New review of Electric Eggplant
cover art: Joan Longthe review... from Offbeat magazine.
The album is still available for instant download on...
Sonny Rollins
Can't resist this. Good of NPR to put it up...
Hendrix! "Do you think music has a meaning?"
And in a funny way, a response to the previous video.
A past improvisation-Jeff Albert, Nick Sanzenbach, Dave Capello
This came up while perusing Jeff Albert's Open Ears blog. It's from Nov. 21, 2007 and sounded pretty interesting after all these years.
Have a free listen...
Sanzenbach(sax), Capello(drums), Freilich(7string guitar), Albert(trombone)
Interview with Jeff Treffinger- guitarist, songwriter, architect, co-founder of The Mermaid Lounge, Tribe Nunzio.
A complete interview with Jeff Treffinger is now up on the interviews page. You may have seen him with the singular Geraniums, or any number of other projects. You may also know him as one of the key hands in the, legendary to some, Mermaid Lounge.
Here he talks about his foregound and background activities that at different times have shaped the New Orleans music scene. Treffinger describes how he came to be putting a bands together in New Orleans at all and, what his purposes were in doing so...or at least his thinking at the time. He tells stories about the accidental discoveries that led him to architecture and how that led him into certain other nooks in New Orleans music. He is frank about what he learned and how, and the interesting folks that he collaborates with or has dealt with over the years that have enabled his dealings to be loaded with a delightful, risky creativity.
Also available as a podcast from the itunes store.
Audio interview with Other Planets leader, Anthony Cuccia
Anthony Cuccia- Percussionist, keyboardist, composer, idea man for The Other Planets. Anthony uses music both for social consciousness and for exploration of its own various technologies. He is always striving for a new way to assemble his ideas.
Both parts of the interview have been posted and are also available as a podcast from the itunes store.
To New Orleans- half open letter
Firstly, I'll be back.
Secondly, it definitely feels like the end of a chapter and it's caused some amount of reflexive pondering. There were a lot of warm send off parties and parting gigs, and I can't express what it I felt like to receive that sort of attention from friends and colleagues. Thank you for all those who sent me off so well and made me feel some sense of accomplishment. It's nice to leave thinking that some musical efforts really have been understood.
...Now I find myself here in California, on the precipice of the Pacific, thinking so hard and gratefully about the last 22 years in New Orleans. I would always rather be there but I suppose musical exploration is driving me right now, more than location. New Orleans offers both in a way I love, but there are some directions that, artistically and, yes, even in music, that the city doesn't really foster at this juncture. There are, of course, still other well known features where the city shows itself to have no ceiling. I feel lucky to have benefitted a great deal from those limitless directions.
The music community that accepted me so easily when I first got to town is really composed of individuals. I can't really say enough about these figures. On the outside we spend a lot of time talking about the groups. And that is important from the outside, as music goes a long way in describing co-effort and harmony within groups. Yet, from the inside, particularly while playing, one is really feeling the
New Orleans Musician's Clinic is in dire need of help
I know a number of musicians who have been saved by this clinic. In the world of New Orleans music, which so many around the world love, it is an unbelievably important service. Please watch the video and, if nothing else, pass it on...
New Orleans Klezmer All-Stars play Outside Lands festival, San Francisco. Mother Jones gets the review
photo by John MargarettenInteresting article focusing on the band's humorous side.
Through the Klezmer All-Stars site: http://www.klezmerallstars.com/
Collaboration, dictatorial ideology, Platonic philosophy hangovers, and other thoughts before starting work on an opera
In preparing to write larger, theatrically bound pieces of music, a voracious appetite for webs of information, culled from as many fields as possible seems to take hold. (I'm speaking as a "newbie" here because I've only written one opera previously, Bang The Law.) Perhaps, it is because things like opera involve so many different features: poetry, acting, producing, directing, music, stage design, costume, psychology, history. Reasearch into everything possible seems to be called for. There is also the perennial fear of accidentally creating something too narrow or trivial. I get into a kind of trawling, sometimes directed, sometimes not, that leads to the right sort of mental and emotional fullness and wonder that overcomes stagnation, procrastination, and distraction. Opera demands collaboration anyhow so mental flexibility derived from poring over related ideas seems paramount becuse there is a certain openness and general knowledge required in working well with others with specialized talents.
I'm involved in the writing of a semi-operatic work currently so this is the process that seems to be dominant again. A couple of months back I was handed a libretto by writer, Adam Falik and agreed to collaborate on his libretto about a couple of early twentieth century art behemoths and a fictional encounter that drags them both down. In perusing some of
'twould have been his Birthday. By now, we'd be celebrating for a week. "This is for you Louis."
What Character! What a band!
Muggles, The Viperrrrrrr!
3 new interviews
Standby, for three new audio interviews.
Anthony Cuccia- Percussionist, keyboardist, composer, idea man for The Other Planets. Anthony is uses music both for socially consciousness and for exploration of its own various technologies. There is always a new way he is striving to assemble his ideas.
Dave Capello- a singular creative drummer with a desire for what is unique and portraying the importance of going for it even where there are risks involved. Originally, from Kansas City, Dave has spent many years playing with a smorgasboard of the most interesting creative units. Previous to New Orleans he was in New York playing with The Bern Nix Trio, and William Parker.
Jeff Treffinger- Architect, song writer, cofounder of Tribe Nunzio, guitarist with The Geraniums, co-owner of The Mermaid Lounge and The Truck Farm. That list is short and only covers the things that folks know most. He went pretty deep in this interview that discusses changes in the New Orleans music scene and the factors that contributed to it, as well as anecdotes that describe what it looked like at various times since his arrival.
Jay Mazza and The Vinyl District article on the leaving-town-epic-jam
This was a nice piece in that it feels really good because more than anything I have wished to be a contributor to this city that has my heart, New Orleans. No doubt, it is a drop in a vast ocean but it feels good that my efforts have been recognized. I hope to come back and be able to give more. More on that later...
Meantime...The Vinyl District