johnblitweiler

Tomorrow, Monday Jan. 7, there'll be a celebration of Alvin on ZoundZ!, 6:30 to 9 pm Chicago time on WHPK 88.5 FM and www.whpk.org. https://jazztimes.com/departments/overdue-ovation/alvin-fielder/?fbclid=IwAR2qlkEkCXO4v5s020qV3mdTiteP4dH9iGnB3rJOZMtATBkfKflKNFxcP7w#.XDJObCj9sOw.facebook is an interview I did over a decade ago and Ted Panken has a great interview with Alvin on his (Ted's) website.

WHPK 88.5 FM Chicago streams over the web at whpk.org but is now down to 28 hours a week of jazz. My program ZoundZ! is Mondays 6:30 to 9 pm Central Time; there's jazz on Wednesday and Thursday evenings, Saturday and Sunday daytimes and late nights. It's the University of Chicago station and the schedule is subject to the university's whimsies - for example, the whole station is off the air until January 7 we now go off the air at midnight all the time. A more reliable station is WNUR (wnur.org) at Northwestern University, which has jazz every weekday morning 6 am to noon. It has an especially fascinating program on Mondays, 10 am to noon: Writers Bloc with Art Lange and Peter Kostakis. For one thing, they're how I discovered a Wilton Crawley CD exists. Two other especially good programs. A number of radio stations around the country carry Steve Cushing's 5-hour program Blues Before Sunrise each week. It's about 70% or so blues (1920s to '60s) and the rest is older jazz, mostly vocals. And Lazaro Vega is nightly jazz host on the two Blue Lake radio stations (https://bluelake.org/radio/program_guide.php) - some of his broadcasts are live performances, typically with important artists.

In fact, I'm playing some enjoyable Christmas downloads by Organissimo tonight.

This is something new for me: In 2018 I volunteered to help program a student film society and one of the series I proposed, a Satyajit Ray series, was accepted. It will happen for 10 weeks in the spring, a night after a 10-week Claude Chabrol series. (I know, 10 weeks is merely an overview of both directors.) No problem locating 35mm or 16mm prints to show, but finding and contacting he/she who has the rights to these has been a bit of a problem A bigger one is, for another series proposal, finding who has the rights to the Bert Stern film "Jazz on a Summer's Day" now that Stern has died and the distributor has vanished. So far just some dodgy advice or "try so-and-so" who suggests trying someone else. Some of you Organissimo folks have experience programming film groups or eaters. Is there somewhere a grand catalogue of who currently own copyrights to films and who distributes them?

Jody played with Wolf, Bo Diddley, and plenty of other Chicagoans worth hearing. He said he invented the "Bo Diddley" guitar line, also the guitar line that Mickey Baker played in "Love Is Strange."

Terrific, glowing music in concert and a delight on CDs, both Volumes I and Volume 2:

Recent reading: The Doomed City by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky - Curiouser and curiouser, a long allegory about people living in a ramshackle artificial state with baboons running loose. Would people who lived in the Soviet Union 50 years ago undersand this more than we who didn't live there then? Gotta keep reading the Strugatskys and hope for another as fine as Roadside Picnic. The Fall by Albert Camus - Very much a post-WW2 attitude, it seems. His despair doesn't seem to fit 21st century life, however depressing events seem. Diablerie by Walter Moseley - It's jive. Granted hard-boiled is artificial, Moseley once could write good hard-boiled, but this mess is padded with the glitz and sex and psychologizing and silly plotting of a writer at the end of his rope. Reread the script of Mother Courage by Brecht, a breath of fresh air lately. Anna of the 5 Towns by Arnold Bennett - The over-the-top distant, miser father and emotionally strangled daughter are all too believable, the Methodism of the Edwardian times is familiar from my 1950s boyhood, and the industrial-city setting is horrifying amidst Blake's "dark, satanic mills."

Yes, God bless him. He was 20 years old when he recorded that. He led an enjoyable band at the Chicago Jazz Festival this year, too.

No, not Pickapeppa. That Jamaican sauce I had once was a yellow-colored and mustard-based sauce, like Melinda's Amarillo Sauce.

Terrific movie. The contrast of that terrible radical Stokely Carmichael speaking to a black audience vs. that distinguished governor-candidate David Duke speaking to his fellow KKKlansmen is illuminating, and a high point.

Yes, King of the Blues is pretty wonderful. Along with the inventive horns, there's the Baby Dodds interplay, so hyperactive and colorful all the time - he's not just accompanying, he's really engaged with the horns. Bunk is such a beauty. Even on some other American Music CDs, when Bunk is not tip-top, George Lewis and Dodds keep the music lively. But yes, some of the post-1945 albums are disappointing. His eight sides with the Yerba Buena band are special favorites, partly because the band seems so reckless next to the lovely trumpet melodies. I like Sister Lottie Peavey's singing, never did enjoy Clancy Hayes' singing. Last Testament was the first Bunk Johnson I ever heard, many decades ago. "Kinklets" and the lilting trumpet in "Out of Nowhere" won me over. Jeff, thanks for remembering Bunk Johnson.

Rubbin' on the Same Old Thing The Girls Go Crazy about the Way I Walk Dirty, Dirty, Dirty

Melinda's Amarillo Sauce (made in LA) used to be a favorite - a mustard-based habanero sauce. The last bottle I bought tastes sorta diluted, though. There's a Jamaican hotsuce (don't recall the name) that tasted like exactly the same recipe.

Lonesome Sundown - what a great name for a blues singer.

"Music in the Making" - a little book by Wilfrid Mellers that is about the questions Larry raises. Published around 70+ years ago and extremely hard to find. Sure enough, I want it today but lost my copy in the fire and have not yet found a replacement copy.