Not To Be Missed: Globe Posters

The show: "Globe Poster: Not to be Missed!" at the Creative Alliance, Baltimore, Maryland, runs from April 27 through June 16, 2013.

True to it’s title, it’s not to be missed.

You probably know the posters even if you don’t know the name of the printer. Especially if you were in any of America’s inner cities in the Sixties, Seventies or Eighties. You remember them: they were those bright dayglo cardboard concert posters. They were stapled to plywood walls and wrapped around telephone polls. They were advertising for live concerts. Now they’re a series of graphics illuminating the history of Black music.

A brief digression: in the mid-70’s I ripped a Globe Poster off a wall in Jackson Mississippi. I had no idea it was a Globe Poster. It announced a concert at the Mississippi Coliseum by BB King, Bobby Blue Bland, Albert King, Little Milton, and several others. It promised seven live bands.Admission was $5 in advance. I took the poster from that plywood wall on Farish Street in a moment of clarity: I knew it was an important piece of the American history of art and music. And I wanted it. To my astonishment, I recognized that instantly, without a lot of analysis.

I preserved the poster and framed it. It has become a priceless treasure. Eventually I saw at the bottom that it was made by Globe Posters in Baltimore (at the time they were at 129 Market Place). From time to time I would wonder how I could get my hands on more posters like it.

Imagine my surprise when I read that Globe Posters, the Baltimore printing company, was finally folding, a casualty in 2010 of electronic media and the mainstreaming of rap music, among other things. Would I find all of their remarkable posters lying in a dumpster for me to rescue, to cram into the trunk of my car, or would they be found rotting in a slimy landfill and lost forever? Goddess be praised, neither. Globe’s extensive, iconic collection was purchased by Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) and preserved. And now, around the corner from where Globe last manufactured its posters on Bank Street in Highlandtown, there’s a museum show of the posters at Creative Alliance.

Curated by Chloe Helton-Gallagher for her MFA thesis,this remarkable show is as much about the history of African American music and changing tastes as it as it is about the posters themselves. Want to prepare for a visit? I'm recommending James Brown of Spotify.

This show is truly not to be missed.

A Scholarship In My Dad's Memory

Melvin L. Michaels (left), May, 2011

My dad, who passed away on February 17, 2012, was a lifetime musician and music lover. He played piano for more than 80 years. And he loved going to concerts and hearing live performances. He was also a gifted teacher and educator.

We've decided to honor himby creating a scholarship in his memory at North Penn High School, in Lansdale, Pennsylvania. My dad served as Director of Secondary Education and later as Assistant Superintendent in North Penn and retired from North Penn in 1987. He lived in Lansdale for many years. The scholarship is called "The Melvin L. Michaels, Ed.D Memorial Music Scholarship". We hope it will be awarded annually. We hope there will be enough financial support that it can continue for a long time and have many beneficiaries.

If you would like to help fund this scholarship so that the initial award may be made in Spring, 2012, please send a donation before March 2, 2012, to:

North Penn High School Senior Awards Fund
attn: Amy Schwartz
NPHS
1340 S. Valley Forge Road
Landsdale, PA 19446

I am happy my cousins came up with this idea. And I hope my Dad's many colleagues, friends, and students will provide support for it.

La Santa Cecilia Rocks!

This is from LA. Hard to believe? Well, it's got everything. Accordion. Cumbia. Salsa. Jazz. Scat. Insane percussion. This rocks. I give it a 9 for the beat. And, guess what, in the opinion of your most humble Bloguero, this should win a Latin Grammy. You heard it here first. Your Bloguero loves this band. He cannot wait for them to play NYC or Boston or someplace where your Bloguero can bask in this.

Sunday Evening Inspiration From Amnesty International

Turn it up. Back away from that keyboard. Turn it up. Get out of that chair. Shake it. Shake it. Shake it.

Enough analysis for now. What we do here, what we aspire to: a world of peace and freedom and justice.

major h/t to LinkTV.org

Remembering The Monk

In a book review of Robin D.G. Kelley's new "Thelonious Monk: The Life And Times Of An American Original," August Kleinzahler gets Monk's music just right:

It’s an angular, splintered sound, percussive in attack and asymmetrical, music that always manages to swing hard and respect the melody. Monk was big on melody. Thelonious Monk’s body of work, as composer and player (the jazz critic Whitney Balliett called Monk’s compositions “frozen . . . improvisations” and his improvisations “molten . . . compositions”), sits as comfortably beside Bartok’s Hungarian folk-influenced compositions for solo piano as it does beside the music of jazz giants like James P. Johnson, Teddy Wilson and Duke Ellington, some of the more obvious influences on Monk. It’s unclear how much of Bartok he listened to. Monk did know well and play Rach­maninoff, Liszt and Chopin (especially Chopin). Stravinsky was also a favorite.

Precisely right. And the book itself, according to the review, sounds wonderful.

The Next Great Irish Band

has arrived in the US, and it's Bell X1:



This is so reminiscent of Talkin Heads. This is great stuff.

The details:

Bell X1 released their fourth studio album Blue Lights On The Runway in early 2009. It is scheduled for a U.S. release on March 3 through their American Yep Roc label. This follows a Feb. 20 release in Ireland. Blue Lights on the Runway will include songs such as "Light Catches Your Face", which was played during a recent episode of One Tree Hill in the U.S. (November 2008), "Blow In's", "How Your Heart Is Wired" and "One String Harp" which have all been played at their recent sell out shows in Vicar Street, Dublin. Blue Lights On The Runway was preceded by its lead single, titled "The Great Defector". The Great Defector became the bands most successful single yet peaking at number 3 in the Irish singles chart, dropping 2 spaces to 5th before regaining ground the following week landing in at number 4.

Remembering Coleman Hawkins

Billie Holiday (1915-1959) and Coleman Hawkins (1904-1969)

Jazz saxophonist Coleman Hawkins had an absolutely unbelievable gift. Lester Young said, "As far as I'm concerned, I think Coleman Hawkins was the President first, right? As far as myself, I think I'm the second one." Miles: "When I heard Hawk I learned to play ballads." But you don't hear this pre-bebop sound much these days. And there is nothing as smooth, as pensive, as inventive. It sounds incredibly simple. It isn't. Oh what we're missing:



I wish there were more of this. I wish I could hear this on the radio sometime.

Ersatz Corridos. Washington Can't Carry A Tune.

Today Nezua at Unapologetic Mexican reports that the US government, you know, those people in Washington, are producing fake corridos to be played on the radio near the US Mexico border. Why? Because they are supposed to deter border crossings from Mexico to the US by undocumented people.

Why does this make me so angry? Is it because it's just another, dishonest trick, another lie from Washington? Is it because it's a complete waste of taxpayer money? Is it because of the arrogance of the trick and its assumption that the audience for ersatz corridos is just plain stooopid? Is it because its so lame?

Unfortunately, I haven't heard the corridos yet. I'm wondering why I suspect that they suck as badly as the idea behind them. And that the program is another $400 toilet seat.

New Year 2009: Bring It On Home To Me

"Bring It On Home to Me" is a 1961 soul song written and recorded by R&B singer-songwriter Sam Cooke. The song, about infidelity, was a hit for Cooke and has become a pop standard covered by numerous artists of different genres. It is one of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. Cooke's recorded version has Lou Rawls singing responses as an uncredited background singer.

This song is considered by many historians of soul music to be the founding, or at least definitive soul song, as it provides the formula that is still popular today

Wiki

The song itself is simple enough:

If you ever change your mind
About leavin', leavin' me behind
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, oh yeah

You know I laughed (ha ha) when you left
But now I know I've only hurt myself
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me.

source

Yes, it's simple. And there have been so many different versions. So many variations. So many different ways of playing and singing it. Many people have dug deed into their own understanding, their creativity, their desire to express themselves and have chosen this song. It is a truly remarkable vehicle.

It's remarkable how each of the versions is at once the same. And very, very different.

And so, as an illustration of my 2009 resolution, to continue to explore my own voice, to find my own way of expression, to expand in creativity and inventiveness, I give you for your year end inspiration, Bring It On Home To Me, Ten+ Versions:

Otis Redding and Carla Thomas:


Wilson Pickett (no embed)

Sam Cooke:


Rod Stewart and Faces:


Percy Sledge:


John Lennon:


The Animals:


Eddie Floyd:


Lou Rawls:


Brownie McGee and Sonny Terry:


Yardbirds:


Mickey Gilley:


Doubtless there are others. Many others. You're welcome to add them. Or invent your own.

May this selection inspire you to even greater clarity and creativity in 2009. Happy New Year. Feliz Ano Nuevo.