maren

MM, that was a very kind post! And I think the clowning responses were more poking fun at them(our)selves, than saying you were heavy-handed! Aw shucks! Well, I can't say I hope my nephew (recently completed boot camp in San Diego) gets to Iraq so you can encounter him (know what I mean?) but if that should come to pass, he's another jazzhead Marine... I've appreciated your other posts, too! Glad to have you aboard and wishing you the best!

Yeah, I've learned to do that, too. The plant goes by either name, but lots of cookbooks call the seed coriander I love 'em both!

Oh my -- so many cakes, so little time!!! Hope you're in a mood to extend the celebration, Jeff !!! You're the best !!!

Sorry I'm late for the party!!! Hope you had a great birthday, and have a great year Clifford!!!

Have a great birthday (and a great 2005), Matt!

Miles re Bird.

Sun Ra?

You and those Ellington takes -- still fresh! Happy birthday and many more!

You know, the new Miscellaneous Music "Top 20 Organ Songs" made me think about "organ played with singers" which made me think of Al Green and Charles Hodges!!! (think "Love and Happiness") which I know isn't JAZZ but which prompted me to search old posts for "Charles Hodges" which turned up this thread from the very first days of Organissimo: http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...&st=0entry508 Missed it the first time around, but gives me the courage to say: Charles Hodges!!!

Second that. Good luck, JP!

It's a beautiful day outside (here in NYC anyway) -- hope you're having a great birthday!!!

Up, because I just happened across THIS PAGE about a Broadway benefit for Gay Men's Health Crisis held on October 26 -- where Jerry Orbach performed (just 2 months ago, in the midst of his own illness). Of all the performers pictured, check out his eyes connecting with the photographer -- and any viewer. Just so sweet, and really THERE -- as MartyJazz said, a real mensch.

Happy New Year, everybody!

You've made me reconsider my resolutions! Let's see: try to smoke a whole pack a day, never get ANY work done at my job, eliminate all physical exercise, plunge into Chapter 11... Given my track record with wholesome resolutions, maybe I'll be better off aspiring to and failing to achieve some bad ones!!!

Thanks for those links, JimS and JimR!

Cool story in today's NY Times arts section. After reading that long "copyright" thread here a few months ago, I wonder how much I should paste here? You need to register (for free) to read the story and see the pictures at http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/30/arts/design/30flora.html. But here's one of them:

Vi Redd

I am sure you will be deriding Susan Sontag any moment now as a screwed up person, and that you hope that her ignorance was not passed on to her children. You could accuse Sontag of everything, but ignorance. Interesting -- when I read the Susan Sontag thread yesterday, I was thinking of contrasting it with this Reggie White thread -- because right there in the Times obit, and specifically quoted by Deus62, was this string of adjectives: "She was described, variously, as explosive, anticlimactic, original, trendy, iconoclastic, captivating, hollow, rhapsodic, naïve, sophisticated, approachable, abrasive, aloof, attention-seeking, charming, condescending, populist, puritanical, sybaritic, sincere, posturing, ascetic, voluptuary, right-wing, left-wing, mannered, formidable, brilliant, profound, superficial, ardent, bloodless, dogmatic, challenging, ambivalent, accessible, lofty, erudite, lucid, inscrutable, solipsistic, intellectual, visceral, reasoned, pretentious, portentous, maddening, lyrical, abstract, narrative, acerbic, opportunistic, chilly, effusive, careerist, sober, gimmicky, relevant, passé, facile, illogical, ambivalent, polemical, didactic, tenacious, slippery, celebratory, banal, untenable, doctrinaire, ecstatic, melancholic, humorous, humorless, deadpan, rhapsodic, aloof, glib, cantankerous and clever. No one ever called her dull." None of us who marked her passing thought it was cruel to say any of those things -- it was just honest -- Susan Sontag, of course, lived long enough to revisit and revise things she'd said earlier...

That's always the way I felt about him, too. Guess he first came to my attention when I was a pre-teen in small-town Wisconsin and saw "The Fantasticks" on TV -- then listened to the original cast album over and over. Then I noticed he was one of the Sharks or Jets in the original "West Side Story" too. Later there was Crimes and Misdemeanors, among so many other things. Living in New York, I see a lot of "famous people" (something my family always asks me about!) -- encountering Jerry Ohrbach was one of the sweetest: I was leaving work one May evening, walking my usual route along 17th Street to First Avenue when -- halfway down the block from my job -- I see a smiling gentleman sitting on a stoop, surrounded by 5 star-struck junior-high girls. Jerry Ohrbach was signing autographs for them -- his attitude was so kind and courtly, with this twinkle in his eye that seemed delighted WITH them about their excitement in meeting a "celebrity" while at the same time expressing a little bit of "who, ME?" He also seemed so father-ly, gently resurrecting their "little girl" sides by saying "Did you see the Disney movie, Beauty and the Beast? Do you remember the talking candle? Yeah, that was me!" and sketching the candle with his autograph. I stood to the side, taking it all in, and when the girls left it was my turn to gush about "Fantasticks, West Side Story, Crimes and Misdemeanors..." He was so sweet -- asked if I'd seen "The Fantasticks" live back in the day -- just very real, like he really loved his work and the people who appreciated it. Very cute, too -- seemed smaller and more delicate in person than on either screen -- just a beautiful guy, physically and -- well, the word "spiritually" seems too pretentious for him -- but with a beautiful social spirit. Charming, that's it. The kind of lovely New Yorker who crops up as a Con Ed repairman, your kid's orthodontist, your friend's tax lawyer, a fireman or policeman (yes, they do exist, the lovely ones, along with the other kind), or a Broadway hoofer... RIP, Jerry Ohrbach.

This is so sad. ElizaBETH, thanks for reaching out and please know that you have friends here. I'm so sorry for your loss.

Since Michael FitzG's quote is still outstanding, and since this was not said by a famous jazz musician, but rather by his wife, I won't leave you quessing -- but I thought this was just too funny to keep to myself: When mildly annoyed with her husband, Nellie Monk was heard to refer to him as: "Melodious Thunk"

Oh -- this makes me sad. I haven't read her most recent books, but a couple of earlier ones had a big influence on me (Styles of Radical Will, On Photography, Illness as Metaphor, Notes on 'Camp'). I didn't think of them as a "big influence" at the time -- because they didn't "convince" me or "change my mind" -- but they were engaging ruminations that stuck with me. In the early 90s I saw her in the audience of a dance performance I went to at BAM -- she's so recognizable -- she must have been used to the kind of look I gave her -- without saying anything, she looked me in the eye with a warm, wry smile that seemed to say, "yeah, we know each other."