I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in "Cheers & Jeers".
OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.
CHEERS to Bill and Michael in PWM, our Laramie, Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous weekend .... and week ahead.
ART NOTES — a career retrospective of the works of Agnes Pelton— with works that interpret desert landscapes and light as transcendental expressions based on her studies of spiritualism and numerology — is at the Phoenix, Arizona Museum of Art through September 8th.
Agnes Pelton (1881 — 1961)THE RELATIVELY NEW interior minister of Lebanon is its first female leader, Raya al-Hassan— who commands over forty thousand law enforcement officials while earning their respect, has cut her predecessor’s large motorcade and security staff, has called upon clerics to allow Muslims and Christians to marry, yet has made relatively few enemies along the way.
HAIL and FAREWELL to the Basketball Hall of Fame player John Havlicek — an NCAA champion for Ohio State and an eight-time champion for the Boston Celtics — who has died at the age of seventy-nine. He was the essence of humility in retirement, praising current-day players and following an interview with Charles Barkley during his playing days, stunned Barkley by telling him, “I’ll be able to tell people I watched you becoming one of the game’s greats”.
THURSDAY's CHILD is named Penny Cirque the Cat— who took the Royal Canadian Mounted Police advertisement on April 1st for “a few good cats” seriously — saying, “The bad guys could easily be taken in by my charm and I am sure they would tell me all the bad things they have done, especially if I offered to let them stroke me when they had confessed and made amends.”
Penny Cirque the CatAMONG THE REASONS cited for the success of the head coach of the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs, Gregg Popovich — with five championships to his credit — is … his workouts? Drafting style? His dislike of the Trumpster? Well, this ESPN essay in particular credits … his team dinners (to create unity) with his wine list selections that make him a favorite of restaurateurs across the country.
WOTTA SURPRISE that Matteo Salvini— the xenophobic interior minister of Italy, who relishes Benito Mussolini’s legacy — became the country’s first top-level politician to skip the Liberation Day ceremony that marks the triumph of Italy’s resistance against the Nazi occupation.
FRIDAY's CHILD is named Moo the Cat— a Saskatchewan kitteh who went missing a year ago (and was not micro-chipped) … yet who was spotted on a Lost and Found Cats Facebook page and then reunited.
Moo the CatTHE OTHER NIGHT yours truly hosted the Top Comments diary with a look at a subject that many of us have scratched-our-heads over, The Rise and Fall of Michael Avenatti— with a wonderment about how we handle such shooting-stars in the future?
BRAIN TEASER - try this Quiz of the Week's News from the BBC.
SEPARATED at BIRTH — two high-tech CEO’s: Qualcomm’s Steven Mollenkopf and Tim Apple …. err, make that Apple’s Tim Cook … both of whose firms, interestingly, just settled a major lawsuit out-of-court.
Steven Mollenkopf (Qualcomm) and Tim Cook (Apple)...… and finally, for a song of the week ............... someone who - during that (brief) time between Buddy Holly and the Beatles - managed to bring a sweeter style of jazz to the general public was Stan Getz - whose tenor saxophone tone was so distinct that he was known as "The Sound". As a tenor saxophonist, he was inspired more by the lighter tone of Lester Young (than the huskier tone of Coleman Hawkins, the other tenor giant of his era) but developed his own style and took his own place on the list of jazz greats. And he did so in several of the post WW-II branches of jazz (bebop, cool jazz) and then helping to popularize South American music, later .... so that he became known to the general public, as well.
Born in Philadelphia in 1927, his family moved to New York for better job prospects for his father. A music prodigy, he had the good fortune to receive instruction from Simon Kovar - a bassoonist at the New York Philharmonic. In his teens, the advent of WW-II caused many musicians to be drafted (or enlist) in the armed forces and - just as with young baseball players of the era (such as Joe Nuxhall) - this caused a great deal of openings in the remaining big bands of the era for young players to fill.
And so for someone too young to be drafted, a 16 year-old Getz was hired by big bandleader Jack Teagarden - who offered him $70/week to join his touring band. He expected resistance from his parents, but his father surprised him by saying, "Stan, seventy bucks a week! I can't make that in two weeks. And I haven't had a job in a month, anyway." Truant officers intervened, and thus Teagarden had to promise to be Stan's guardian (with his parent's blessing) to ensure he kept up his studies.
This led to stints in Stan Kenton's band (where Stan first developed a taste for heroin) as well as Benny Goodman and - after the war - with Woody Herman's band, where he was one of four saxophonists known as the Four Brothers (with Zoot Sims as one of the others). Early Autumn was a hit song for the Woody Herman band that showcased Stan Getz.
From the late 1940's on, Stan Getz then began to lead his own quartets, where he began winning several magazine popularity polls for his instrument. One aspiring musician he saw while working in Connecticut was Norwalk native Horace Silver - whom he brought on-the-road and even recorded some of the young pianist's tunes.
The 1950's were the height of Stan Getz's mainstream jazz days, and he had several different quartets with guitarist Jimmy Raney, trombonist Bob Brookmeyer and pianist Oscar Peterson. As a guest soloist, his playing helped guitarist Johnny Smith have a hit with Moonlight in Vermont in 1952.
His heroin addiction also grew, leading to an arrest for attempted robbery and which helped break-up his marriage. He escaped to Scandinavia at the end of the 1950's, where he began to get clean and returned to the US at the dawn of the 1960's. But after appearing on (what he considered his most ambitious recording, playing on the album Focus by Eddie Sauter's big band) he found that (a) his style of music was now being eclipsed by the folk music boom, and (b) he found his audience had dwindled.
This led to a big break: the guitarist Charlie Byrd took Stan to his home and played him some tapes he brought back from a 1961 State Department tour he made of Latin America, with the sound of the jazz/samba hybrid that was called Bossa nova in Brazil - and told Stan that he couldn't find anyone interested in recording it in America. Stan immediately set-up a recording session in February, 1962.
That album Jazz Samba began selling well in August 1962, with the title track even making the singles pop charts in September and Desafinado following (even more strongly) two weeks later. This led eventually to the recording Jazz Samba Encore!, with one of the originators of Bossa nova, Brazilian guitarist Luiz Bonfá.
Then in 1964 came the release of Getz/Gilberto (a collaboration with Antonio Carlos Jobim and João Gilberto) that was his biggest seller, thanks in large part to The Girl from Ipanema (featuring the airy vocals of Astrud Gilberto) winning the 1965 Grammy for Record of the Year. Getz/Gilberto was named as Album of the Year - the last jazz album to win the award until Herbie Hancock's "River: The Joni Letters" some 43 years later in 2008. Although it was short-lived - the advent of the British Invasion ensured that - there was a Bossa nova craze in the USA for several months.
For the remainder of the 1960's, Getz worked with some of the upcoming jazz players (such as Bill Evans and Gary Burton) and even made some recordings in the 1970's in the jazz/rock fusion style (with Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke). In June 1978, President Jimmy Carter invited Stan to perform at the White House (to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Newport Jazz Festival) saying, "It's almost worth getting elected president to have a concert done for you by Stan Getz."
In the mid-1980s Getz worked regularly in the San Francisco Bay area and taught at Stanford University as an artist-in-residence at the Stanford Jazz Workshop. During 1988, Getz worked with Huey Lewis and the News on their Small World album: playing the extended solo on the title track (which became a minor hit single). And he later performed often with the pianist Kenny Barron - and developed a modern standard with the Kenny Barron song Voyage in their later years.
But while Stan had kicked heroin years earlier, years of drinking and cigarettes had accumulated. The vibraphonist Gary Burton had remarked that working with Stan while he was drinking — which was frequently — was rather unpleasant. He was diagnosed with liver cancer and cirrhosis, which he managed to deal with for several years before Stan Getz died in June, 1991 at the age of 64.
When Rolling Stone released their list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, it included Getz/Gilberto at #447. And in words that came from perhaps the best-loved saxophonist of all: the oft-quoted John Coltrane remark, "We’d all sound like (Stan) if we could" ... says a lot.
A young Stan Getz …... ….… and later on in lifeMy favorite album he performed on was one recorded just a few weeks before his death in 1991. The nonpareil vocalist Abbey Lincoln recorded a monster of an album You Gotta Pay the Band - which brought together not only Stan Getz but also the pianist Hank Jones (who had played piano on Stan's first record date 45 years earlier) and one of my favorite bassists, Charlie Haden.
And one ballad, the title track to the film Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams - with lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman, and music by Johnny Mandel - is my favorite recorded ballad of the entire decade of the 1990's. Below you can hear it, with Stan's tenor saxophone solo the highlight of the tune.
Summer wishes, winter dreams Drifting down forgotten streams Songs and faces Smiles and whispers Come from far away To visit me this day
Yesterday has come to tea Sitting here across from me Dressed in faded flowers And rambling on for hours... ...and hours: I'd love to stay But I must leave today
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