Up 6 or earlier. I’m a little ahead on the R&B notes, so I listened to the new Wire album, Mind Hive, on Spotify. A couple of pop songs and some darker, goth-leaning numbers. They still have weird moments - how did they decide to title a song “Oklahoma,” and yell it at the start?
Coffee - wasn’t in the mood for the books I’m in the middle of, started A.O. Scott’s Better Living Through Criticism. Goes down easy, wears learning lightly. Maybe too much so.
Had to go back to bed when I got back. Napped until almost noon, and wasted some time after that. Libraries aren’t closed, but the virus increases my resistance to going. So, not a writing day.
Made myself work on my (physical) inbox at 2:45, worked for 2 hrs. Filing/trashing, returning a W-9, adding things to to-do list, etc. Did actually feel like progress. Listened to the previous Wire album, Silver/Lead while doing so - not quite as good as the current one, I thought. Trudgier “rock” rhythms. Also the last few tracks on disc 2 of Okzaki/Monk.
Groceries w/ Bree. More people in our local, not-huge health food store than I’ve seen at one time, stocking up but maybe not to the point where you’d call it panic buying (I saw toilet paper), as were we.
Saw the news that B’way shows an any 500+ events are cancelled by the city until further notice. Rec’d emails about the Encores! performance of Love Life (Weill/Lerner), which will be refunded (maybe next season), and Tony Bennett in Staten Island, new date TBD. Kept looking for explicit word about the Wire show I had tickets for tonight, but heard nothing from Music Hall of Williamsburg, cap. 650 (by email/twitter feed). Was already leaning toward not going — they played last night, and even it was going on as scheduled, it probably shouldn’t have been, and I wasn’t about to log an hr. on the subway and back to find out. Realized that Jay Sherman-Godfrey was playing w/ Wire Troop at Let Love Inn, which I’d told him I’d be missing for Wire (odd coincidence about the band names), so I did go out to Astoria. Predictably scant attendance, and maybe even going to low-key things like this is contraindicated, but it was good to hear them play. May not hear any live music for a while.
Made a list of my ongoing/pending creative projects (writing, music) between sets. Maybe I should post it. It’s long - if I didn’t start anything else, and spent all reasonably available work time bringing them to fruition, it would take several years to complete them (more, if getting a couple of theater pieces produced is a goal). That makes me anxious.
Read some Johnston before leaving for the show, and on trains. Had to skip around in the collection b/c of the density of the prose. Long 2-part piece on Agnes Martin, and a really lovely and interesting passage on her participation in a John Cage piece, which seems to have been a kind of consciousness raising experience for her. Gives a different view on what the political meaning of that kind of work might be than the Mira Schor line on his quietist obfuscation of his gayness; and on the controversy on Julius Eastman’s performance choices (in a different Cage piece).
Home midnight. Watched a couple things on YouTube. Lights out 12:45, put on disc 3 of Okzaki.
3.11.20
Up 6.
Form notes, 10 songs.
Coffee. Read 25 p. Butler, 30 p. Johnson, Brian Kane, “Acousmatic Fabrications: Les Paul and the ‘Les Paulverizer.”
Started a long article on “Body and Soul.”
Left about noon, made quota of Butler on train (though I ought to go back to musical examples w/ accompanying CD).Library 1-3:30. Moved around to a few moments in the “form” section of intro - progress not steady, but I don’t have much interfering w/ work the next few days. Saw Tomeka again.
Check out Mark Slobin, Folk Music, A Very Short Introduction.
Read some Johnson - by ’71, she’s a self-proclaimed “lesbian chauvinist,” writing what was once a dance review column in stream-of-consciousness style. Listened to a few tracks of Okzaki.
Therapy.
Dinner w/ Bree.
Home about 8. Tidied office - a little dispiriting to pile up loose ends/to-dos, but at least I cleaned up.
Finished notes on the current R&B disc. Ripped the next two discs.
Watched Pleasure Cruise (Frank Tuttle 1933), w/ Roland Young, Genevieve Tobin.
Lights out midnight. L&O podcast (another of my brainless comforts.
3.10.20
Ups for an hr+ around 2-3. Watched some crap online. This was happening a lot a few months ago, not so much recently. Not sure why it recurred. Got back to sleep for 3 hrs, up 6:45.
Form notes, 10 songs.
Train, read 25 p. Butler.
Therapy.
Bought Bree some unsweetened chocolate.
Lunch, coffee (late).
LC library noon - worked about 11:30-2, reinserting a couple of bits into the intro. I think it works now; will move on (or back) to form/alism.
Responded to E. Newton’s diss passage (at some length, about 900 words written quickly - lucid but not what you’d publish, like a peer review). Hope it helps.
Took a break - read some of Jill Johnston, Disintegration of a Critic on Judson, Fluxus, &c. Supposed to get weirder.
Ran into Tomeka Reid, who was studying up on bebop for a job interview at Brown. Told her how much I liked her last record.
Worked off and on 4-5:30. Tried to settle on 1st 2 grafs of form section. A lot of this material exists in multiple drafts.
Watched some of this weird conversation between Earl Sweatshirt and his mother, Cheryl L. Harris of “Whiteness as Property” fame. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwgIWG6V3qk
Library closed at 6. Finally bought new headphone adapter at Apple Store. Sandwich.
Read Butler in plaza at Lincoln Ctr. until Bree showed up. Finally listened to a little more Okzaki.
NY Philharmonic, Debussy Apres-Midi… and Nocturnes, Ravel Scheherazade, and Scriabin Poem of Ecstasy. Some empty seats - I don’t know if people are starting to stay home. Singer for Ravel mouthed/mimed “wash your hands” to audience.
Home about 10. Read a bit more Butler, didn’t quite make 50 p.
Lights out 11:30. Dharma talk.
[Didn’t read a journal article.]
3.9.20
Up 9:30. John Oliver segment.
Form notes, 10 songs.
Left at 11:45. Mailed tax documents to acct. Done until the return shows up.
Coffee, started Mark J. Butler, Unlocking the Groove.
53rd St. library, worked 1:30-4:30. Putting stuff back in.
Had a bite, home 6. Chatted w/ Bree.
Read: to p. 53 of Butler, p. 80 or so of Brooks-Motl.
Took out recycling, brought up laundry.
Read Susan Reid, “Socialist Realism in the Stalinist Terror: The Industry of Socialism Art Exhibition, 1935-41.”
Cooked some vegetables, ate w/ Bree. Called Dad.
Wasted some time, but finished Brooks-Motl. Better than some poetry I’ve read recently.
Lights out not much after 11.
3.8.20
Up 9:30 - lost an hr. to Daylight Savings Time (which I’m otherwise happy about). SNL.
Farmer’s market. Signed a ballot position for a local Dem candidate.
Home, put on KSPC livestream for a while.
Worked through email, 1 hr., did various related tasks. E.g. paid Bob, downloaded concert tickets.
Talked w/ Bree about home projects, travel plans, hr.+. (“Family Meeting”) [Hired a housekeeper.]
Coffee (late), read:
Thomas McEvilley, “Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief” (famous negate review of MoMa’s 1984 primitivism show)
Richard A. Peterson, “Why 1955? Explaining the Advent of Rock Music”
Katherine Spring, “Pop Go the Warner Bros., et al.: Marketing Film Songs during the Coming of Sound.”
Bookstall across the street: Moravia, Contempt, CDs of Grace Jones, Pull Up to the Bumper and Ahmed El-Salamouny, Aquarela.
Form notes on The R&B Years 1946, v. 1, disc 1, 10 songs. Some interesting discoveries already, re compound forms: Gatemouth Brown’s “I Ain’t Mad At You, Pretty Baby” and “Did You Ever Love a Woman” seem to set some precent for “I Got a Woman.”
Worked on taxes.
Spent 30-45 min. or so starting to work on music for a lyric David Hadju sent me. Would like to finish this, then go on to lyrics for the Eyelashes tracks.
Headed down to the Jazz Gallery to hear Tyshawn Sorey Sextet - but I had the wrong night. Disappointing. Looked in the windows of Rizzoli (closed at 7). Could have gotten a coffee or a drink or a bite, but headed home, had a slice after I got off the train. Read quite a bit of Guibert on the train, both ways.
Home 8:30, wasted 90 min, then finished Guibert.
Lights out 11:30.
[Didn’t write or try to, read Brooks-Motl, listen to Miles Okzaki]