Puerto Rico's loss is Nashville's gain this month as the Frist Center for the Visual Arts presents a special exhibit (through May 16; see www.fristcenter.org) called "Masterpieces of European Painting from El Museo de Arte Ponce." These gems - from a museum built in 1959 by collector (& co-founder of the Puerto Rican Pro-statehood Party), Luis Ferre - range from religious iconography circa 1350 to Lovis Corinth's 1910 Expressionist nude "Pregnant Woman."
Perhaps the most appealing artworks on display hang in the last two galleries, among a group of sumptuous paintings by members & adherents of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. They were a loose affiliation of anti-academic artists, established in England in 1848 as part of an aesthetic quest for "truth to nature" & ideal beauty. Here is a brief survey of my favorite seven paintings in the entire exhibit:
* "Ysoude with the Love Philter" (oil/canvas, 1870) by Frederick Sandys (1832-1904). A portrait of a demure brown-eyed brunette (elsewhere named Isolde) in semi-profile holding a red rose. Based on the tragic Arthurian legend of a misdirected love-potion, a rich blue hue dominates the color-scheme of this eye-catching work in which symbolic flowers abound.
* "The Escape of a Heretic, 1559" (oil/canvas, 1857) by Sir John Everett Millais (1829-96). In this dramatic scene from the time of the Spanish Inquisition, somber brown tones pervade this depiction of 3 figures: (1) a nobleman/rescuer disguised as a monk aims a dagger at (2) a cowering bound priest/captor, while (3) a beautiful young woman in a robe, partially concealing a heretic's shirt complete with devil & flames, flees the cell with a startled expression. The oppressive interior is relieved by a glimpse of a tree through a tiny window in the background.
* "The School of Nature" (oil/wood panel, 1893) by William Holman Hunt (1827-1910). This portrait, originally of Hunt's 16-year-old daughter Gladys, presents a seated beauty sketching on her red pad in a summer garden, a dog at her feet & a fountain behind her. It features a face repainted, for some unexplained reason, by another artist into that of a more mature woman. It remains an alluring, contemplative composition in which green & pink colors prevail.
* "Roman Widow (Dis Manibus)" (oil/canvas, 1874) by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-82). My favorite of the entire show, this painting offers a seductive yet aloof blue-eyed redhead (based on Rossetti's favorite model, Alexa Wilding) performing a funerary ritual with zither-like instruments beside her husband's cinerary urn. Gold, pink, auburn & green tones lend the portrait a vibrant sheen & a vitality that belies the morbid subject.
* The small Briar Rose series (oil/canvas, 1871-73), a triptych comprised of: (1) "The Prince Enters the Wood" (2) "The King & His Court" & (3) "The Sleeping Beauty" by Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones(1833-98). This rather eerie trio of paintings, executed in Burne-Jones's semi-crude mystical style, presents a variety of figures sleeping in a forest, in a garlanded courtyard & in a bedchamber of slumbering beauties, respectively. Based on the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty, as interpreted by Alfred Lord Tennyson in his poem "Day Dream" (1842), there is a hallucinatory quality to the series.
Asked why he hadn't - like most artists who tackled this popular subject - depicted the awakening of Sleeping Beauty, Burne-Jones replied: "I want it to stop with the princess asleep and to tell no more, to leave all the afterwards to the invention & imagination of people." Good words to live by in this era of comatose imagination.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Friday, February 19, 2010
Beauty & the Bruise
I was jogging alongside the athletically - if not aesthetically - inspiring full-scale replica Parthenon in Nashville's Centennial Park on a warm sunny Friday afternoon, after getting a $5 beauty-school haircut by a skilled gay Southerner named Cody, when I saw her: a cool beauty a la Scarlett Johansson reading a book on the steps facing West End Avenue. She paused to look down & then smiled at me as I passed in my black shorts & tanktop.
I smiled back & kept on running, absorbing that young beauty's implied encouragement, thinking "It's high time to end this sexual drought." To be surrounded by so much feminine beauty without a lover is a torture akin to spending a series of nights in the spiked embrace of a medieval "iron maiden" device. I feel like a romantic heretic in the bloody hands of some Kafkaesque Inquistion, baffled by the senseless cruelty of involuntary celibacy.
The night before, a drop-dead gorgeous olive-skinned 24-year-old singer named Marcy, a woman of Hungarian/Roma & Polish ancestry who hails from Traverse City (Michigan), sat next to me on the sofa at Music City Hostel. We talked while drinking wine & half-watching men in silly costumes figure-skate in Vancouver. She gave me her CD & suggested that I might become her manager when she returns to Chicago. I'd rather be her lover, but neither scenario is likely, so I'll just enjoy the fantasy. I gave her a Hot Club of Rambler City gypsy-jazz CD & an article about Django Reinhardt. Oh, and my contact info, of course.
"A good novel is like a punch in the face," wrote Franz Kafka. And seeing a beautiful woman - who you know won't sleep with you - is like a punch in the solar plexus: it takes your breath away, but leaves a lingering bruise on your heart.
I smiled back & kept on running, absorbing that young beauty's implied encouragement, thinking "It's high time to end this sexual drought." To be surrounded by so much feminine beauty without a lover is a torture akin to spending a series of nights in the spiked embrace of a medieval "iron maiden" device. I feel like a romantic heretic in the bloody hands of some Kafkaesque Inquistion, baffled by the senseless cruelty of involuntary celibacy.
The night before, a drop-dead gorgeous olive-skinned 24-year-old singer named Marcy, a woman of Hungarian/Roma & Polish ancestry who hails from Traverse City (Michigan), sat next to me on the sofa at Music City Hostel. We talked while drinking wine & half-watching men in silly costumes figure-skate in Vancouver. She gave me her CD & suggested that I might become her manager when she returns to Chicago. I'd rather be her lover, but neither scenario is likely, so I'll just enjoy the fantasy. I gave her a Hot Club of Rambler City gypsy-jazz CD & an article about Django Reinhardt. Oh, and my contact info, of course.
"A good novel is like a punch in the face," wrote Franz Kafka. And seeing a beautiful woman - who you know won't sleep with you - is like a punch in the solar plexus: it takes your breath away, but leaves a lingering bruise on your heart.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Poem for a Danish singer/songwriter & part-time gypsy gal
A lovely, friendly Dane named Connie made my day simply by walking the two miles from the Greyhound depot to Music City Hostel & arranging to spend the night as our guest. I said hello over a small meal at the dinner table & her smile thawed my frozen heart. Half an hour later I was driving Connie & her guitar to Lower Broadway, where she was determined to busk her way out of temporary poverty.
This radiant foreign gal, fresh off the bus from Canada via Detroit, managed to get a geezer in an Air Force uniform to bestow a tip before she'd even played a note. I handed her a pair of berry-flavored Ricola lozenges for her sore throat, bought her a sweet tea with lemon at Jack's Bar-B-Q, and gave her an audience. For good luck, I tipped her a buck. I watched her perform for 20 minutes, by which time my greenback had plenty of paper company in her tip-cap. Here's the poem I wrote in her honor:
A Busker on Broadway
by Josef C. Mrazek
Connie commands the corner of Fourth Street and Broadway
a Danish queen of the folk guitar, strumming and singing
through a winter Nashville afternoon, alert and fearless,
picking those cold steel strings, making them ring warmly,
performing as though her next meal depended on that pile of
wrinkled dollar bills falling into her green tweed cap.
Busking is merely business, but music might just be
her soul’s salvation.
She inspires the lunchtime passersby who return her smile,
who stop to listen, to comment, to appreciate the bright
sight of a striking blonde in a black billed hat, absorbing
the life-giving sun in a black sweater, legs encased in torn
blue jeans atop red suede shoes outside Gruhn Guitars,
‘round the corner from the famous Ryman Auditorium,
within view of the Cumberland River, adorning the dirty
sidewalks of honky-tonk row. She dwells supreme in
Hillbilly Heaven.
An approachable angel in dreadlocks drawing upon
a repertoire of Americana classics – Sheryl Crow,
Neil Young, “Me and Bobby McGee” - plus songs all her own
in Danish and English, she pauses to take requests, sips sweet tea,
then launches into “Part-Time Gypsy,” daring to rhyme playas with
Himalayas, opening her heart, pushing notes past delicious
lips, attracting coins and other satisfying signs from
a generous universe.
This radiant foreign gal, fresh off the bus from Canada via Detroit, managed to get a geezer in an Air Force uniform to bestow a tip before she'd even played a note. I handed her a pair of berry-flavored Ricola lozenges for her sore throat, bought her a sweet tea with lemon at Jack's Bar-B-Q, and gave her an audience. For good luck, I tipped her a buck. I watched her perform for 20 minutes, by which time my greenback had plenty of paper company in her tip-cap. Here's the poem I wrote in her honor:
A Busker on Broadway
by Josef C. Mrazek
Connie commands the corner of Fourth Street and Broadway
a Danish queen of the folk guitar, strumming and singing
through a winter Nashville afternoon, alert and fearless,
picking those cold steel strings, making them ring warmly,
performing as though her next meal depended on that pile of
wrinkled dollar bills falling into her green tweed cap.
Busking is merely business, but music might just be
her soul’s salvation.
She inspires the lunchtime passersby who return her smile,
who stop to listen, to comment, to appreciate the bright
sight of a striking blonde in a black billed hat, absorbing
the life-giving sun in a black sweater, legs encased in torn
blue jeans atop red suede shoes outside Gruhn Guitars,
‘round the corner from the famous Ryman Auditorium,
within view of the Cumberland River, adorning the dirty
sidewalks of honky-tonk row. She dwells supreme in
Hillbilly Heaven.
An approachable angel in dreadlocks drawing upon
a repertoire of Americana classics – Sheryl Crow,
Neil Young, “Me and Bobby McGee” - plus songs all her own
in Danish and English, she pauses to take requests, sips sweet tea,
then launches into “Part-Time Gypsy,” daring to rhyme playas with
Himalayas, opening her heart, pushing notes past delicious
lips, attracting coins and other satisfying signs from
a generous universe.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Mardi Gras greetings from an ex-resident of New Orleans
I'm sittin' here in chilly Nashville listening to American Routes, a mighty fine roots-music public-radio show produced in New Orleans & hosted by Tulane professor/folklorist Nick Spitzer. Here's a taste of what you're missing, if you aren't tuned in to that aural extravaganza.
The joyous, raucous sounds of the Wild Magnolias, a Mardi Gras Indians group that once played Carnegie Hall, enters my brainstem via earbuds connected to a Walkman, now a mere relic of the late 20th Century. Lord, how it makes me wish I had a gal to dance with at this male-infested Music City Hostel!
Then along comes Professor Longhair's protege Dr. John, playin' sly piano & singin' an old blues number called "Winin' Boy" in his inimitable drunk-sounding drawl, backed by tuba & trumpet & other assorted horns & reeds provided by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. Good God, that kinda soulful party music makes you feel so good it almost hurts. Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans? I do.
So I cast my mind back 22 years, when I was living Uptown on Prytania Street in the Crescent City, renting some old servants' quarters behind Jackie Bullock's big house. Our neighbor - just 2 blocks down Soniat Street - was Bob Dylan, who bought a house in the City That Care Forgot so he could record "Oh Mercy" (with brilliant Louisiana-based producer Daniel Lanois) while soaking up an atmosphere unlike anywhere else on Earth. I got so drunk once at a Rockin' Dopsie zydeco show at the Maple Leaf Bar that I needed a hotel co-worker's help reaching my bed.
Basta with the nostalgia. New Orleans sure ain't dead yet & neither am I. Nor, presumably, you. So get off your bum, spin a platter & dance. Happy Mardi Gras!
The joyous, raucous sounds of the Wild Magnolias, a Mardi Gras Indians group that once played Carnegie Hall, enters my brainstem via earbuds connected to a Walkman, now a mere relic of the late 20th Century. Lord, how it makes me wish I had a gal to dance with at this male-infested Music City Hostel!
Then along comes Professor Longhair's protege Dr. John, playin' sly piano & singin' an old blues number called "Winin' Boy" in his inimitable drunk-sounding drawl, backed by tuba & trumpet & other assorted horns & reeds provided by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. Good God, that kinda soulful party music makes you feel so good it almost hurts. Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans? I do.
So I cast my mind back 22 years, when I was living Uptown on Prytania Street in the Crescent City, renting some old servants' quarters behind Jackie Bullock's big house. Our neighbor - just 2 blocks down Soniat Street - was Bob Dylan, who bought a house in the City That Care Forgot so he could record "Oh Mercy" (with brilliant Louisiana-based producer Daniel Lanois) while soaking up an atmosphere unlike anywhere else on Earth. I got so drunk once at a Rockin' Dopsie zydeco show at the Maple Leaf Bar that I needed a hotel co-worker's help reaching my bed.
Basta with the nostalgia. New Orleans sure ain't dead yet & neither am I. Nor, presumably, you. So get off your bum, spin a platter & dance. Happy Mardi Gras!
Saturday, February 13, 2010
A Letter to Fellow Insomniacs from Music City
Ladies & Gentlemen:
This 1:00 a.m. (CST) communique was inspired by a pair of demented media sources: (1) Hunter S. Thompson's letter to a friend, dated October 19, 1960 (exactly 2 weeks after my birth), postmarked San Francisco; & (2) a WRVU-FM radio program of weird, hilarious & corny 78-rpm novelty & show tunes called "Old Timey Funky Fresh Jams" hosted by a guy & a gal playing what they describe as "frickin' awesome artists taking dirt naps."
In his letter, 23-year-old HST complains that "If I don't get a job almost immediately I'll either starve to death or be desperate enough to attempt the long trek back to New York . . . To cross the continent by thumb in the dead of winter is something I dread more than anything I can think of. But if the only alternative is a half-gainer off the Golden Gate bridge, I will probably prefer the thumb and the cold and the hunger and all the rest of the shit a man has to eat and wallow in if he wants to stay alive."
That passage captures a mood of bittersweet despair that I am all too familiar with. Nevertheless, it's written with such humorous determination that I can't help but smile at the struggling young Hunter, who composed it in an empty borrowed apartment on the West Coast. Then, of course, he avoided a dirt nap (i.e. traditional burial) upon his suicide some 45 years later by arranging to have his mortal remains cremated & stuffed into a custom-made cylinder of fireworks. Ever dramatic, Thompson stipulated that this semi-human rocket should be launched at his Owl Farm compound in Woody Creek, Colorado. His widow - aided financially by HST's good buddy & fellow Kentuckian, "Colonel" Johnny Depp - actually granted this appropriately strange incendiary request.
Imagine the spectacle, as witnessed by Madison lawyer Bill Dixon (another pal of the legendary journalist/fabulist) in August 2005: the HST-rocket is fired from atop a gigantic raised fist clutching a stylized peyote button, Thompson's Gonzo logo, as Bob Dylan's "Mr. Tambourine Man" serenades at ear-blistering decibels the crowd of friends & family. The rocket rises toward heaven, but stops short of God's grasp, exploding in a fiery blaze of sound & light, eventually drifting back down to Earth.
Can't think of a better way to scatter one's ashes across the surface of this odd planetary way station from womb to tomb myself.
This 1:00 a.m. (CST) communique was inspired by a pair of demented media sources: (1) Hunter S. Thompson's letter to a friend, dated October 19, 1960 (exactly 2 weeks after my birth), postmarked San Francisco; & (2) a WRVU-FM radio program of weird, hilarious & corny 78-rpm novelty & show tunes called "Old Timey Funky Fresh Jams" hosted by a guy & a gal playing what they describe as "frickin' awesome artists taking dirt naps."
In his letter, 23-year-old HST complains that "If I don't get a job almost immediately I'll either starve to death or be desperate enough to attempt the long trek back to New York . . . To cross the continent by thumb in the dead of winter is something I dread more than anything I can think of. But if the only alternative is a half-gainer off the Golden Gate bridge, I will probably prefer the thumb and the cold and the hunger and all the rest of the shit a man has to eat and wallow in if he wants to stay alive."
That passage captures a mood of bittersweet despair that I am all too familiar with. Nevertheless, it's written with such humorous determination that I can't help but smile at the struggling young Hunter, who composed it in an empty borrowed apartment on the West Coast. Then, of course, he avoided a dirt nap (i.e. traditional burial) upon his suicide some 45 years later by arranging to have his mortal remains cremated & stuffed into a custom-made cylinder of fireworks. Ever dramatic, Thompson stipulated that this semi-human rocket should be launched at his Owl Farm compound in Woody Creek, Colorado. His widow - aided financially by HST's good buddy & fellow Kentuckian, "Colonel" Johnny Depp - actually granted this appropriately strange incendiary request.
Imagine the spectacle, as witnessed by Madison lawyer Bill Dixon (another pal of the legendary journalist/fabulist) in August 2005: the HST-rocket is fired from atop a gigantic raised fist clutching a stylized peyote button, Thompson's Gonzo logo, as Bob Dylan's "Mr. Tambourine Man" serenades at ear-blistering decibels the crowd of friends & family. The rocket rises toward heaven, but stops short of God's grasp, exploding in a fiery blaze of sound & light, eventually drifting back down to Earth.
Can't think of a better way to scatter one's ashes across the surface of this odd planetary way station from womb to tomb myself.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Stax soul, Dream Boogie & a Memphis Boy: the Muse gets inspired
A devotee of both pop culture & highbrow art, your friendly neighborhood Muse of the Weird can find inspiration almost anywhere. I got enough thrills this week to last about a month - at a movie & pair of museums, no less. I'll try to translate my enthusiasm into entertaining, web-text for the Attention Deficit Generation.
The Stax Museum of American Soul Music (SMASM) sits grandly on McLemore Avenue in a rundown part of Memphis - bluesman Memphis Slim's old home is a crumbling ruin just across College Street. Sadly, Soulsville USA has become yet another struggling Mississippi River city attempting to re-brand itself (justifiably) as the Birthplace of Rock 'n' Roll. Located adjacent to a new music academy for high schoolers, SMASM treats visitors to a wealth of memorabilia & interpretive info about soul music, a worthy complement to 1960s rock 'n' roll & pop. Soul artists like Ray Charles & James Brown clogged the R&B charts as well as the pop hit parade with innovative songs circa 1959 to the early '70s.
After a brief introductory film, I was captivated by SMASM's initial exhibit: an evocation of a Sunday gospel service using weathered wooden slats, pews & the granite cornerstone (dated 1906) salvaged from Hoopers Chapel (TN) A.M.E. church, along with videos of preachers, singers & celebrants moved by the spirit to dance & shout. Gospel music, of course, provided the foundation for country music as well as the soul sound. Several important artists, including Sam Cooke & Aretha Franklin, crossed over from sanctified singing to soul stardom. If secular blues is the devil's music, as the old taboo would have it, then you can book my ticket to Hell right now.
While covering the notable work of such Memphis labels as Hi & Goldwax, with nods to Motown & other out-of-towners, SMASM focuses on the unlikely story of Stax/Volt Records, established & operated (along with the Satellite Records shop) by an unmusical white brother & sister. Jim Stewart & Estelle Axon had the good sense to hire a loyal bunch of talented Memphians, including writer/producer (later performer & so-called savior) Isaac Hayes. Even when forced to use crude 2-track tape recorders in a renovated movie theater, Stax's resourceful studio staff managed to produce some of the most unforgettable wax tracks ever made.
Booker T & the MGs, a harmoniously integrated group (2 whites & 2 blacks), made irresistible dance music ("Green Onions," "Time is Tight," etc.) that facilitated the death of segregation in the South. This instrumental group (which John Lennon satirized as "Book a table & the maitre D's") was the Stax house band, backing such stars as Sam & Dave and the overpowering Otis Redding, whose untimely death in a Madison (WI) plane crash in 1967 foreshadowed the demise of Stax half a decade later. In the replica Stax studio room, you can get within inches of Booker T. Jones's Hammond M-3 organ, Andrew Love's baritone sax, Al Jackson Jr.'s drumkit, Duck Dunn's bass & Steve Cropper's Fender Telecaster.
Sensory overload looms along every corridor as records play, producers reminisce, gold records shine & Tina Turner's slinky mini-dress & stage shoes beckon. Videos of '70s Soul Train TV dancers, projected on a large wraparound screen, invite you to find your own groove on a polished dance floor. It was a time of black pride & nearly universal appreciation. The ecstatic crowds attending Stax's revue tour of Europe in 1966 simply blew the musicians' minds.
Back home, Stax artists ruled the streets of Memphis. As funky Rufus Thomas bluntly put it: "If you were black for one night on Beale Street, you never would want to be white anymore." As proof of soul music's enduring popularity, I needed look no further than the Sarratt Cinema on the Vanderbilt University campus Wednesday night (Feb. 10): a packed house attended the "Sam Cooke: Legend" documentary, introduced by writer-in-residence Peter Guralnick, author of "Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke," a detailed biography by a master interviewer & fine prose stylist.
The Musicians Hall of Fame & Museum (MHFM), in contrast to SMASM, awaits a merciless wrecking ball in shining downtown Nashville, alias Music City USA. A poor stepchild of the nearby Country Music Hall of Fame & Museum, MHFM has the misfortune to be located on the footprint of the city's controversial new convention center. It is stuffed with equally riveting items donated by members of such legendary studio collectives as the Nashville A Team, the Memphis Boys, Detroit's Funk Brothers & LA's Wrecking Crew. Those gentlemen played on too many great country, pop & rock records to mention. I had the good fortune to shake hands with humble 70ish drummer Gene Chrisman, who was wearing his Memphis Boys jacket as he strolled with his family inspecting the exhibits, including a snare drum he'd autographed.
I learned that Gene Chrisman played on the first 45-rpm record I ever bought, Elvis Presley's 1969 hit "In the Ghetto" (written by Mac Davis) as well as on one of my favorite blue-eyed soul/pop tunes of all time, the Box Tops' "Cry Like a Baby" (1968; by teen-aged genius singer/songwriter Alex Chilton). Even as the MHFM's director, another fella named Joe, handed out trophies & medallions to the likes of DJ Fontana, Elvis' drummer for 14 years, a different kid of wrecking crew was busy demolishing the building next door. "It's a damn shame they're tearing it down," DJ said in his brief acceptance speech, referring to the MHFM.
Amen, brother. Even the greatest musicians are too often relegated to the shadows cast by big stars.
The Stax Museum of American Soul Music (SMASM) sits grandly on McLemore Avenue in a rundown part of Memphis - bluesman Memphis Slim's old home is a crumbling ruin just across College Street. Sadly, Soulsville USA has become yet another struggling Mississippi River city attempting to re-brand itself (justifiably) as the Birthplace of Rock 'n' Roll. Located adjacent to a new music academy for high schoolers, SMASM treats visitors to a wealth of memorabilia & interpretive info about soul music, a worthy complement to 1960s rock 'n' roll & pop. Soul artists like Ray Charles & James Brown clogged the R&B charts as well as the pop hit parade with innovative songs circa 1959 to the early '70s.
After a brief introductory film, I was captivated by SMASM's initial exhibit: an evocation of a Sunday gospel service using weathered wooden slats, pews & the granite cornerstone (dated 1906) salvaged from Hoopers Chapel (TN) A.M.E. church, along with videos of preachers, singers & celebrants moved by the spirit to dance & shout. Gospel music, of course, provided the foundation for country music as well as the soul sound. Several important artists, including Sam Cooke & Aretha Franklin, crossed over from sanctified singing to soul stardom. If secular blues is the devil's music, as the old taboo would have it, then you can book my ticket to Hell right now.
While covering the notable work of such Memphis labels as Hi & Goldwax, with nods to Motown & other out-of-towners, SMASM focuses on the unlikely story of Stax/Volt Records, established & operated (along with the Satellite Records shop) by an unmusical white brother & sister. Jim Stewart & Estelle Axon had the good sense to hire a loyal bunch of talented Memphians, including writer/producer (later performer & so-called savior) Isaac Hayes. Even when forced to use crude 2-track tape recorders in a renovated movie theater, Stax's resourceful studio staff managed to produce some of the most unforgettable wax tracks ever made.
Booker T & the MGs, a harmoniously integrated group (2 whites & 2 blacks), made irresistible dance music ("Green Onions," "Time is Tight," etc.) that facilitated the death of segregation in the South. This instrumental group (which John Lennon satirized as "Book a table & the maitre D's") was the Stax house band, backing such stars as Sam & Dave and the overpowering Otis Redding, whose untimely death in a Madison (WI) plane crash in 1967 foreshadowed the demise of Stax half a decade later. In the replica Stax studio room, you can get within inches of Booker T. Jones's Hammond M-3 organ, Andrew Love's baritone sax, Al Jackson Jr.'s drumkit, Duck Dunn's bass & Steve Cropper's Fender Telecaster.
Sensory overload looms along every corridor as records play, producers reminisce, gold records shine & Tina Turner's slinky mini-dress & stage shoes beckon. Videos of '70s Soul Train TV dancers, projected on a large wraparound screen, invite you to find your own groove on a polished dance floor. It was a time of black pride & nearly universal appreciation. The ecstatic crowds attending Stax's revue tour of Europe in 1966 simply blew the musicians' minds.
Back home, Stax artists ruled the streets of Memphis. As funky Rufus Thomas bluntly put it: "If you were black for one night on Beale Street, you never would want to be white anymore." As proof of soul music's enduring popularity, I needed look no further than the Sarratt Cinema on the Vanderbilt University campus Wednesday night (Feb. 10): a packed house attended the "Sam Cooke: Legend" documentary, introduced by writer-in-residence Peter Guralnick, author of "Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke," a detailed biography by a master interviewer & fine prose stylist.
The Musicians Hall of Fame & Museum (MHFM), in contrast to SMASM, awaits a merciless wrecking ball in shining downtown Nashville, alias Music City USA. A poor stepchild of the nearby Country Music Hall of Fame & Museum, MHFM has the misfortune to be located on the footprint of the city's controversial new convention center. It is stuffed with equally riveting items donated by members of such legendary studio collectives as the Nashville A Team, the Memphis Boys, Detroit's Funk Brothers & LA's Wrecking Crew. Those gentlemen played on too many great country, pop & rock records to mention. I had the good fortune to shake hands with humble 70ish drummer Gene Chrisman, who was wearing his Memphis Boys jacket as he strolled with his family inspecting the exhibits, including a snare drum he'd autographed.
I learned that Gene Chrisman played on the first 45-rpm record I ever bought, Elvis Presley's 1969 hit "In the Ghetto" (written by Mac Davis) as well as on one of my favorite blue-eyed soul/pop tunes of all time, the Box Tops' "Cry Like a Baby" (1968; by teen-aged genius singer/songwriter Alex Chilton). Even as the MHFM's director, another fella named Joe, handed out trophies & medallions to the likes of DJ Fontana, Elvis' drummer for 14 years, a different kid of wrecking crew was busy demolishing the building next door. "It's a damn shame they're tearing it down," DJ said in his brief acceptance speech, referring to the MHFM.
Amen, brother. Even the greatest musicians are too often relegated to the shadows cast by big stars.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Black Power! Vietnam vets exhibit at the NCRM in Memphis
After following the "Music Highway" stretch of I-40 from Nashville to Memphis this weekend, I visited the National Civil Rights Museum (NCRM), located at the old Lorraine Motel near downtown Soulsville USA. My favorite exhibit was not the permanently displayed assassination paraphernalia (eerily placed in the former rooming house where Ray fired the fatal shot at Dr. King on April 4, 1968), but rather the NCRM's moving temporary exhibit about the bitter experiences of African-American veterans who served in large numbers in Vietnam from 1965 to 1973.
I learned so much in that single small room, laid out around a recreated "hootch" (i.e. hut where soldiers bivouaced awaiting combat, from the Japanese "uchi" or house). For example:
* I dug the video demonstrations (from file footage & vet testimony) of "dapping," a complex system of hand/fist touch-signals used by black soldiers to communicate such information as how long they'd been on patrol & how many assaults they'd endured.
* Mau Mau was a black nationalist organization established on U.S. military bases in West Germany (including the Heidelberg Army HQ where I was born) in the 1960s, which quickly spread to 'Nam; a few black-red-green MM-type flags - rich in war & peace symbolism, some featuring Swahili slogans - were on display, along with several photos & filmclips of troops giving the black-power salute, occasionally alongside sheepish white guys trying to look hip to the brothers.
* Civil-rights hero & Nashville native Julian Bond authored an anti-war comic book called "Vietnam" (with stylish illustrations by T.G. Lewis) at age 27 in 1967 while appealing his expulsion from the Georgia House of Representatives for opposing the war & the military draft; he was ultimately exonerated by the United States Supreme Court (see Bond v. Floyd, 385 U.S. 116), which ruled that the state legislature had violated Bond's free-speech rights by refusing to seat him.
* NAACP attorney (later U.S. Supreme Court Justice) Thurgood Marshall attended Pres. Truman's ceremonial signing of Executive Order No. 9981, ordering desegregation of the Armed Forces, in May 1948; Marchall stands tall & dignified as ever behind the beaming but seated "Buck-stops-here" Harry with an expression that conveys both well-deserved pride & appropriate skepticism.
* Pres. Lyndon Johnson, in cahoots with then-warmonger/Defense Sec. Robert McNamara, authorized "Project 100,000" in 1966, lowering the Armed Forces' qualification standards so as to instantly raise available troop levels, i.e. to summon more cannon fodder for LBJ's Vietnam Disaster.
* The Selective Service System suspiciously issued Orders to Report for Induction even to 26-year-old activists with student deferments who dared to drop out of school in order to work for civil rights in the South; sometimes SSS induction orders were sent in clusters to black neighborhoods.
* African-Americans suffered about 40% of the combat casualties in Vietnam, despite comprising just 10% of the U.S. population at the time.
* The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) officially came out against the Vietnam War in 1966; Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. followed in 1967, upsetting even Bobby Kennedy, who didn't dare publicly oppose the war until early 1968.
* Wallace Terry, a journalist who covered the war up close as Time magazine's Saigon bureau chief starting in 1967, wrote a classic book called "Bloods: An Oral History of the Vietnam War," which focuses on African-American combat troops; in 1957, at age 19, Terry disguised himself as a waiter in order to get an interview with Arkansas' segregationist Gov. Orville Faubus - the story caused a sensation when it hit the front page of the NY Times.
Perhaps the most moving items at that NCRM exhibit, however, were a pair of telegrams sent by the Dept. of Defense to the family of sailor Leroy Mudd in 1970: the first, dated June 29, states (in cold bureaucratic, typo-riddled language) that Mudd was missing & presumed drowned after diving into a river in pursuit of a football that had gone overboard; the second, dated July 1, notes that Mudd's body had been recovered, adding that the government would pay up to $500 to cover any private burial costs. Mudd, 18, had only been in 'Nam for a few months.
"Afghanistan," as I like to remind friends with whom I correspond through the U.S. Postal Service, nearly rhymes with "Vietnam." The Masters of War just can't seem to inflict enough violence & mayhem on humanity. Sorry, Bob - your 1963 protest song has fallen on too many deaf ears, even all these years after the Cold War ended.
I learned so much in that single small room, laid out around a recreated "hootch" (i.e. hut where soldiers bivouaced awaiting combat, from the Japanese "uchi" or house). For example:
* I dug the video demonstrations (from file footage & vet testimony) of "dapping," a complex system of hand/fist touch-signals used by black soldiers to communicate such information as how long they'd been on patrol & how many assaults they'd endured.
* Mau Mau was a black nationalist organization established on U.S. military bases in West Germany (including the Heidelberg Army HQ where I was born) in the 1960s, which quickly spread to 'Nam; a few black-red-green MM-type flags - rich in war & peace symbolism, some featuring Swahili slogans - were on display, along with several photos & filmclips of troops giving the black-power salute, occasionally alongside sheepish white guys trying to look hip to the brothers.
* Civil-rights hero & Nashville native Julian Bond authored an anti-war comic book called "Vietnam" (with stylish illustrations by T.G. Lewis) at age 27 in 1967 while appealing his expulsion from the Georgia House of Representatives for opposing the war & the military draft; he was ultimately exonerated by the United States Supreme Court (see Bond v. Floyd, 385 U.S. 116), which ruled that the state legislature had violated Bond's free-speech rights by refusing to seat him.
* NAACP attorney (later U.S. Supreme Court Justice) Thurgood Marshall attended Pres. Truman's ceremonial signing of Executive Order No. 9981, ordering desegregation of the Armed Forces, in May 1948; Marchall stands tall & dignified as ever behind the beaming but seated "Buck-stops-here" Harry with an expression that conveys both well-deserved pride & appropriate skepticism.
* Pres. Lyndon Johnson, in cahoots with then-warmonger/Defense Sec. Robert McNamara, authorized "Project 100,000" in 1966, lowering the Armed Forces' qualification standards so as to instantly raise available troop levels, i.e. to summon more cannon fodder for LBJ's Vietnam Disaster.
* The Selective Service System suspiciously issued Orders to Report for Induction even to 26-year-old activists with student deferments who dared to drop out of school in order to work for civil rights in the South; sometimes SSS induction orders were sent in clusters to black neighborhoods.
* African-Americans suffered about 40% of the combat casualties in Vietnam, despite comprising just 10% of the U.S. population at the time.
* The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) officially came out against the Vietnam War in 1966; Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. followed in 1967, upsetting even Bobby Kennedy, who didn't dare publicly oppose the war until early 1968.
* Wallace Terry, a journalist who covered the war up close as Time magazine's Saigon bureau chief starting in 1967, wrote a classic book called "Bloods: An Oral History of the Vietnam War," which focuses on African-American combat troops; in 1957, at age 19, Terry disguised himself as a waiter in order to get an interview with Arkansas' segregationist Gov. Orville Faubus - the story caused a sensation when it hit the front page of the NY Times.
Perhaps the most moving items at that NCRM exhibit, however, were a pair of telegrams sent by the Dept. of Defense to the family of sailor Leroy Mudd in 1970: the first, dated June 29, states (in cold bureaucratic, typo-riddled language) that Mudd was missing & presumed drowned after diving into a river in pursuit of a football that had gone overboard; the second, dated July 1, notes that Mudd's body had been recovered, adding that the government would pay up to $500 to cover any private burial costs. Mudd, 18, had only been in 'Nam for a few months.
"Afghanistan," as I like to remind friends with whom I correspond through the U.S. Postal Service, nearly rhymes with "Vietnam." The Masters of War just can't seem to inflict enough violence & mayhem on humanity. Sorry, Bob - your 1963 protest song has fallen on too many deaf ears, even all these years after the Cold War ended.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
"History Detective" Elyse Luray visits Nashville: calling all collectors!
I got to meet one of my brainy celebrity crushes last night at Belmont University: Elyse Luray, art historian, auctioneer/appraiser & co-presenter of the informative & inspiring PBS series "History Detectives," among other television programs. Speaking at Yankee warp-speed in her trademark high black leather boots & long dress, she delivered a lecture about collecting art & antiques while offering reminiscences of her work with such icons as cartoonist Chuck Jones & filmmaker George Lucas. A native of Baltimore & an alumna of Tulane University (Class of '89), Luray rose to prominence at Christie's Auction House. She is an expert on Native-American art, arms & armor as well as collectible pop-culture & Old-West Americana.
Ms. Luray offered a several cogent tips for collectors:
* Collect items that inspire your passion, not mere investments.
* Narrow the focus of your collection so that it has a theme & a manageable scope.
* Do research using primary resources, specialty books & auction catalogs; Google might suggest some directions, but it cannot substitute for genuine investigation.
* Avoid restored objects, "multiples" (most prints & photos) & online auctions.
* Understand the difference between fair-market value (willing buyer meets flexible seller, e.g. at auction) & replacement (i.e. retail/insurance) value.
* Gather & keep any documentation about the object - proper provenance adds value.
* Paper studies (e.g. designs, sketches, storyboards & scripts) for later works are becoming rarer in this computerized era & may therefore have greater value in future.
* Never make a major purchase without getting a warranty (i.e. a money-back guarantee if the object proves to be inauthentic) from the dealer or seller.
Before a brief Q & A session, the audience was treated to a 16-minute story from "History Detectives" in which Ms. Luray traces a group of paintings by Thelma Johnson Streat, who was among the 40,000 artists (including dancers, writers, actors & singers) employed by the WPA's federal arts projects (1935-43) & the first African-American woman to have her own work bought by the Museum of Modern Art. She was able to find a rare letter by Diego Rivera extolling Streat's talent as well as a government film & document proving that Streat worked on a massive 1940 "Union-of-Americas" mural, now on display at the City College of San Francisco. The gratitude expressed by the paintings' current owner, a niece of Ms. Streat in Oregon, made Luray's cross-country travel & archival research worthwhile. If you are interested in either U.S. history or collectible art & antiques, I urge you to check out the very entertaining "History Detectives" (episodes available at www.pbs.org). It even has a groovy theme: Elvis Costello's "Watching the Detectives" (1977).
Among the small exhibition of 19th-century decorative arts, presented under the rubric "American Experience" at Belmont's Leu Gallery (its opening was the tie-in for Ms. Luray's campus visit), I was moved by the needlepoint samplers on silk & linen (c. 1840). The moral & religious verses stitched onto those faded folksy handkerchief-sized fabrics were less interesting than the fact that such products of the domestic arts gave women a rare expressive outlet at a time when they were excluded from participating in our so-called democracy. The women & girls who made them often added their names, ages & dates - as if to say "I matter too in this world run by men."
Ms. Luray offered a several cogent tips for collectors:
* Collect items that inspire your passion, not mere investments.
* Narrow the focus of your collection so that it has a theme & a manageable scope.
* Do research using primary resources, specialty books & auction catalogs; Google might suggest some directions, but it cannot substitute for genuine investigation.
* Avoid restored objects, "multiples" (most prints & photos) & online auctions.
* Understand the difference between fair-market value (willing buyer meets flexible seller, e.g. at auction) & replacement (i.e. retail/insurance) value.
* Gather & keep any documentation about the object - proper provenance adds value.
* Paper studies (e.g. designs, sketches, storyboards & scripts) for later works are becoming rarer in this computerized era & may therefore have greater value in future.
* Never make a major purchase without getting a warranty (i.e. a money-back guarantee if the object proves to be inauthentic) from the dealer or seller.
Before a brief Q & A session, the audience was treated to a 16-minute story from "History Detectives" in which Ms. Luray traces a group of paintings by Thelma Johnson Streat, who was among the 40,000 artists (including dancers, writers, actors & singers) employed by the WPA's federal arts projects (1935-43) & the first African-American woman to have her own work bought by the Museum of Modern Art. She was able to find a rare letter by Diego Rivera extolling Streat's talent as well as a government film & document proving that Streat worked on a massive 1940 "Union-of-Americas" mural, now on display at the City College of San Francisco. The gratitude expressed by the paintings' current owner, a niece of Ms. Streat in Oregon, made Luray's cross-country travel & archival research worthwhile. If you are interested in either U.S. history or collectible art & antiques, I urge you to check out the very entertaining "History Detectives" (episodes available at www.pbs.org). It even has a groovy theme: Elvis Costello's "Watching the Detectives" (1977).
Among the small exhibition of 19th-century decorative arts, presented under the rubric "American Experience" at Belmont's Leu Gallery (its opening was the tie-in for Ms. Luray's campus visit), I was moved by the needlepoint samplers on silk & linen (c. 1840). The moral & religious verses stitched onto those faded folksy handkerchief-sized fabrics were less interesting than the fact that such products of the domestic arts gave women a rare expressive outlet at a time when they were excluded from participating in our so-called democracy. The women & girls who made them often added their names, ages & dates - as if to say "I matter too in this world run by men."
Monday, February 1, 2010
The Muse's Manifesto: An Open Letter from Music City
Ladies & Gentlemen:
While I enjoy a rare moment of peace & privacy in this all-too-hostile hostel, mercifully located within easy walking distance of Baptist Hospital (in case I should resort to drastic coping measures), I thought I would amuse you with a few inspirational words. They come to your attention via the weird miracle that is the World Wide Web, a technology apparently spun by some greedy spiders in a corner office near Silicon Valley, California.
I promise to make this brief because life's too short to be tedious or, what's worse, to inflict one's tedium on others. Fortified by Tazo Zen green tea & a banana, I attack the task despite the midnight hour & my failing eyesight. Tonight in my bunk -- by the way, I share a small room outfitted with steel bunkbeds alongside a closeted gay slob, a human paradox indeed, but a silly young cartoon fan who serves a good purpose: he makes me, a hypersensitive aesthete, feel macho by comparison.
Anyway, I was reading a letter dated June 26, 1959, written by Hunter S. Thompson. At the time, he was an unemployed 22-year-old ex-journalist & Air Force vet living hand to mouth in a remote cabin near Cuddebackville, New York. His addressee was a paramour in Florida with the unfortunate name of Miss Frick. In that charming letter (HST kept carbon copies of his vast typewritten correspondence even then) he assures her that, despite setbacks in his attempts at publishing fiction, "They ain't throwin' dirt on my coffin yet."
This was 7 years before his first literary success, the insightful & delightful "nonfiction" book "Hell's Angels: The Strange & Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs" (1966). The Doctor had plenty of struggle ahead of him before the glory years at Rolling Stone magazine. And, of course, his life-story ended sadly: like his early hero Hemingway, Hunter eventually put a gun in his mouth & pulled the trigger.
But he quotes a poet in that Frickian letter, composed by an ambitious & talented youthful misfit from Louisville - a quote which bears repeating & glossing:
"To be nobody-but-yourself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you somebody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." - e.e. cummings.
If you prefer a musical paraphrase of that idea, try this one:
"Well, I try my best / To be just like I am
But everybody wants you / To be just like them."
- Bob Dylan, "Maggie's Farm" (1965).
Perhaps you are engaged in that endless campaign of self-realization. If so, I salute you. If not -- if, in fact, you have already surrendered to what Dylan once called "society's pliers," i.e. its constant conformist onslaught, well, I suppose I can only pity you. All I can say for sure is that I am doing my damnedest to be & remain nobody but Myself. And I have the scars (as well as the bunkbed) to prove it. But they ain't throwin' dirt on my coffin yet, are they? Now go think for yourself. I'm tired.
While I enjoy a rare moment of peace & privacy in this all-too-hostile hostel, mercifully located within easy walking distance of Baptist Hospital (in case I should resort to drastic coping measures), I thought I would amuse you with a few inspirational words. They come to your attention via the weird miracle that is the World Wide Web, a technology apparently spun by some greedy spiders in a corner office near Silicon Valley, California.
I promise to make this brief because life's too short to be tedious or, what's worse, to inflict one's tedium on others. Fortified by Tazo Zen green tea & a banana, I attack the task despite the midnight hour & my failing eyesight. Tonight in my bunk -- by the way, I share a small room outfitted with steel bunkbeds alongside a closeted gay slob, a human paradox indeed, but a silly young cartoon fan who serves a good purpose: he makes me, a hypersensitive aesthete, feel macho by comparison.
Anyway, I was reading a letter dated June 26, 1959, written by Hunter S. Thompson. At the time, he was an unemployed 22-year-old ex-journalist & Air Force vet living hand to mouth in a remote cabin near Cuddebackville, New York. His addressee was a paramour in Florida with the unfortunate name of Miss Frick. In that charming letter (HST kept carbon copies of his vast typewritten correspondence even then) he assures her that, despite setbacks in his attempts at publishing fiction, "They ain't throwin' dirt on my coffin yet."
This was 7 years before his first literary success, the insightful & delightful "nonfiction" book "Hell's Angels: The Strange & Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs" (1966). The Doctor had plenty of struggle ahead of him before the glory years at Rolling Stone magazine. And, of course, his life-story ended sadly: like his early hero Hemingway, Hunter eventually put a gun in his mouth & pulled the trigger.
But he quotes a poet in that Frickian letter, composed by an ambitious & talented youthful misfit from Louisville - a quote which bears repeating & glossing:
"To be nobody-but-yourself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you somebody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." - e.e. cummings.
If you prefer a musical paraphrase of that idea, try this one:
"Well, I try my best / To be just like I am
But everybody wants you / To be just like them."
- Bob Dylan, "Maggie's Farm" (1965).
Perhaps you are engaged in that endless campaign of self-realization. If so, I salute you. If not -- if, in fact, you have already surrendered to what Dylan once called "society's pliers," i.e. its constant conformist onslaught, well, I suppose I can only pity you. All I can say for sure is that I am doing my damnedest to be & remain nobody but Myself. And I have the scars (as well as the bunkbed) to prove it. But they ain't throwin' dirt on my coffin yet, are they? Now go think for yourself. I'm tired.
Would The Band by another name sound as sweet?
In British music critic Peter Doggett's fine book "Are You Ready for the Country: Elvis, Dylan, Parsons and the roots of country rock" (2000), I came upon this funny story by Levon Helm, winner of the 2010 (first ever) Grammy award for best Americana album for "Electric Dirt," about choosing a name in 1967 for his most famous group, The Band (Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Class of 1994):
"We were going to call ourselves the Crackers [i.e. Southern black slang for poor white folks]. I was proud to come out of an Arkansas farm, and the other guys [all Canadians] weren't exactly rich, either. So we thought we should tell it like it is. And then we figured, no, maybe it will piss people off. Sometimes I wish we had gone with the Crackers, just to push it in their faces."
Fellow Band member Richard Manuel, who committed suicide by hanging after a post-gig conversation with Helm in Florida in 1986, said that they also wanted to call themselves The Honkies. Serious as they usually sounded, The Band certainly had a sense of humor. Guitarist Robbie Robertson, writer of perhaps the Band's greatest songs ("The Weight" & "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down") let Levon take the lead vocal on those numbers. A very good move, as it turned out.
Congratulations on the Grammy, Levon. Sure wish I could attend one of those Midnight Rambles on your rural property in upstate New York. That would be a wonderful & possibly weird evening of old-fashioned entertainment.
"We were going to call ourselves the Crackers [i.e. Southern black slang for poor white folks]. I was proud to come out of an Arkansas farm, and the other guys [all Canadians] weren't exactly rich, either. So we thought we should tell it like it is. And then we figured, no, maybe it will piss people off. Sometimes I wish we had gone with the Crackers, just to push it in their faces."
Fellow Band member Richard Manuel, who committed suicide by hanging after a post-gig conversation with Helm in Florida in 1986, said that they also wanted to call themselves The Honkies. Serious as they usually sounded, The Band certainly had a sense of humor. Guitarist Robbie Robertson, writer of perhaps the Band's greatest songs ("The Weight" & "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down") let Levon take the lead vocal on those numbers. A very good move, as it turned out.
Congratulations on the Grammy, Levon. Sure wish I could attend one of those Midnight Rambles on your rural property in upstate New York. That would be a wonderful & possibly weird evening of old-fashioned entertainment.
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