The
familiar sound of Jackie McLean’s bright alto matched beautifully by Tina
Brooks’ tenor. What a lovely
pairing. The tune, “Shadows” from
the Freddie Redd album “Shades of Redd” in that magic jazz year of 1960 when
Rudy Van Gelder must have been recording 365 days in a row. I’ve always had the score for
“The Connection” the Jack Gelber play about junkies waiting to cop heroin, which
was recorded a year before this.
Freddie Redd was responsible for all the songs, as I recall. I seem to remember reading the liner
notes and seeing that Leonard Bernstein attended a performance and was
overheard whistling “Who Killed Cock Robin” on the way out.
Born in Harlem in 1928 I’m happy to report that Freddie Redd
is still alive and seemingly active, from his residence in Baltimore. Listening to this follow-on album “Shades”
it is lovely from start to finish and it is hard to understand why it didn’t
launch a string of such releases throughout the decade. It looks like he only recorded one
other album the following year on Blue Note, that wasn’t even released until
1988. As explored earlier, it
would appear that he had a similar experience to Tina Brooks who recorded
incredible albums that Blue Note decided not to release until later. Perhaps, like Brooks, he had a habit
that tainted his relationship with the label and eventually with
everything. Like so many of his
peers, Dexter Gordon, Joe Albany, he fled New York and spent the next decade in
Denmark and France, returning in the mid seventies.
Today, I’ll head back up to Lisbon. My little Volkswagon rental only lists
the speed in KPH and, a typical American I have next to no idea how fast I was
going. I only know it was very
fast, I made good time, and occasionally there were still people passing
me. I figured I was pushing ninety
MPH but it turns out that I was pushing 120 MPH, which is silly with or without
proactive highway policing.
We’ll budget a bit more time for today journey. No need to whatsoever to 凭轼结辙[1] in my little rental.
Sitting back at my perch at the Presidente Hotel, where I’ve
come for the last three days so that I can get online. The same Germanic family is sitting
across from me again this morning.
Caught mom staring at me. I
must look off with my headphones on, sitting here alone, typing for the third
day straight. The kids all look just
like mom with their straight blond hair and slightly suspicious looks. Dad doesn’t look so Teutonic, from the
back.
Catching up on the news it’s rough out there. The Times had an interesting summary
article examining Obama’s foreign policy challenges, suggesting the complexity
of so many cross cutting cleavages and their interrelations. How can you push Egypt on Gaza when you
cut off aid? How can you push Russia
on Syria when you need to be stern about the plane shot down? How can you buttress the Shias in Iraq
without the help of the help of the Iranian’s who you are trying to impose
sanctions on? I think he is being
tested sorely and I’m still glad he’s in there rather than a hothead showman. Take your time and be judicious, Barak. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/23/world/crises-cascade-and-converge-testing-obama.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Ar%2C%7B%221%22%3A%22RI%3A7%22%7D
And amidst all this China has, fortunately been
comparatively quiet. The
manufacturing sector is picking up.
Food safety and energy plans’ potential to pollute are being discussed
but otherwise the only news fit-to-print is an uplifting story about a giant yellow
toad. Chinese netizens did a mock
up photo of the grinning toad with a pair of specs to suggest he looked just
like Jiang Zemin. Now Xinhua,
China’s news agency has deleted all references to the giant toad. I hope Obama has a chance to read the
article and steal a laugh amidst so much noise.
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