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James Isaac Moore (January 11, 1924 – January 31, 1970), better known by his stage name Slim Harpo, was an American blues musician, a leading exponent of the swamp blues style, and “one of the most commercially successful blues artists of his day”. His most successful and influential recordings included “I’m a King Bee” (1957), “Rainin’ in My Heart” (1961), and “Baby Scratch My Back” (1966) which reached no. 1 on the R&B chart and no.16 on the US pop chart. A master of the blues harmonica, his stage name was derived from the popular nickname for that instrument, the “harp”.
Moore was born in Lobdell, Louisiana, the eldest child in his family. After his parents died he worked as a longshoreman and construction worker in New Orleans in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Influenced in style by Jimmy Reed, he began performing in Baton Rouge bars under the name Harmonica Slim, and also accompanied his brother-in-law Lightnin’ Slim in live performances. He started his own recording career in March 1957, working with the A&R man and record producer J. D. “Jay” Miller in Crowley, Louisiana. At his wife’s suggestion, he took the name Slim Harpo in order to differentiate himself from another performer called Harmonica Slim. His first solo release, for Excello Records, based in Nashville, Tennessee, was “I’m a King Bee“, backed with “I Got Love If You Want It” in 1957. The other musicians on the recording were Gabriel “Guitar Gable” Perrodin (guitar), John “Fats” Perrodin (bass), and Clarence “Jockey” Etienne (drums). Harpo played guitar in his live shows, but he usually used other guitarists when recording. The record was a regional hit but failed to make the national charts. He followed up with several more singles for Excello before having his first chart hit, “Rainin’ in My Heart”, in early 1961. The record reached number 17 on the Billboard R&B chart and number 34 on the U.S. pop chart, and it was followed soon after with an LP of the same name and additional singles. Many of his songs were co-written with his wife, Lovelle Moore, although she never received credit.
Never a full-time musician, Harpo had his own trucking business during the 1960s. According to writer Ryan Whirty, “Harpo and his band needed to tour constantly and play as much as possible; times were frequently lean financially, and the men had to scrape up whatever they could get.” But, by 1964, several of his tracks had been released on albums and singles in the UK, and British rock bands like the Rolling Stones, the Pretty Things, the Yardbirds, the Kinks, Pink Floyd and Them began to feature versions of his songs in their early repertoires. The Moody Bluesreportedly took their name from an instrumental track of Slim’s called “Moody Blues”.
more...NGC 2770 is intriguing, as over time it has hosted four different observed supernovae (not visible here).
Supernovae form in a few different ways, but always involve a dying star. These stars become unbalanced, lose control, and explode violently, briefly shining as brightly as an entire galaxy before slowly fading away.
One of the four supernovae observed within this galaxy, SN 2015bh, is especially interesting. This particular supernova initially had its identity called into question. When it was first discovered in 2015, astronomers classified SN 2015bh as a supernova imposter, believing it to be not an exploding star but simply an unpredictable outburst from a massive star in its final phase of life. Thankfully, astronomers eventually discovered the truth and the object was given its correct classification as a Type II supernova, resulting from the death of a star between eight and 50 times the mass of the Sun.
more...Aynsley Thomas Dunbar (born 10 January 1946) is an English drummer. He has worked with John Mayall, Frank Zappa, Jeff Beck, Journey, Jefferson Starship, Nils Lofgren, Eric Burdon, Shuggie Otis, Ian Hunter, Lou Reed, David Bowie, Mick Ronson, Whitesnake, Pat Travers, Sammy Hagar, Michael Schenker, UFO, Michael Chapman, Jake E. Lee, Leslie West, Kathi McDonald, Keith Emerson, Mike Onesko, Herbie Mann, and Flo & Eddie. Dunbar was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Journey in 2017.
more...James Joseph Croce (/ˈkroʊtʃi/; January 10, 1943 – September 20, 1973) was an American folk and rock singer-songwriter. Between 1966 and 1973, Croce released five studio albums and numerous singles.
His first two albums were commercially unsuccessful, failing to chart or produce any hit singles. During this period, Croce took a series of odd jobs to pay bills while he continued to write, record, and perform concerts. After forming a partnership with songwriter and guitarist Maury Muehleisen, his fortunes turned in the early 1970s. His breakthrough came in 1972; his third album You Don’t Mess Around with Jim produced three charting singles, including “Time in a Bottle“, which reached No. 1 after his death. The follow-up album, Life and Times contained the song “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown“, which was the only No. 1 hit he had during his lifetime.
The day before the lead single to his fifth album, I Got a Name, was released, Croce, along with five others, were killed in a plane crash, at the height of his popularity. Croce’s music continued to chart throughout the 1970s following his death. His wife, Ingrid Croce, was his early songwriting partner and she continued to write and record after his death, and his son A. J. Croce himself became a singer-songwriter in the 1990s. Croce was born in South Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to James Albert Croce and Flora Mary (Babusci) Croce, both Italian Americans from Trasacco and Balsorano in Abruzzo and Palermo in Sicily.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcqauC49Xmc
Edward Harrington (January 10, 1935 – June 1, 2018), better known by his stage name Eddy Clearwater, was an American blues musician who specialized in Chicago blues. Blues Revue said he plays “joyous rave-ups…he testifies with stunning soul fervor and powerful guitar. One of the blues’ finest songwriters.” Harrington was born in Macon, Mississippi, on January 10, 1935. He was raised by his part-Cherokee grandmother in Mississippi. His family moved to Birmingham, Alabama, in 1948. He was a cousin of the blues harmonica player Carey Bell.
He began playing guitar at age 13, teaching himself left-handed and upside down. He began performing with gospel groups, including the Five Blind Boys of Alabama. He moved to Chicago in 1950, playing predominantly gospel, and later developed his blues artistry after working with Magic Sam, Otis Rush, and others.
more...Maxwell Lemuel Roach (January 10, 1924 – August 16, 2007) was an American jazz drummer and composer. A pioneer of bebop, he worked in many other styles of music, and is generally considered alongside the most important drummers in history. He worked with many famous jazz musicians, including Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Abbey Lincoln, Dinah Washington, Charles Mingus, Billy Eckstine, Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, Eric Dolphy, and Booker Little. He was inducted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1980 and the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1992. Roach also led his own groups, most notably a pioneering quintet co-led with trumpeter Clifford Brown and the percussion ensemble M’Boom. He made numerous musical statements relating to the civil rights movement. Max Roach was born to Alphonse and Cressie Roach in the Township of Newland, Pasquotank County, North Carolina, which borders the southern edge of the Great Dismal Swamp.
Roach studied classical percussion at the Manhattan School of Music from 1950 to 1953, working toward a Bachelor of Music degree. The school awarded him an Honorary Doctorate in 1990.
In 1952, Roach co-founded Debut Records with bassist Charles Mingus. The label released a record of a May 15, 1953 concert billed as “the greatest concert ever”, which came to be known as Jazz at Massey Hall, featuring Parker, Gillespie, Powell, Mingus, and Roach. Also released on this label was the groundbreaking bass-and-drum free improvisation, Percussion Discussion.
In 1954, Roach and trumpeter Clifford Brown formed a quintet that also featured tenor saxophonist Harold Land, pianist Richie Powell (brother of Bud Powell), and bassist George Morrow. Land left the quintet the following year and was replaced by Sonny Rollins. The group was a prime example of the hard bop style also played by Art Blakey and Horace Silver. Brown and Powell were killed in a car accident on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in June 1956. The first album Roach recorded after their deaths was Max Roach + 4. After Brown and Powell’s deaths, Roach continued leading a similarly configured group, with Kenny Dorham (and later Booker Little) on trumpet, George Coleman on tenor, and pianist Ray Bryant. Roach expanded the standard form of hard bop using 3/4 waltz rhythms and modality in 1957 with his album Jazz in 3/4 Time. During this period, Roach recorded a series of other albums for EmArcy Records featuring the brothers Stanley and Tommy Turrentine.
“Soleá” is a flamenco singing style. “The Andonda”, a gypsy singer, was the first reference of this style. She was married with the singer “El Fillo”, who died in Sevilla in 1878.
Oldest documents date from the 1850s, referring it as “La Soledad”. Sometimes as “soleá granaina”. In any case, these adjectives denote that this was very different from the current style.
“Soleá” dancing is performed by an only dancer with great expressiveness. Movements can be typically feminine and are accompanied by “zapateado”. Dancer also draws attention moving his hips with seriousness and rudeness.
Although “soleá” rhythm is heavy and slow, measure is similar to “bulerías” and “alegrías” (with other character). Considering music theory, rhythm would start on the pulse that is marked as 3, as way of following the lyrics of the song. Therefore, it would be a three beat rhythm with a changed accent, better said, a twelve pulse rhythm: 3+2+2+2+3.
more...Performing with Theater 55’s production of Urinetown.
“To Pee or not to Pee!”
Illusion Theatre, 528 Hennepin Ave, 8th Floor
2/28/2020 – 3/15/2020
Fridays at 7:30pm
Saturdays at 2pm and 7:30pm
Sundays at 2pm
** Special matinee on Wednesday, March 11 at 1pm
more...
In 1879, astronomer Benjamin Gould identified what looked to be a ring in the sky, measuring about 3,000 light-years across, made of dust and gas and young stars – interconnected stellar nurseries. Now, a new discovery has shattered our understanding of this structure, which has been known for 150 years as Gould’s Belt.
This wave – newly named the Radcliffe Wave, after Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study, where the research was conducted – includes many of the stellar nurseries found in Gould’s Belt, and others besides.
It’s the largest gaseous structure identified in the Milky Way (although not the largest structure in the galaxy; the Fermi gamma-ray bubbles, for example, span 50,000 light-years).
“No astronomer expected that we live next to a giant, wave-like collection of gas – or that it forms the local arm of the Milky Way,” said astronomer Alyssa Goodman of the Smithsonian Institution, and co-director of the Science Program at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.
“We were completely shocked when we first realised how long and straight the Radcliffe Wave is, looking down on it from above in 3D – but how sinusoidal it is when viewed from Earth. The Wave’s very existence is forcing us to rethink our understanding of the Milky Way’s 3D structure.”
The Gaia satellite was launched in 2013, and has been collecting data ever since to produce the most accurate 3D map yet of our home galaxy, the Milky Way. This is what the researchers were studying to try to get a better understanding of the structure of Gould’s Belt – to determine if the clouds do, in fact, form a ring in three dimensions.
They also used recently developed techniques based on the colour of stars to map the 3D distribution of dust around them, and to accurately measure the distances to stellar nurseries – regions where clumps of dust and gas collapse under their own gravity to form new stars.
Yet, as they looked closer at the data, they realised they were looking at a structure of these interconnected regions, but also a structure that was much bigger than Gould’s Belt itself.
“Instead, what we’ve observed is the largest coherent gas structure we know of in the galaxy, organised not in a ring but in a massive, undulating filament,” said physicist and astronomer João Alves of the University of Vienna in Austria.
“The Sun lies only 500 light-years from the Wave at its closest point. It’s been right in front of our eyes all the time, but we couldn’t see it until now.”
If you look at it from the top down (obviously we can’t physically do this, but we can simulate the perspective with a computer-generated map), the Radcliffe Wave is more or less a straight line. Come back down to the galactic plane and look at it side-on, however, and it has an impressive sinuous wiggle.
It’s a peculiar shape, and it’s not entirely clear how it came about. “It could be like a ripple in a pond, as if something extraordinarily massive landed in our galaxy,” Alves said. We know such a thing is possible – Gaia data have also helped previously identify giant ripples across the Milky Way’s disc, thought to have been created by the collision with a dwarf galaxy less than a billion years ago. But the team’s paper offers no speculation about the event that could have created the Radcliffe Wave, although those investigations could form the basis of a future study.
more...James Patrick Page OBE (born 9 January 1944) is an English musician, songwriter, and record producer who achieved international success as the guitarist and founder of the rock band Led Zeppelin.
Page began his career as a studio session musician in London and, by the mid-1960s, alongside Big Jim Sullivan, was one of the most sought-after session guitarists in Britain. He was a member of the Yardbirds from 1966 to 1968. In late 1968, he founded Led Zeppelin.
Page is widely considered to be one of the greatest and most influential guitarists of all time. Rolling Stone magazine has described Page as “the pontiff of power riffing” and ranked him number three in their list of the “100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time”, behind Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. In 2010, he was ranked number two in Gibson‘s list of “Top 50 Guitarists of All Time” and, in 2007, number four on Classic Rock‘s “100 Wildest Guitar Heroes”. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice; once as a member of the Yardbirds (1992) and once as a member of Led Zeppelin (1995).
more...Joan Chandos Baez (/baɪz/;born January 9, 1941) is an American singer, songwriter, musician and activist. Her contemporary folk music often includes songs of protest or social justice. Baez has performed publicly for over 60 years, releasing over 30 albums. Fluent in Spanish and English, she has also recorded songs in at least six other languages.
Baez is generally regarded as a folk singer, but her music has diversified since the counterculture era of the 1960s and encompasses genres such as folk rock, pop, country and gospel music. She began her recording career in 1960 and achieved immediate success. Her first three albums, Joan Baez, Joan Baez, Vol. 2 and Joan Baez in Concert, all achieved gold record status. Although a songwriter herself, Baez generally interprets other composers’ work, having recorded songs by the Allman Brothers Band, the Beatles, Jackson Browne, Leonard Cohen, Woody Guthrie, Violeta Parra, the Rolling Stones, Pete Seeger, Paul Simon, Stevie Wonder, Bob Marley, and many others. She was one of the first major artists to record the songs of Bob Dylan in the early 1960s; Baez was already an internationally celebrated artist and did much to popularize his early songwriting efforts. On her later albums she has found success interpreting the work of more recent songwriters, including Ryan Adams, Josh Ritter, Steve Earle, Natalie Merchant and Joe Henry.
Baez’s acclaimed songs include “Diamonds & Rust” and covers of Phil Ochs‘s “There but for Fortune” and The Band‘s “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down“. She is also known for “Farewell, Angelina“, “Love Is Just a Four-Letter Word“, “Forever Young“, “Here’s to You“, “Joe Hill“, “Sweet Sir Galahad” and “We Shall Overcome“. Baez performed fourteen songs at the 1969 Woodstock Festival and has displayed a lifelong commitment to political and social activism in the fields of nonviolence, civil rights, human rights and the environment. Baez was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on April 7, 2017.
Baez was born on Staten Island, New York, on January 9, 1941. Joan’s grandfather, the Reverend Alberto Baez, left the Catholic Church to become a Methodist minister and moved to the U.S. when her father was two years old. Her father, Albert Baez (1912–2007), was born in Puebla, Mexico and grew up in Brooklyn, New York, where his father preached to—and advocated for—a Spanish-speaking congregation. Albert first considered becoming a minister but instead turned to the study of mathematics and physics and received his PhD degree at Stanford University in 1950. Albert was later credited as a co-inventor of the x-ray microscope.
more...John Paul “Bucky” Pizzarelli (born January 9, 1926) is an American jazz guitarist. He is the father of jazz guitarist John Pizzarelli and double bassist Martin Pizzarelli. He worked for NBC as a staffman for Dick Cavett (1971) and ABC with Bobby Rosengarden in (1952). The list of musicians he has collaborated with includes Benny Goodman, Les Paul, Stéphane Grappelli, and Antônio Carlos Jobim. Pizzarelli cites as influences Django Reinhardt, Freddie Green, and George Van Eps.
Pizzarelli was born January 9, 1926 in Paterson, New Jersey. He learned to play guitar and banjo at a young age. His uncles, Pete and Bobby Domenick, were professional musicians, and sometimes the extended family would gather at one of their homes with their guitars for jam sessions. Pizzarelli cites as an inspiration Joe Mooney, a blind accordion player who led a quartet that included Pizzarelli’s uncle, Bobby Domenick. During high school, Pizzarelli was guitarist for a small band that performed classical music. Pizzarelli began his professional career at 17 when he joined the Vaughn Monroe dance band in 1944.
In 1952 Pizzarelli became a staff musician for NBC, playing with Skitch Henderson. In 1964, he became a member of The Tonight Show Band on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. During his time spent performing for the Tonight Show, he accompanied guest bands and musicians playing through a variety of musical genres, including playing with Tiny Tim (after tuning the performer’s ukulele) on the day that Tiny Tim married Miss Vicki on Carson’s show.
more...Kenneth Clarke Spearman (January 9, 1914 – January 26, 1985), nicknamed Klook, was an American jazz drummer and bandleader. A major innovator of the bebop style of drumming, he pioneered the use of the Ride cymbal to keep time rather than the hi-hat, along with the use of the bass drum for irregular accents (“dropping bombs“).
Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, he was orphaned at the age of about five and began playing the drums when he was about eight or nine on the urging of a teacher at his orphanage. Turning professional in 1931 at the age of seventeen, he moved to New York City in 1935, establishing his drumming style and reputation. As the house drummer at Minton’s Playhouse in the early 1940s, he participated in the after-hours jams that led to the birth of bebop. After military service in the US and Europe between 1943 and 1946,he returned to New York, but between 1948 and 1951 he was mostly based in Paris. He stayed in New York between 1951 and 1956, performing with the Modern Jazz Quartet and playing on early Miles Davisrecordings during this time. He then moved permanently to Paris, where he performed and recorded with European and visiting American musicians and co-led the Kenny Clarke/Francy Boland Big Band between 1961 and 1972. He continued to perform and record until the month before he died of a heart attack in January 1985. Clarke was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on January 9, 1914 as the youngest of two sons, to Martha Grace Scott, a pianist from Pittsburgh, and Charles Spearman, a trombonist from Waycross, Georgia. The family home was on Wylie Avenue in the Lower Hill District of Pittsburgh. Clarke’s father left the household to start a new family in Yakima, Washington, and his mother, who began a relationship with a Baptist preacher shortly afterwards, died suddenly in her late twenties when Clarke was about five, leaving him an orphan. He and his brother were placed in the Coleman Industrial Home for Negro Boys.
Clarke was drafted into the US army and reported for induction in 1943. During his basic training in 1944, he married singer Carmen McRae. He went absent without leave for nearly four months, during which time he played with Cootie Williams and Dinah Washington, before being captured and sent to Europe. he eventually became part of the Special Services where he led and sang in chorales and performed on drums, trombone, and piano in various bands. While in Paris he met pianist and arranger John Lewis, with whom he began a long association.
Shortly after being discharged from the military and 1946, Clarke converted to Islam and took the name Liaquat Ali Salaam. He joined Dizzy Gillespie’s band for eight months, replacing Max Roach, who had become the most important bebop drummer in Clarke’s absence. Clarke introduced Lewis to the band and made several bop recordings with Gillespie’s sextet including “One Bass Hit (part 1)” and “Oop Bop Sh’Bam“, where his nickname was enshrined in the scat lyrics “Oop bop sh’bam a klook a mop”. He left Gillespie’s band temporarily and worked with Tadd Dameron, Sonny Stitt, Fats Navarro, and his own 52nd Street Boys, before rejoining Gillespie’s group in December 1947. He embarked on a tour with the band in Europe in early 1948, which he considered the highlight of his career. He stayed on in Paris until that August, recording, performing, teaching, and helping to select musicians for the First International Jazz Festival. He then returned to New York for nine months to work with Dameron’s group at the Royal Roost. During this time he also played with bassist Oscar Pettiford‘s band and recorded in the second session of the Miles Davis album Birth of the Cool. Also around this time, or perhaps shortly afterward, he developed an addiction to heroin that lasted until at least the 1960s. In 1948 he permanently separated from McRae; they divorced in 1956.[3][8][10] In May 1949 Clarke returned to Paris for the festival, making the city his home base for the next two years. While there he worked and recorded with bands led by pianist Bernard Peiffer and saxophonist Coleman Hawkins, and returned to Bechet’s band. At this time he met and had a brief affair with jazz singer Annie Ross, which resulted in a son, Kenny Clarke Jr. (born 1950), who was raised by Clarke’s brother and his wife.
Upon returning to New York in 1951, he toured with Billy Eckstine, and made recordings with saxophonist Charlie Parker‘s quintet and Milt Jackson‘s quartet. Jackson’s ensemble, which included Clarke’s friend John Lewis, became the Modern Jazz Quartet, and he performed with the group at the first Newport Jazz Festival in 1954 and recorded for their albums Modern Jazz Quartet (1952), 1953: An Exceptional Encounter (1953), and Django (1953–1955).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjS39J5QHA4
Large galaxies grow by eating small ones. Even our own galaxy engages in a sort of galactic cannibalism, absorbing small galaxies that are too close and are captured by the Milky Way’s gravity. In fact, thepractice is common in the universe and illustrated by this striking pair of interacting galaxies from the banks of the southern constellation Eridanus, The River. Located over 50 million light years away, the large, distortedspiral NGC 1532 is seen locked in a gravitational struggle with dwarf galaxy NGC 1531 (right of center), a struggle the smaller galaxy will eventually lose. Seen edge-on, spiral NGC 1532 spans about 100,000 light-years. Nicely detailed in this sharp image, the NGC 1532/1531 pair is thought to be similar to the well-studied system of face-on spiral and small companion known as M51.
more...Dave Weckl (born January 8, 1960) is an American jazz fusion drummer and leader of the Dave Weckl Band. He was inducted into the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 2000.
Weckl attended Francis Howell High School in St. Charles, Missouri, and graduated in 1978. He majored in jazz studies at the University of Bridgeportin Connecticut. Starting out on the New York fusion scene in the early 1980s, Weckl soon began working with artists such as Paul Simon, Madonna, George Benson, Michel Camilo, Robert Plant and Anthony Jackson. His most famous early work though, where his popularity blossomed, was with the Chick Corea Elektric Band from 1985 to 1991.[citation needed]
Weckl spent a total of seven years with Corea, during which he performed on many albums and also appeared with Corea’s Akoustic Band. He augmented his work with Corea by continuing his session work and appearing often with the GRP All-Star Big Band. He recorded four albums in 1988 and 1989 with the Manhattan Jazz Quintet. Weckl has released a series of instructional videotapes, and in 1990, he led his first solo date, Master Plan, for GRP. Heads Up followed in 1992, as well as Hard-Wired in 1994.
After leaving Corea’s band, Weckl recorded and toured with guitarist Mike Stern. Under his own name, he has been the leader of twelve recordings since 1990, seven of which as the Dave Weckl Band. He currently resides in Los Angeles, California, where he has his own home studio.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiNfjYUTPMs
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