Sunday, July 31, 2022

Nichelle Nichols
1932-2022

One  day, at an NAACP function, a fan greeted her: Martin Luther King Jr. He said how important her role was and how his family watched Star Trek faithfully and adored her in particular - the only Black character. Nichols thanked him, but said she planned to leave.

“You cannot and you must not. Don’t you realize how important your presence, your character is? ... Don’t you see? This is not a Black role, and this is not a female role. You have the first non stereotypical role on television, male or female. You have broken ground ... For the first time, the world sees us as we should be seen, as equals, as intelligent people - as we should be.”

Nichols stayed.


Arielle Kass, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution - February 2021.
















Philip Glass
GLASSWORLDS 5 - 
ENLIGHTENMENT
____________________

Nicolas Horvath

SPIRO AGNEW
Frankly Speaking (1970)
____________________

A spirit of national masochism prevails, encouraged by an effete corps of impudent snobs who
characterize themselves as intellectuals.


Saturday, July 30, 2022

Art Porn
____________________

Photographer unknown to me.
THE FUTURE
____________________

Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats

JOHN ADAMS
"Thoughts on Government’" (1776)
____________________

Fear is the foundation of most governments.


Friday, July 29, 2022

Currently Reading
____________________

CHINESE LETTER

Svetislav Basara
I can't even imagine how bad this thing stinks.

TRANSFIGURATION OF VINCENT
____________________

M. Ward

LANGSTON HUGHES
"Cross"
____________________

My old man's a white old man
And my old mother's black.
If ever I cursed my white old man
I take my curses back.
If ever I cursed my black old mother
And wished she were in hell,
I'm sorry for that evil wish
And now I wish her well
My old man died in a fine big house.
My ma died in a shack.
I wonder where I'm going to die,
Being neither white nor black?


Thursday, July 28, 2022

Tony Dow
(1945-2022)

(First love. I remember being so distraught that Leave It to Beaver was pre-empted from after school television during the Watergate hears.)
MOROCCO / MAROC
Arabic Traditional Music / Musique de Tradition Arabe
____________________

Abdeslam Cherkaoui
Unesco Collection
Musics and Musicians of the World

EMIL CIORAN
All Gall Is Divided
____________________

The more we frequent men, the blacker our thoughts; and when, to clarify them, we return to our solitude, we find there the shadow they have cast.


Wednesday, July 27, 2022

LES DERVICHES TOURNEURS DE DAMAS
[WHIRLING DERVISHES OF DAMASCUS]
____________________

Sheikh Hamza Shakkûr
Ensemble Al-Kindî

ELIAS CANETTI
The Human Province
____________________

I want to keep smashing myself until I am whole.


Tuesday, July 26, 2022

Currently Reading
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OUR LADY OF THE HIGHWAY

Hal Hartley

THOMAS HARDY
"How Great My Grief"
____________________

How great my grief, my joys how few,
Since first it was my fate to know thee!
- Have the slow years not brought to view
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Nor memory shaped old times anew,
   Nor loving-kindness helped to show thee
How great my grief, my joys how few,
   Since first it was my fate to know thee?


Georg Philipp Telemann
COMPLETE ORCHESTRAL SUITES, VOL I
____________________

Pratum Integrum Orchestra

TOMAS TRANSTRÖMER
"The Indoors Is Endless"
____________________

It’s spring in 1827, Beethoven
hoists his death-mask and sails off.

The grindstones are turning in Europe’s windmills.
The wild geese are flying northwards.

Here is the north, here is Stockholm
swimming palaces and hovels.

The logs in the royal fireplace
collapse from Attention to At Ease.

Peace prevails, vaccine and potatoes,
but the city wells breathe heavily.

Privy barrels in sedan chairs like paschas
are carried by night over the North Bridge.

The cobblestones make them stagger
mamselles loafers gentlemen.

Implacably still, the sign-board
with the smoking blackamoor.

So many islands, so much rowing
with invisible oars against the current!

The channels open up, April May
and sweet honey dribbling June.

The heat reaches islands far out.
The village doors are open, except one.

The snake-clock’s pointer licks the silence.
The rock slopes glow with geology’s patience.

It happened like this, or almost.
It is an obscure family tale

about Erik, done down by a curse
disabled by a bullet through the soul.

He went to town, met an enemy
and sailed home sick and grey.

Keeps to his bed all that summer.
The tools on the wall are in mourning.

He lies awake, hears the woolly flutter
of night moths, his moonlight comrades.

His strength ebbs out, he pushes in vain
against the iron-bound tomorrow.

And the God of the depths cries out of the depths
‘Deliver me! Deliver yourself!’

All the surface action turns inwards.
He’s taken apart, put together.

The wind rises and the wild rose bushes
catch on the fleeing light.

The future opens, he looks into
the self-rotating kaleidoscope

sees indistinct fluttering faces
family faces not yet born.

By mistake his gaze strikes me
as I walk around here in Washington

among grandiose houses where only
every second column bears weight.

White buildings in crematorium style
where the dream of the poor turns to ash.

The gentle downward slope gets steeper
and imperceptibly becomes an abyss.



Translated by Robin Fulton


Monday, July 25, 2022

Marin Marais
PIÈCES DU VIOLE DU SECOND LIVRE (1701)
____________________

Jordi Savall
Anne Gallet
Hopkinson Smith

MIRCEA ELIADE
Yoga - Immortality and Freedom
____________________

When one approaches an exotic spirituality, one understands principally what one is predestined to understand by one's own vocation, by one's own cultural orientation, and that of the historical moment to which one belongs.


Sunday, July 24, 2022

SHARP OBJECTS
_____________________

Jean-Marc Vallée
USA, 2018
THE FINAL TOUR (1960)
The Bootleg Series Vol. 6
____________________

Miles Davis and John Coltrane

Saturday, July 23, 2022

RAGING BULL
____________________

Martin Scorsese
USA, 1980
LIFTED, or THE STORY IS IN THE SOIL, KEEP YOUR EAR TO THE GROUND
____________________

Bright Eyes

EHSAN SEHGAL
"A Dream Man"
____________________

You think you have discovered
The man of your dreams
Whom you love with the depth of your heart
But you don't know yet
You are a dream of his love
What shall happen
When you come to know
He loves someone else


Friday, July 22, 2022

JOHN AND THE HOLE
____________________

Pascual Sisto
USA, 2021
SACRIFICIUM
____________________

Cecilia Bartoli

Giovanni Antonini
Il Gardino Armonico

JOEL KOVEL
Overcoming Zionism: Creating a Single Democratic State in Israel/Palestine
____________________

I feel that the notion of Zionism, as that there is this kind of destiny of the Jewish people to have their own state, is just a wrong idea. And it's an idea that requires signing on to imperialism. It means signing on to ethnic cleansing. It means—despite everything that has been said about it, it means basically becoming a racist situation, where you're oppressing an indigenous population and depriving them of their right to existence, and then thinking that somehow you can go ahead and have a decent life on that basis. And you can't, in my view. And I join hands with those people who feel that the time has come to basically think of Israel in the same category as South Africa, as a state that just has gone wrong and needs replacement.


Thursday, July 21, 2022

Wilco
ALPHA MIKE FOXTROT
RARE TRACKS 1994-2014
____________________

EMIL CIORAN
All Gall is Divided
____________________

As far back as I can remember, I’ve utterly destroyed within myself the pride of being human. And I saunter to the periphery of the Race like a timorous monster, lacking the energy to claim kinship with some other band of apes.


Wednesday, July 20, 2022

THE STORY OF FILM
An Odyssey
____________________

Mark Cousins,
UK, 2011

-

Episode Fourteen
NEW AMERICAN INDEPENDENTS AND THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION

Episode Fifteen
CINEMA TODAY AND THE FUTURE

Art Porn
____________________

Photographer unknown to me.

Hypnotic Clambake
SQUARE DANCE MESSIAH
____________________

ELIAS CANETTI
The Agony of Flies
____________________

It isn’t being alone that I need to know, for that comes easy to me. I like being alone; what I need to learn is how to keep silent around people … It doesn’t matter to whom my words are addressed or whether or not they are understood; the words in themselves have a horrifying and devastating effect on me. They are too strong; I need to muffle them by writing them down … I myself cannot evade my words; I am at their mercy; I take them in whole; I understand them fully and they shake me the way a storm shakes up the sea.


Tuesday, July 19, 2022

THE STORY OF FILM
An Odyssey
____________________

Mark Cousins,
UK, 2011

-

Episode Twelve
FIGHT THE POWER - PROTEST IN FILM

Episode Thireteen
NEW BOUNDARIES - WORLD CINEMA IN AFRICA, ASIA, AND LATIN AMERICA
Currently Reading
____________________

GARDEN OF EARTHLY BODIES

Sally Oliver
Tōru Takemitsu
COMPLETE PIANO WORKS
____________________

Roger Woodward

Monday, July 18, 2022

THE DUEL
[大決鬥 - Da Jue Dou]
____________________

Cheng Cheh
Hong Kong, 1971
Currently Reading
____________________

SONGS OF LOVE, MOON, AND WIND
Poems from the Chinese

Translated by Kenneth Rexroth

Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers
THE LONG-AWAITED ALBUM
____________________
 


TU FU
"Country Cottage"
____________________

A peasant's shack beside the
Clear river, the rustic gate
Opens on a deserted road
Weeds grow over the public well.
I loafin my old clothes. Willow
Branches sway. Flowering tree
Perfume the air. The sun sets
Behind a flock of cormorants,
Drying their black wings along the pier.


Translated by Kenneth Rexroth


Sunday, July 17, 2022

Frente!
MARVIN THE ALBUM
____________________

DOROTHY PARKER
"Inscription for the Ceiling of a Bedroom"
____________________

Daily dawns another day;
I must up, to make my way.
Though I dress and drink and eat,
Move my fingers and my feet,
Learn a little, here and there,
Weep and laugh and sweat and swear,
Hear a song, or watch a stage,
Leave some words upon a page,
Claim a foe, or hail a friend-
Bed awaits me at the end.

Though I go in pride and strength,
I'll come back to bed at length.
Though I walk in blinded woe,
Back to bed I'm bound to go.
High my heart, or bowed my head,
All my days but lead to bed.
Up, and out, and on; and then
Ever back to bed again,
Summer, Winter, Spring, and Fall-
I'm a fool to rise at all!


Saturday, July 16, 2022

A CHILD IS WAITING
____________________

John Cassavetes
USA, 1963
Kruder and Dorfmeister
DJ-KICKS
____________________

JOAN DAVIS
____________________

I don't get it. Unless my mirror lies to me, I'm not bad looking.

But let me get one look at that face on the screen and I'm sick for a week.


Friday, July 15, 2022

THE STORY OF FILM
An Odyssey
____________________

Mark Cousins,
UK, 2011

-

Episode Nine
AMERICAN CINEMA OF THE 1970s


Episode Ten
MOVIES TO CHANGE THE WORLD

Episode Eleven
THE ARRIVAL OF THE MULTIPLEX & ASIAN MAINSTREAM
Currently Reading
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23 TALES

Leo Tolstoy
The Tallest Man on Earth
THE WILD HUNT
____________________

Thursday, July 14, 2022

BASTARD SWORDSMAN
[TIAN CAN BIAN]
____________________

Lu Chun-ku
Hong Kong, 1983
Johann Sebastian Bach
THE SIX MOTETS
____________________

Harry Christophers
The Sixteen

EMIL CIORAN
On the Heights of Despair
____________________

An animal banished from life, man's condition is tragic for he no longer finds fulfillment in life's simple values. For animals, life is all there is; for man, life is a question mark. An irreversible question mark, for man has never found, nor will ever find, any answers. Life not only has no meaning; it can never have one.


Wednesday, July 13, 2022

THE STORY OF FILM
An Odyssey
____________________

Mark Cousins,
UK, 2011

-

Episode Seven
EUROPEAN NEW WAVE


Episode Eight
NEW DIRECTORS, NEW FORM
Currently Reading
____________________

WHAT MOVES THE DEAD

T. Kingfisher
Various Artists
CLASSIC DELTA AND DEEP SOUTH BLUES
____________________

MIRCEA ELIADE
The Sacred and The Profane
_____________________

It was lunar symbolism that enabled man to relate and connect such heterogeneous things as: birth, becoming, death, and resurrection; the waters, plants, woman, fecundity, and immortality; the cosmic darkness, prenatal existence, and life after death, followed by the rebirth of the lunar type ("light coming out of darkness"); weaving, the symbol of the "thread of life," fate, temporality, and death; and yet others. In general most of the ideas of cycle, dualism, polarity, opposition, conflict, but also of reconciliation of contraries, of coincidentia oppositorum, were either discovered or clarified by virtue of lunar symbolism. 

We may even speak of a metaphysics of the moon, in the sense of a consistent system of "truths" relating to the mode of being peculiar to living creatures, to everything in the cosmos that shares in life, that is, in becoming, growth and waning, death and resurrection.



Tuesday, July 12, 2022

THE STORY OF FILM
An Odyssey
____________________

Mark Cousins,
UK, 2011

-

Episode Five
POST-WAR CINEMA

Episode Six
SEX & MELODRAMA
Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber
VIOLIN SONATAS FROM THE KREMSIER ARCHIVE
____________________

Anton Steck, Hille Perl, CHristian Reger, Lee Santana