Up 7:30. Nothing of note.
Left at 10. Put a Feldman string quartet on for background, read most of Latouche quota. Elmslie figures frequently by this point.
Coffee/breakfast near library.
Lincoln Center - got there around 11:30.
Worked from 1 to 5:30, with a break for lunch and a trip to the Julliard bookstore across the street.
Didn’t feel like I accomplished much.
Met Jordan Davis in line outside Mercury Lounge to see Caitlyn Smith (and opener Andrea Davidson). Anthropology, for me - she’s a Nashville writer making a bid to be the artist in her own right, and I was curious about what kind of show and backing band you put together for that. Answer: slick.
Had a slice, talked about Jordan’s book.
Read Latouche on train home, back around 11.
Read the Assayas, wasn’t in the mood for poetry.
Lights out 12:30.
4.12.18
Up 7:45. Late-night clips.
E77 around 9. DM exchange w/ Mark about playing a show together (sometime).
Read Golden Apple ch. of Latouche - quick, b/c I know the show and skimmed the synopsis.
Started looking at Jennifer Moxley’s Druthers. Wrote daybook poem.
Home a little after 11. Tidied office, booked plane tix for Seattle/Ontario, made list w/ Bree of about a dozen things she needs me to do, did the easiest 4 right away.
Dithered a lot too, though.
Got ready to leave, but saw my dad had called. Talked to him for 20 min.
Listened to the rest of the Robert Dick podcast on the way to Langston Hughes Library (and while eating a burrito).
Worked on Pop Con 5-7:45. Trying to neaten up into grafs, being kind of indecisive about what to include.
Checked out Kevin Young, The Grey Album and W.J.T. Mitchell, Seeing Through Race (which I didn’t know about, and may not get to).
Home about 8:30.
Quota of Latouche, about 1/4 of Moxley.
Read a few pages of Assayas before bed.
Lights out 12:30.
Moderately depressed the last 2-3 days, possibly longer, to be honest.
4.11.18
Up 6:30. YouTube crap. Listened to a few more tracks on Code Girl (which I’m beginning to follow) and 1/2 of a long 5049 episode w/ flautist Robert Dick.
Gave up on falling back asleep at 8:30.
Helped Bree get her costume down, read a couple of blog posts about the analytic/continental split.
Left at 10, read 1/2 of Latouche quota on train. I’m really going to have to dig out Ballet Ballads.
53st St. Library, worked on Pop Con talk, 11-1.
Went across the street to see The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (H.C. Potter, 1939) - the most obscure Astaire/Rogers movie, b/c it’s a a straight, ultimately tragic biopic (of the 1910s ballroom dancing pioneers; he dies as a flight instructor in WWI). Nice comic relief from Walter Brennan and Enda Mae Oliver. The songs are period - reminded that I should look up a couple, esp. “On Moonlight Bay” to confirm (or not) my contentions about the rarity of AABA from before the late 1910s. I guess this isn’t why everyone goes to see movies.
Lunch, went back to library.
Read this Taylor remembrance.
Worked, a little desultorily, 4:30-7. Draft is already longer than I can read, but important points are missing. Will start to have cutting soon.
Checked out Oliver Assayas, A Post-May Adolescence.
Finished Latouche quota on train downtown.
Judson Church for a monthly show of “discarded” material called Dead Darlings. Wrote in poetry daybook and finished Rodney’s book while waiting for it to start. Poems that jump out include “schottische” and “mazurka,” which I guess tell you were I’m at, though perhaps my favorite lines are in from earlier in the book (“his first time in ankara”):
[…] we
will not speak in content’s
tenements, a sparrow
who flies and is cheerful
is a poem for all people,
a form to lift the district,
the district’s formal friend.
Elsewhere: “I find it so amazing/that work is too constricting/for poets to be read with full attention/attention in the love from other minds.” You and me both.
Show itself: host and one guest read memoir pieces about their partners’ infidelity; David Cale, who was in Marat/Sade w/ Bree, read a piece on his therapists’ death; Mark Eitzel played a failed song called “Gay Jesus” and 2 others. Said hi to Mark; glimpsed David Nagler but he left before I could find him.
Started the Assayas on the train home - ostensibly a letter to Alice Debora about the author’s way into Situationism. Reads fast; lots of background on the internecine French left, post-’68.
Home about 10:30. Watched an episode of Honey West for a change from Mason.
Lights out 12.
4.10.18
Up 6. Listened to a music business podcast, went back to bed. Up for good 9:30.
Went to E77. Spent 15 min. cleaning up desktop. Read middle third of Koeneke.
Spend 2 hrs. on TPA ch. intro.
Picked up bottled water for Bree. Home about 1:30.
Read 50 p. quota of Latouche, most of it on Beggar’s Holiday, his collaboration w/ Ellington, w/ breaks for lunch and (briefly) piano. That took me until about 4.
Took a nap for an hr.
Ordered a copy of a Cecil Taylor/Pauline Oliveros DVD.
Listened to one side of an old Blue Note compilation (’40s sides, inc. James P. Johnson and Sidney Bechet).
Wrote 1 p. in poetry daybook. Made a little pile of the books I mean to read over the next month or so.
Worked on draft of Pop Con talk at E77, 7-10.
Had a slice, got some extra cash, came home, watched Perry Mason.
1 more page in daybook, to catch up. One small tax task.
Put on Code Girl. Lights out 1:30.
4.9.18
Up 8:30.
Left about 10, read Latouche on train(s) - past p. 200 by the end of day.
Therapy. Bought a Bobby Short CD at Salvation Army after.
To Cooper Union, met David Mulkins to check out piano. Not tuned recently, and 3 bass notes (F, Bb, C#) sounded bad, but it will be ok for Wed.
Lunch with David.
To Lincoln Center. Worked on Pop Con piece, 4-8 (close).
Started Rodney Koeneke’s new Body and Glass on the train home. I think he’s one of the few people I know who looks at this occasionally. Highly crafted, often metrically regular or close to it. Harder (for me) to say anything to the content immediately, but the prosody is, to sound like a poetry review “ravishing.” So far, so good, Rodney! (Oh, I also listened to you and Sandra Simonds on that radio segment. She sounded less intimidating than she does online.)
Home by 9, ate leftovers, wrote to Jon Weber (Bree’s pianist). Watched a Perry Mason.
Lights out 1.