When I saw Metric last September at Radio City Music Hall as guest of live music buddy Steve Conte we were startled to hear Emily Haines welcome to the stage one of her musical heroes, Lou Reed. He came out for two songs, standing side by side with Haines. I was so sorry to learn of his passing today, at age 71. Here are my pictures of them from that special show.
The above trailer for a terrific looking new documentary, “Following the Ninth,” about performances of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in different locales around the world, has me eager to see this new film which will be screened at Lincoln Center beginning October 29th. It’s co-produced by media writer and author Greg Mitchell, whose book, So Wrong for So Long: How the Press, the Pundits–and the President–Failed on Iraq, with a Preface by Bruce Springsteen, I published with him in 2008. Greg and his co-producer Kerry Candaele have also written a current book, Journeys With Beethoven: Following the Ninth. You can find more info at Greg’s blog, via this link.
The past few months have been terrific for new films about music, with two earlier documentaries that I really enjoyed, which I wrote about and posted on this site. The first was on the blues. This is a couple sentences I wrote about it:
“It is a joyous film with superb archival footage, moving interviews, and high-quality audio of many great blues performances. It also narrates a moving story about how aspiring teenage musicians like guitarist Mike Bloomfield and keyboard player Barry Goldberg, from affluent parts of Chicago, began frequenting the clubs and bars where black titans of the blues like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf were then in residence.”
You may read the whole post via this link: Great New Documentary on the Blues, “Born in Chicago”.
The second film was on American guitarist and fabulist John Fahey. This is part of what I wrote about it:
“He developed a prodigiously creative vernacular guitar and compositional style that reflected blues, folk, and traditional American sources while also drawing on Charles Ives, Bela Bartok, Gregorian chant, and world music, before that term had any currency. As a facilitator and label owner, he would do things like send a postcard cold to a black bluesmen c/o General Delivery at a Mississippi delta town post office where he hoped the man still lived, asking: “Would you like to record for the Takoma Records label?”; thus did he bring to public awareness the music of Booker (later known as ‘Bukka’) White, Charley Patton, and Skip James.
You may read my whole post here: “In Search of Blind Joe Death,” New Documentary on John Fahey.
It’s a great season for films on music, especially as I think about the upcoming “Inside Llewyn Davis,” which from the trailer appears to be a feature film very freely adapted by the Coen Brothers from the late Dave Van Ronk’s memoir Mayor of MacDougal Street. Here’s the trailer for it:
This is a link to my coverage of the annual CMJ Music Festival at the sister blog to this one, Honourary Canadian. The post, Three Fun Showcases for Great Canadian Acts at NYC’s CMJ Music Festival, includes lots of pictures like the one of Yamantaka//Sonic Titan at the top of this post, and a video of the band Kandle, from Montreal.
It’s been a celebratory week in NYC and an active one on The Great Gray Bridge, so here is a summary of recent highlights for interested readers who may have missed any of them.
1) Celebrating Photojournalist & Author Ruth Gruber’s 102nd Birthday With Her
2) Word of an Important New Book on Bob Dylan By a ’60s Confidant
3) Celebrating Valerie Plame’s “Blowback”&Recalling Tumultous Events of a Decade Ago
4) #FridayReads, Oct. 4–Katie Hafner’s Exquisite Memoir “Mother Daughter Me”
Said the Whale, a power-pop 5-piece from Vancouver, BC, was in town last week and they put on a great show on the Lower East Side at Mercury Lounge. Here’s a pic of Tyler Bancroft and Ben Worcester–songwriters, lead singers and guitarists in the band. For my full post on the show, please read it at my new blog Honourary Canadian. The second pic is of me with Ben, taken by my gig buddy Steve Conte.
October 2 Update: Earlier this story about a new Dylan book was only reported on a subscription-required only website. Now it’s also been covered in Publishers Weekly and here is a link to that story.
Word comes from BookBrunch’s Liz Thomson (subscription required) of a new memoir about Bob Dylan, by a hitherto little-known associate named Victor Maymudes who reportedly served as tour manager, driver, and Dylan confidant beginning in 1961. The photo here by Daniel Kramer shows the two playing chess in Woodstock, NY. Reportedly, he was at Newport when Dylan controversially went electric for the first time, and also on the UK tour that led to D.A. Pennebaker’s classic documentary “Dont Look Back” (sic). Maymudes died before he could finish the manuscript. The photos, tapes, film, and papers passed to his son, Jacob, and then barely survived a fire that wrecked the younger Maymudes’ home. He will now complete the manuscript. The book already has an editor and publisher in the States, George Witte of St. Martin’s Press, who’s been following the fate of the manuscript since the beginning of the century. According to Thomson, Jacob Maymudes and his agent are still seeking a UK publisher, and other foreign partners. A documentary is also reported to be in the works, with this video trailer prepared to introduce Victor Maymudes’ work to interested parties.