Chasing the Blues

Farewell, Doc Watson

Like many others, I discovered Doc Watson through the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," which brought together musicians like Watson, Maybelle Carter and Jimmy Martin to record traditional songs with slick, rock-era arrangements. Watson's recordings of Jimmy Driftwood's "Tennessee Stud" and other songs were the centerpiece of the album, making the unassuming Watson a big star.

From there, I hunted down Watson's solo recordings, and saw him perform. I particularly remember him at a legendary place called Kingfish in South Baton Rouge, where I also saw Mose Allison and Randy Newman.

I also tried to match Watson's vituouso guitar playing, eventually buying a lower-end Martin guitar and videotapes in which Watson showed his technique on songs like "Deep River Blues," originally recorded by the Delmore Brothers in the 1930s. I got where I could do a passable rendition of the song's riffs, moving down the frets with an E-chord position and picking the strings in a pale imitation of Doc. Watching him on the tape explain his techniques added to my admiration for his talent, as I realized that I could never match him, even if I practiced for 10,000 hours.

The Times obituary calls attention to Watson's innovations in flat picking, and traditional finger picking, making the guitar a lead instrument in playing traditional fiddle tunes, rather than primarily a rhythm instrument. Other guitarists, such as Clarence White, also were pioneers in the field. Along with his guitar work, Watson was a fine singer and a gifted showman.

To give an informal flavor, "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" included recordings of the musicians talking and joking with each other between takes. Many of us remember Watson admonishing his colleagues "Let's watch our timing." He was a true professional.

Three movies

Inspired by the Academy Awards, I've been on my annual midwinter movie-watching spurt. Over the last month, I've seen "The Descendants," "The Artist" and "A Separation," only yesterday.

My favorite was "The Artist," with its cinematic images a reminder that film is primarily a visual medium. I loved the characters as well. However, the film is another example of our culture's nostalgic binge; a lot of the film was loving homages to scenes from movies past. Now our nostalgia is moving back to 1927, black and white silent films? I loved the dog, but dog tricks are not exactly a sign of creative originality.

"The Descendants" was disapponting, not nearly the Oscar-level film it was purported to be, although enjoyable. Clooney was fine, but the most captivating star was the young woman who played his teen daughter. The movie picked up energy wheneer she was on the screen.

The deepest, most distrurbing, film was "A Separation," a bleak look at Iranian society. The movie required a lot of concentration, keeping up with the subtitles and the convoluted plot, some points of which don't make logical sense. Still, it's a strong movie. 

I've fallen into the habit of staying at home and watching films on On Demand. Going to the theater to see these movies reminded me of what an entertaining experience it is.

Farewell to Angelo Dundee, Ben Gazzara

I've reached the age where death takes on more significance. Someone's passing can unexpectedly reveal a passage into my past. Such was the case with two deaths this week: Angelo Dundee and Ben Gazzara.

The death of Dundee, trainer of Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard, recalled the era of 1960s television, when I watched ABC Sports boxing telecasts and heard the loved/hated Howard Cosell pronounce his name with his affected Brooklyn accent, Angelo Dun-Dee. Dundee was the Italian American mentor behind Ali, a strong rebuttal to the anti-white claims of Ali's Black Muslim cohorts. He was part of the reason I adored Ali, unlike most people in Baton Rouge.

After Ali was stripped of his heavyweight title for refusing to Vietnam, I defended Ali in a debate with one of our neighbors, a very nice man with a gravelly voice who ran the biggest funeral home in the city and later buried my father. He's gone now, of course; on a visit back to our neighborhood, his wife confided to me that he "wasn't well." We stood in his carport, I defending Ali, and he, a very large man, calling Ali a traitor. The death of Dundee brings it all back. 

I loved all of the iconoclasts of the time: Ali, Joe Namath. They gave me hope of escaping Baton Rouge, although I also had a deep love for it, especially the crazy countercultural world of LSU that I entered into. I believed in Joe Namath, the quarterback who repeatedly carried Bear Bryant's Crimson Tide to wins over our Tigers, and so took him at his word when he guaranted a New York Jets win over the Baltimore Colts in the 1969 Superbowl, and I bet on the Jets against my friend Ray, the greatest athlete I ever knew and the most tragic character as well. How triumphant I was to collect my meagre winnings from Ray the Monday after Namath had engineered his famous upset.

And then there was Gazarra, whom I loved on the TV show "Run for Your Life." Again, that show was a glimmer of hope, a vision of a wider world, beyond Baton Rouge. His character was hip, cool, "existential," although I didn't know what the hell it meant. I'd read it somewhere in one of the magazines I picked up every week at the newsstand in downtown Baton Rouge where I used to go when I began playing hooky from Sunday school at First Presbyterian.  Existenialism: It sounded good to say. The show came on in the loved Thursday night lineup of NBC: Dean Martin's variety show also sticks out, a weekly smashup of Hollywood and Vegas show  biz, that also tantalized my muddled adolescence (Ah, Joey Heatherton, you live in my dreams.)

Later, I loved Gazzara in the John Cassavetes movies we caught at Baton Rouge's Varsity, an art cinema house now a very good restuarant. Ah, the Varsity, where I saw Visconti movies, porn flicks (The Wicked Die Slow) and Zappa's "200 Motels" (horrible). 

Dundee, Gazzara. They loom in my memory and esteem. 

When the Saints Go Marching Out of the Playoffs

A few weeks ago, NBC's Chris Collingsworth, one of the many overly talkative commentators who build a longing for John Madden to come back, said Louisiana could have two football titles. Chatty Chris underestimated Louisiana football teams' propensity for shooting themselves in the cleats.

Following LSU's BCS meltdown, in which Les Miles returned to his former frozen-daze on the sidelines, the Saints again failed on the road in the playoffs, committing five turnovers and unable to stop Alex Smith and the 49ers in the last-second drive. How can a team that looks so invincible in the Super Dome look so bad on the road? 

While Drew Brees is the main Saint, Pierre Thomas runs a close second. The Saints are a different team without the hard-running Pierre, who was knocked out of the game early in the first quarter on a vicious hit. By the way, that appeared the type of "helmet to helmet" blow that has received penalties throughout the year, but no flag came down Saturday. I actually prefer games like Saturday's when the refs didn't mar the game with constant penalty calls, in fact not a single one was called against the Saints, but I wondered why an obvious helmet to helmet, resulting in a head injury to Thomas, didn't warrant a penalty. With a penalty call, the Saints would have kept the ball and likely scored, changing the tenor of the game.

Well, no excuses, the 49ers deserved the victory. No team that makes five turnovers should win. The Saints have some young talent with running back Mark Ingram, although his late season injury is troubling, and Jimmy Graham, but the rest of the team is growing older. The disappointing loss left me wondering how many more years of top play are left for Brees and his receiving corps. Climaxing with the great Super Bowl win of now three years ago, this team has been together for quite some time now. 

Leave it to the San Francisco fans to show some admirable wit. Despite the loss, I salute the fan who had the sign, "Who dat? We dat."

In the other Saturday game, The Patriots blowout of the Broncs should dampen Tebow mania for a while. With the Broncs falling behind early, the Broncs' John Fox would have been justified in yanking Tim, but the Tebow tempest prevented that from happening. Despite the loss, the kid is still praiseworthy — he was still playing hard late in the game, jumping up and down after a meaningless gain. And, he was still smiling after the game. As an LSU fan, I hated the kid when he was at Floriday, but now I hope he advances his passing technique during the off season and establishes himself further as an NFL QB. If nothing else, his success would help show that Mel Kiper Jr. along with Collingsworth, should shut up.

Keep Alive New Orleans' Preservation Hall

My daughter Sara sent along this link http://flavorwire.com/70724/daily-dose-pick-preservation to a video about the new album benefiting New Orleans' Preservation Hall Jazz Band. Preservation Hall, the vintage French Quarter institution, is in poor financial shape, and an all-star cast of luminaries, including the ghost of Louis Armstrong, joined with the band to make the recording.

It would be a tragedy for the old New Orleans bar and music hall to pass away, just when traditional jazz is undergoing a revival. Allen Toussaint's "Bright Mississippi," one of the best CDs of last year, displayed the aesthetic depths of the original New Orleans music. The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has brought attention to the music.

After the advent of bebop, cool jazz and fusion, the old "hot" jazz looked to some 1960s hipsters as an outmoded relic. Armstrong, with his clowning and mass popularity, suffered a loss of artistic credibility to Miles Davis fans, although many of these knew little of Miles outside of "Bitches Brew."

Then some members of my generation began delving into the music's history, discovering Armstrong's earth-shattering recordings of the 1930s and '30s, along with other musicians of the era. Woody Allen focused attention on the music, as did the British poet and jazz lover Philip Larkin, whom considered cool jazz a musical death.

"Preservation" promises to re-introduce traditional New Orleans jazz to a new generation. Terence Blanchard, representing the contemporary New Orleans generation, is among those who play with the Preservation Hall band. Pete Seeger, Dr. John and a host of younger singers and musicicians are featured. We hope the album inspires new generations to keep the music alive.

A Wintry Visit to Central Park

Returning from an unexpected fast trip to New York City, I'm caught in that time distortion upon return. Atlanta feels slower, sedate, uncongested and pastoral.

While New Yorkers brag about how quickly things move there, and how quick-thinking and reacting they are, it can seem like the most inefficient of cities. With all of its visual, verbal and aesthetic excitment, the steady change that constantly transforms it, it's also a place frozen in time. Central Park, the Met, the Fifth Avenue Library, the Village: in the 40 years I've visited New York City, much of it never changes. Each generation of young people, immigrants and workers has a similarity of activity, gestures, habits, speech.

Walking down a street with sidewalks lined by dirty, crusted snow, with a body-knifing wind blowing from the East River, I sensed a sadness beneath the city's motion, I feeling that its great days were waning. Or perhaps it was just that it was mid-February, and we had come because of a death in the family.

On a cold afternoon, I walked from our hotel on east 92nd Street to Central Park. I'd read a piece on Augustus St. Gaudens' Grand Army Plaza statue of Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, and wanted to take a close look at it; although I'm sure I'd seen it before. So I trekked over to Fifth Avenue and began walking toward the Plaza Hotel (no longer a hotel), passing the row of great museums -- The Met,the Guggenhneim, The Frick -- on the grand avenue. No matter how many times I've gone to Central Park over the years, I'm always astonished that the city made a decision to devote so much land to leisure and beauty.

Snow, lovely in the park, still covers its hills, swales and sidwalks. The sun had broke nout, , and folks are out walking, running, skating and biking. Young mothers push babies in strollers, and young honeys stroll arm in arm. A few bratty adolescent boys throw snowballs and insults at each other.

At last, I come to St. Gaudens' mounted Sherman and winged Victory, towering in gold over the bright white day. Getting close to the statue, I'm intrigued that the great sculptor rendered the horse's male genitalia with detailed accuracy. The statue, dedicated in 1906, presents Sherman as a symbol of rising American power. Sadly, as a sign of the city and nation's possibly declining power, the gold on the statue is badly flaking off and needs re-gilding.

I'd seen St. Gaudens' monument in Boston to Col. Shaw and his Negro regiment, the subject of Robert Lowell's "For the Union Dead" (answering Allen Tate's "For the Confederate Dead"). The Shaw work, while heroic, is much less triumphant, its sense of mourning predominant. The Sherman work proclaims unequivocally the nation's industrial, military, financial, judicial and aesthetic might.

A Song of Praise as the Old Year Wanes

I take it that many are saying good riddance to 2009 and "the aughts" decade.

While the year and decade brought professional, economic and personal challenges, I've decided to focus on the good parts of the last 10 years. One of the highlights of 2009 for me was reading Mary Karr's "Lit," an acount of the poet and memoirist's recovery from alcoholism and her spiritual awakening through Catholicism. I was struck by her conception of prayer as expressing gratitude for life's blessings. In that spirit, I look back, and look ahead to the future.

During 2009, my wonderful wife and I made great trips to San Francisco, Brooklyn and Savannah. A highlight of the San Francisco trip for me was seeing the great Legion of Honor art collection, then finding my way to the pathways along the cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The farthest point West in the United States: full of historical, geographical, artistic and literary sigificance.  We also loved the Fillmore street neighborhood near our hotel in Japantown, and walking through the city's hilly and glorious streets. How wonderful to see historic spots where longtime heroes walked: City Lights Bookstore, the Hungry I, Fillmore East. The city of Herb Caen still lives. We loved seeing our daughter, Sara, happily living in the beautiful city by the bay and working for the federal public defender's office.

Brooklyn, where we traveled to celebrate the wedding of our friends Tim and Pui, was another memorable experience discovering a great city. Walking through Brooklyn's neighborhoods, enjoying its restuarants, bookstores and art galleries, ambling through Prospect Park, all made us aware that Brooklyn is a world-class city in its own right.

Savannah was also marvelous, with his layers of history and culture and serendipitous downtown experiences.

During the year, I increased my participation on Facebook. While I had sympathy with my son's groaning over we baby boomers taking over what had begun as a defining institution for his generation, I valued reconnecting with old friends and keeping up with their lives and interests. I also enjoyed writing this blog, Chasing the Blues, and my other one, Southern Bookman. My former AJC colleagues' many blogs and Web ventures impressed and enthralled me with their creativity, wit and entrepreneurship.

I'm glad to live in a neighborhood with so many useful and enjoyable businesses, from restaurants to grocery stores to bookstores, to gas stations. A special note of thanks to the friendly staff at the PPC health club and to my fellow exercise sufferers, for their warmth and encouragement. Atlanta sometimes appears to be falling behind other cities it once led, but when I drive down Peachtree or see the Buckhead skyline standing proudly against the bright blue horizon, I feel proud of my adopted city.

I'll also remember the decade as the one in which our children grew into wonderful, productive and caring adults. Each of them has special gifts to contribute to the world.

In closing, I mourn those lost, in that horrible morning of Sept. 11, in Iraq and Afghanistan and throughout the world. Colleagues who passed away, or who I no longer see everyday as I did for years, remain bright in my memory. Farewell to those great writers and artists like John Updike, Frank McCourt, Paul Newman and Marlon Brando.

A new decade dawns, full of new challenges and the possibility of great accomplishments. For those in pain, I offer the old chestnut that sometimes we are making the most progress when we appear stuck in the depths. As the most interesting man in the world would say, stay thirsty, my friends. 

A Brief Encounter With My Fair Lady

I happened upon the final part of Lerner and Lowe's "My Fair Lady" on TCM, catching the final bit of Freddy's "On the Street Where You Live." Too bad I missed wonderful songs like "I Could Have Danced All Night" and "Wouldn't It Be Loverly," although the latter was featured in a reprise when Audrey Hepburn's Eliza Doolittle, now dressed as a refined lady, returns to Covent Garden, where she had been a Cockney flower girl. But I did catch the great English song-and-dance man Stanley Holloway doing "I'm Getting Married in the Morning" and Rex Harrison's poignant "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face."

My enjoyment of "Danced" and "Loverly" likely would have been hampered by the knowledge that Hepburn wasn't really singing them, but that a backup vocalist had to be brought in to cover for Audrey's lack of singing talent. I guess Audrey couldn't have half-talked the numbers, a la Harrison, a bit weathered as Henry Higgins. But she's a lovely Eliza, especially in the re-colorized version shown on TCM.

TCM hit upon the interesting, at least in theory, idea of playing the musical version of a script, followed by the nonmusical version. So, following "My Fair Lady," the 1938 production of George Bernard Shaw's play "Pygmalion" aired. "My Fair Lady" derived from Bernard Shaw's Edwardian warhorse.

The all-talk (and it's quite talky, but still moves quickly) version of the story stars Leslie Howard as Higgins, and Wendy Hiller as Eliza. While the color version of "My Fair Lady," despite the Victorian era period costumes, cannot escape being a relic of the 1960s, the black-and-white "Pygmalion" retains a deep Victorian tone, an artifact from a vanished time. I was surprised to see that the screenplay was written by Bernard Shaw; the original play was first produced at the turn of the century, the height of British, and Shaw's power. "Pygmalion" was probably the once Fascist-admiring Shaw's grand farewell.

The sepia London scenes carry a melancholy retrospective awareness that soon the great old city would be destroyed by German bombs. I don't know how geographically accurate the movie's scenes are, but that prewar London pictured is unrecognizable when compared with today's transformed city. 

Another interesting tidbit: the film editor of "Pygmalion" is David Lean, who would make his mark as the director of such movies as "Lawrence of Arabia."

In regard to Howard, also the co-director of "Pygmalion," he would the very next year star as "Ashley Wilkes" in "Gone With the Wind."  Another great British star, Vivien Leigh, is, of course, Scarlett O'Hara, and Clark Gable plays Rhett Butler, more virile than Howard's weak-willed Wilkes. (While we're dropping names, George "Superman" Reeves also makes an appearance in "Gone With The Wind.").  

Speaking of David Lean, I was under the impression that Leslie Howard was in Lean's "Brief Encounter." But an Internet search gave me me information that Howard died in 1943 over Biscay Bay in a World War II mission, while "Brief Encounter" was made in 1946. That was Trevor Howard in the lead role of the heart-breaking film about a couple's unconsummated love affair, taken from a Noel Coward play.

Well, if I care to hear "I Could Have Danced All Night" and "Wouldn't It be Loverly," I have the CD of the original cast recording, in which Julie Andrews memorably plays Eliza Doolittle to Harrison's Higgins. In contrast to Audrey Hepburn, Julie Andrews brought her magnificent singing voice to the role, and her performances on the record are spine-tingling. Alas, an operation in recent years ruined her voice, although I read recently that her singing ability is gradually returning.

The original vinyl 33 album of "My Fair Lady" was a mainstay of my parents' record collection, and I spent many happy boyhood minutes listening to it.  In those days, my father made frequent business trips to New York City, and his seeing "My Fair Lady" was a highlight of his life. How happy was I when a remastered version came out on CD, and I was able to relive my boyhood introduction to the magic of the theater.

 The old RCA hi-fi on which I used to lower the needle to the black vinyl grooves still sits in our den. I keep thinking that one day I'll acquire a new needle for it, and again play some of my vinyl records from the '60s. But most of my records I've replaced with CDs, now also obsolete, of course.

 

Waking Up After Midnight

After falling asleep watching the not so funny "Funny People," I awoke to catch the end of the HBO Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame Concert. I'd avoided the concert previously, not wanting to see the rockers of my youth creak and wheeze across the stage. However, the songs were fairly entertaining, although David Crosby looked ghastly. Then I had a welcome boost of young talent: catching the Unplugged performance of Katy Perry. I loved her songs and her singing, and the nutty monlogues she gave between songs, sort of Gracie Allen meets Mary Tyler Moore, in her "Dick Van Dyke Show" days.

...I caught the pilot of "Men of A Certain Age," and was a bit underwhelmed. The Ray Romano vehicle tries a bit too hard to be quirky and existential. Ray, go watch a few John Cassevetes movies. I missed some of the key plot turns because I kept switching back and forth to the Chris Berman-Tom Jackson halftime show on Monday night football to see what they'd say about the Saints' crazy win over the Redskins. That Robert Meachem touchdown after stripping the ball from a Redskins defensive back who'd just had an interception might be the best play of the year. And to think that Meachem had a disappointing rookie season, when he came in out of shape and not mentally ready for the NFL. Now Meacham, like the rest of the Saints, plays to win.

...Unusual weather we're having, ain't it? as Bert Lahr's Cowardly Lion said in the Wizard of Oz. After a day of incessant rain, today is gorgeous, more like March or April than December. Or perhaps I'm already ready for spring.

A Few Thoughts About Atlanta's Future

As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying above me: cleaning my gutters. They've also attacked my yard with their blowers, the leaves are in retreat. On a cold, overcast Friday, I'm channeling George Orwell; Eric Blair for all of you purists.

From Orwell, my thoughts turn to the future, to this city and what it can do to renew its vision for the futute. With Kasim Reed elected as Atlanta's new mayor, although challenger Mary Norwood is seeking an ill-advised recount of a close race, I am thinking about this perpetually adolescent city.

From the time we moved to Atlanta, up to the 1996 Olympics, Atlanta kept surging toward greatness. Ever since the Olympics, the city has seemed stuck in neutral. Sure, before the recession, big construction projects continued, high rises popped up in astonishing profusion, the suburbs continued mutating, we had big cultural attractions like the Louvre exchange with the High, and big sporting events. But the city's admittedly overblown swagger seemed lost.

Of course the new mayor and council need to take care of matters such as making the city safer, fixing up its infrastructure, helping downtrodden neighborhoods feel a sense of hope, reaching out to wealthy northside neighborhoods, etc. I hope Kasim will regenerate a larger sense of mission, that feeling of greatness.

A few things come to mind: doing something to help get the Streets of Buckhead project going. Ben Carter's half-built project sits there, a huge gap in the area's heart. I know the old strip was bad, but at least it had activity and energy.

Second, get a new symphony hall and opera house in gear. Dallas and other cities have gone way ahead of us in cultural amenities. The new suburban cultural centers are fine, but Atlanta should have world-class venues in an arts center near the High. The aqarium, the college football hall of fame and the civil rights museum are great pieces in our cultural mosiac. Also needed are a acoustically perfect music hall, a place for opera and musical theater, a fine new home for the Alliance. All of this would enhance the Fox Theater.

Working with the federal government, we need job training programs. Industry and factories move to rural areas and smaller cities, but Atlanta has a bunch of land at the Fort McPherson site and the Ford and GM sites. In improving our partnership with the state government, Atlanta can attract new industry here. Working with federal stimulus/job programs, steps should be taken to bring new offices and businesses downtown.

 

On the sporting scene, a new stadium is needed. Again, Dallas and other cities have moved ahead in this. The Georgia Dome is a huge tomb: a new open air stadium, with retractable roof, would be great. Perhaps the Dome can remain for convention use. With a new stadium, the city can rebuild its national stature and again attract events like the Super Bowl and Final Four.

MARTA needs support and revitalization. Projects such as the high-speed train to Athens and Macon, and even to Savannah, Jacksonville, Charlotte, etc., should be pushed forward.

These are just a few thoughts as the city receives new leadership. Men with blowers have me thinking that Atlanta needs to get back to work.