charlie-gillett-obituary
Wednesday, 17 March 2010
A Slip of Paper
Today I went to the doctor—
the doctor said I was dying,
not in those words, but when I said it
she didn't deny it—
What have you done to your body, her silence says.
We gave it to you and look what you did to it,
how you abused it.
I'm not talking only of cigarettes, she says,
but also of poor diet, of drink.
She's a young woman; the stiff white coat disguises her body.
Her hair's pulled back, the little female wisps
suppressed by a dark band. She's not at ease here,
behind her desk, with her diploma over her head,
reading a list of numbers in columns,
some flagged for her attention.
Her spine's straight also, showing no feeling.
No one taught me how to care for my body.
You grow up watched by your mother or grandmother.
Once you're free of them, your wife takes over, but she's nervous,
she doesn't go too far. So this body I have,
that the doctor blames me for—it's always been supervised by women,
and let me tell you, they left a lot out.
The doctor looks at me—
between us, a stack of books and folders.
Except for us, the clinic's empty.
There's a trap-door here, and through that door,
the country of the dead. And the living push you through,
they want you there first, ahead of them.
The doctor knows this. She has her books,
I have my cigarettes. Finally
she writes something on a slip of paper.
This will help your blood pressure, she says.
And I pocket it, a sign to go.
And once I'm outside, I tear it up, like a ticket to the other world.
She was crazy to come here,
a place where she knows no one.
She's alone; she has no wedding ring.
She goes home alone, to her place outside the village.
And she has her one glass of wine a day,
her dinner that isn't a dinner.
And she takes off that white coat:
between that coat and her body,
there's just a thin layer of cotton.
And at some point, that comes off too.
To get born, your body makes a pact with death,
and from that moment, all it tries to do is cheat—
You get into bed alone. Maybe you sleep, maybe you never wake up.
But for a long time you hear every sound.
It's a night like any summer night; the dark never comes.
Louise Glück
http://www.threepennyreview.com/samples/gluck_su09.html
Louise Glück's A Village Life, which includes this poem, was published in 2009 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Tuesday, 16 March 2010
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