April 24 – Week in Review

Monday was a tough day for my colleagues in Houston who got 15″ of rain in just a fHouston floodew hours.  Here are pictures of downtown Houston and the underwater roads next to the AIG office.

 

 

 

Houston Flood AIG

On Monday night we had tickets to see Lucinda Williams at the Kessler.  I was too tired for it (particularly the long drive home late at night) so we missed out.  Great reviews for the show:

http://www.star-telegram.com/entertainment/arts-culture/article72400597.html

http://www.guidelive.com/music/2016/04/18/lucinda-williams-leaves-kessler-crowd-speechless-first-three-nights-dallas

The water levels continued to rise in Houston on Tuesday – here’s the view from a colleague’s house.

Flooding 2016 - 1 Flooding 2016 - 2

On Wednesday we had a leisurely lunch at Zin Zen in Adriatica (Croatian village styled area walking distance from our home) – greek salad, chicken florentine panini  and some great potato soup.  Finished the New York times crossword while enjoying a glass of wine.

Blue Apron

I signed up for the Blue Apron cooking service this week and it arrived on Wednesday afternoon.  Everything you need, including recipes, to make 3 dinners for 2 people.

The first meal I tried was seared salmon and green potato salad with pickled mustard seeds.  It was good but the pickled mustard seeds cooked a bit long and the sugar hardened to more of a candy than a sauce.  First lesson learned.  The green potato salad was the highlight – it gets the green color from spinach, celery, and scallions and also includes sour cream and horseradish.  Next up was Korean Bao sliders with Gochujang Mayo and sweet potato tempura.  The sliders were delicious with ginger, gochuyang sauce, scallion, and black bean sauce added to the ground beef.  The Chinese steamed buns cooked up easily and were very tasty.  The combination of the soft steamed buns, crisp cucumber, patty, and spicy mayonnaise was excellent.  I think we’ll try this again.  The sweet potatoes needed to cook a few minutes longer – a bit too crispy – lesson #2.

dinnersliders

On Saturday night we streamed the recent movie “Burnt”, starring Bradley Cooper.  It was mediocre but did a good job of presenting the food and the precision and chaos in high end kitchens.  The main character had moved to London from Paris and was trying to earn a third Michelin star for his restaurant – which he ultimately was able to accomplish when he treated his staff as a team and dialed back the egomania.

Sunday was a very leisurely day.  We read for quite a while – I enjoyed various Scottish words in my Kate Atkinson book – fusty, jotters, catarrh.  We took our Michelopolis painting of a New Orleans Victorian house in to be re-framed – hopefully it will match the living room better when we get it back.  Some good sour cream chicken enchiladas for dinner.

Penelope is still in the body shop being repaired.  Hoping to get her back today before the next round of hailstorms are expected to hit on Tuesday.

I finished the book, “Disrupted – My adventures in the start-up bubble”, by Dan Lyons this week in a couple of days.  Very funny, accurate, and sad at the same time – almost like a black comedy but unfortunately true.  A separate posting with more about this book is coming soon.

Lots of new vinyl was delivered this week including the “Vinyl, me please” monthly release – “The Score” by the Fugees, Chet Baker’s “Chet is Back”, and Louis Armstrong’s “Basin Street Blues” – more about these in another posting coming soon.  Chet Baker is the one that’s getting the most turntable time by far.

Music Discovery – Bros. Landreth, The Relatives

Came across this tune, “Our Love”, on my Spotify Discover Weekly list last night.  I love the Ian Moore style guitar at 1:27 (hoping to see him with his band at Dan’s Silverleaf on Friday night and hoping the sound is much better than at the Guitar Sanctuary).

These are 2 brothers from Canada that have become relatively well known over the last few years.  They grew up in a musical household – their Dad was a singer/songwriter and played a lot of Bonnie Raitt, Little Feat, and John Hiatt.  You can certainly here those influences – particularly in the guitar styles.

The Relatives, “Things are Changing”, was another pleasant discovery last night.  Turns out this is a band formed in Dallas over 40 years ago that has just recently reformed and is enjoying some success.  Gospel music with Jimi Hendrix and Sly and the Family Stone running through it.  You can really feel that kicking in around 1:34.  Here’s a NY Times article about the band.

And here’s the song.

Tedeschi Trucks Band – Tiny Desk Concert

Really looking forward to seeing the Tedeschi Trucks Band with Jimmy Vaughan and Billy Gibbons at Jazzfest a week from Thursday.  This is a great tiny desk show with so many folks around the desk.  The tiny desk is a series of unplugged NPR concerts – there are some great ones out there including Jackson Browne.

 

April 17, Week In Review

A lot of commuting this week with full days in the office Monday thru Thursday, dinners on Monday and Tuesday and a Happy Hour on Wednesday.  Penelope didn’t fare well on the Tuesday morning commute.  The car in front of me hit a cyclist and as I stopped to check on his injuries, I was rear-ended by a minivan that then left the scene.  “P” is currently at the body shop being repaired.  Fortunately the damage is minimal due to the fancy Porsche rear impact deflector guards.

P

We streamed the movie “Meru” on Amazon.  Great climbing movie with all the usual set backs and tragedy of this genre.  Jon Krakauer did great narration.  The team ultimately were the first to summit Meru.

From Wiki:

After attempting but failing to summit Meru in 2008, Conrad Anker, Jimmy Chin, and Renan Ozturk return to the mountain in order to conquer its peak – a 4,000 foot wall known as the “Shark’s Fin”. As they climb, the men also document their ascent. “You know, I’m always a climber first,” said Chin on balancing climbing with filmmaking. “I’m always thinking about the safety of myself and the team. And I make that evaluation before I take the camera out.”[2] The film is a mixture of footage that chronicles both attempts (the failed 2008 and the successful 2011) while crafting a narrative about the climbers’ attempts to face their demons. After suffering a horrific accident while filming on location with Mr. Chin, Mr. Ozturk has a mere five months to recover before their second attempt, battling near-fatal injuries. Four days after Mr. Ozturk’s accident, Mr. Chin returns to the filming location to finish but is caught in a catastrophic avalanche that he miraculously survives with barely a scratch. Mr. Anker wrestles with bringing his mentor’s dream to fruition and the loss of both him and his climbing partner many years ago.

On Saturday afternoon we saw “Miles Ahead” a pseudo-biopic of Miles Davis starring and directed by Don Cheadle.  I give it a solid C – the plot was pretty convoluted around a stolen master tape of Miles’ return to music after 5 years – but the historical recaps and the music were good.  Ewan McGregor seemed quite out of place as a Rolling Stone journalist with a Scottish accent who befriends Miles.  Particularly enjoyed the “current day” Miles band at the end featuring Gary Clark Jr, Herbie Hancock, and Wayne Shorter.

On Sunday we did the typical early dinner while Alicia attended her SAT prep class.  Coal Vines in Plano was the destination this week – good sausage and pepper pizza, over-priced and weak Manhattan, and a Dallas Blonde beer from Deep Ellum brewery.  We finished out the week with the usual Madam Secretary and Good Wife viewing.

Music Discovery: “Devil” Music – Anderson East, Procul Harum

Lots of commuting time last week and came across these “Devil” themed tunes on Sirius XM.

Anderson East has a pleasant mix of soul, rock and country in his sound.  The tracks recorded at Muscle Shoals have that great sound that recordings of the 60s and 70s from that great studio posses.

Here’s more from Anderson East on Seattle radio:

This Procul Harum song sounded heavier than the usual stuff I remember from them.  Great guitar from Robin Trower.

“The Plot Against America” by Philip Roth

 

Roth

Finished this book yesterday.  It started quickly but became a bit of a slog.  This was surprising since I’ve read more of Philip Roth’s books than any other single author over the last few years and usually finish them quickly.  The comparisons of the fictional tale to the current Trump campaign are a bit eerie.  The New York Times review described the book as “a terrific political novel” as well as “sinister, vivid, dreamlike, preposterous and, at the same time, creepily plausible.

A plot summary from wiki:

The Plot Against America is a novel by Philip Roth published in 2004. It is an alternative history in which Franklin Delano Roosevelt is defeated in the presidential election of 1940 by Charles Lindbergh. The novel follows the fortunes of the Roth family during the Lindbergh presidency, as antisemitism becomes more accepted in American life and Jewish-American families like the Roths are persecuted on various levels. The narrator and central character in the novel is the young Philip, and the care with which his confusion and terror are rendered makes the novel as much about the mysteries of growing up as about American politics. Roth based his novel on the isolationist ideas espoused by Lindbergh in real life as a spokesman for the America First Committee and his own experiences growing up in Newark, New Jersey. The novel depicts the Weequahic section of Newark which includes Weequahic High School from which Roth graduated.

Sections I highlighted while reading:

Israel didn’t yet exist, six million European Jews hadn’t yet ceased to exist, and the local relevance of distant Palestine (under British mandate since the 1918 dissolution by the victorious Allies of the last far-flung provinces of the defunct Ottoman Empire) was a mystery to me.

For nearly a decade Lindbergh was as great a hero in our neighborhood as he was everywhere else.  The completion of his thirty-three-and-a-half-hour nonstop solo flight from Long Island to Paris in the tiny monoplane of the Spirit of St Louis even happened to coincide with the day in the spring of 1927 that my mother discovered herself to be pregnant with my older brother.

the boldness of the world’s first transatlantic solo pilot had been permeated into the pathos that transformed him into a martyred titan comparable to Lincoln.

“No person of honesty and vision”, Lindbergh said, “can look on their pro-war policy here today without seeing the dangers involved in such a policy both for us and for them.”  And then, with remarkable candor, he added:

A few far-sighted Jewish people realize this and stand opposed to intervention. But the majority still do not…We cannot blame them for looking out for what they believe to be their own interests, but we must also look out for ours.  We cannot allow the natural passions and prejudices of other peoples to lead our country to destruction.

Fiorello La Guardia was the 99th mayor of New York (1934-45) and stood 5’2″ tall.

“The pompous son of a bitch knows everything – it’s too bad he doesn’t know anything else.”

prodigious pedant that he was

“Did you know, Sandy, that tobacco was the economic foundation of the first permanent English settlement in America, at Jamestown in Virginia?”

And when you remember that the First Families of Virginia were the forebears of the Virginia statesmen who were our country’s Founding Fathers, you appreciate tobacco’s vital importance to the history of our republic.

It was the first time I was my father cry.  A childhood milestone, when another’s tears are more unbearable than one’s own.

“on the day when a candidate for the presidency of the United States requires a phalanx of armed police officers and National Guardsmen to protect his right to free speech, this great country will have passed over in to fascist barbarism.  I cannot accept that the religious intolerance emanating from the White House has already so corrupted the ordinary citizen that he has lost all respect for fellow Americans of a creed or faith different from his won.  I cannot accept that the abhorrence for my religion shared by Adolf Hitler and Charles A. Lindbergh can already have corroded…”

the uneasy aloofness that was her inbuilt defense against Gentiles.

and then, to throw a scare into the tourists crowding the beach, emerging from the water screaming “Shark! Shark!” while pointing in horror at his stump.

 

Vocabulary:

virulence:  Venomous hostility

pogrom:  An organized massacre, typically of Jews

proselytize:  Convert as a recruit

ignominious:  disgrace, dishonor, public contempt

vilify:  defame, slander

bellicose: eager to fight

callow:  immature

venerable:  commanding respect due to age or dignity

rectitude:  principled in conduct

sonorous:  deep, resonant

peripatetic:  itinerant

goyim:  a term used by Jews to refer to somebody not Jewish

mellifluous:  sweet, smooth, honeyed

pince-nez:  glasses held on by a nose pincher without leg pieces

portentous:  ominously significant

probity:  integrity, honesty

upbraiding:  severe reproaching or finding fault with

repudiate:  refuse to accept the truth, deny the truth of

ingrate:  ungrateful one

potentate:  person with great power, ruler

ignominious:  humiliating, discreditable

obsequious:  fawning, servilely compliant

despot:  autocrat, tyrant

taciturn:  inclined to silence, reserved in speech

nefarious:  extremely wicked, vicious

evanescent:  fleeting, fading away

laconic:  concise, of few words

quixotic:  impulsive, unpredictable – a la Don Quixote in romance

 

 

 

 

 

Music Discovery – Warren Haynes covers Radiohead

Came across this gem on the Sirius XM Jam_ON station on my evening commute.  The version I heard was from Nashville on October 13th.  There are a number of versions from Warren’s recent tour with the Ashes and Dust band (members of Railroad Earth) on Youtube.

Here’s another newer Jam band (Moon Taxi) with the same Radiohead cover.

And finally, while searching for the Warren Haynes cover, I came across this cover of Lead Belly’s “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” by Warren and Chris Stapleton – kindred voices.

Music Discovery: Ray Charles, Miles Davis, Ron Carter, and Camel

Seven Spanish Angels

Heard this song performed on “The Voice” TV show and looked for the original.  It’s by Ray Charles and Willie Nelson.  Is there any more soulful singer than Ray Charles?  Maybe Levon Helm or an Otis Redding ballad?

 
Ahmad’s Blues
A great MilesDavis Workin.jpgpiece by Ahmad Jamal and included on Miles Davis’ 1959 release “Workin’ with the Miles Davis Quintet”.
I really enjoyed the brushed cymbals by Philly Joe Jones and the cello by Paul Chambers.  Red Garland is the star on piano.  I don’t believe Miles plays on the track at all.
Chapter XI
Another discovery from the Sirius XM Real Jazz channel during my long commute.  This is from the 1978 Ron Carter album Peg Leg.  He plays piccolo bass on 3 of the 6 tracks on this album.  I saw Ron Carter at the Blue Note in New York a couple of years ago with Bill Frisell and he was clearly the go to player in the band although Frisell was the headliner.  He will turn 80 next year and has played on over 1100 recordings – apparently 2nd most in history.  He’s well known as part of the Miles Davis quartet (with Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter) in the early 60s.
The Snow Goose
I heard the Camel song “Chord Changes” on Sirius XM Deep Tracks and it reminded me of how much I enjoyed their 1975 album “The Snow Goose”.  Haven’t heard it in over 20 years.  It was recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra and the arrangements are very strong.  Apparently based on a novella by Paul Gallico.  The album was performed with the LSO at the Royal Albert Hall to great acclaim and is regarded as one of the best “symphonic rock” pieces.  (Did I mention that I played at the Royal Albert Hall in 1979, 80 and 81?)  There are also several great live versions of this on Youtube.  One on “The Old Grey Whistle Test”, a BBC late night music show from the 70s and 80s,  which remains my favorite TV music show.

April 4, 2016 Best Music Week Ever

This was a fantastic week of music, perhaps the “Best Music Week Ever”.  Bruce Springsteen, Steve Miller and Jimmy Vaughan, and then John Scofield and John Medeski.  Finn had some great news this week also – he made the Dean’s Honor Roll for his last quarter.  Here’s a Spotify playlist to accompany this posting:

On Tuesday we stopped for lunch at the Meddlesome Moth en route to check into the W hotel in downtown Dallas and attend the Springsteen concert at American Airlines Center.  Started with a nice cheese and charcuterie platter and then had a mushroom and farro (a grain similar to Italian rice) platter.  Diana was unsettled by the various moth emblems that reminded her of the night of the 600 moth attack on Pecan Valley.  Keith was counseled about not returning to the house immediately when requested to help address the moth infestation.

?

 

moth

 

 

Bruce started at 8pm and didn’t finish until after 11:30pm.  We heard the entire River double album from start to finish and then a parade of greatest hits.  Favorites included Badlands, Hungry Heart, and Thunder Road.  He finished with a 15 minute version of Shout.

bruce

The harmonica intro to The River always gives me chills.  Here’s the mid-song harmonica break:

 

On Wednesday, I headed to New York for 3 days.  That night I saw a one of a kind concert in the Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center.  Steve Miller put on a show called “From Ma’ to Miles”, a collection of jazz and blues tunes spanning from Ma’ Rainey to Miles Davis.  Jimmy Vaughan (older brother of Stevie Ray) was his special guest.  The band also included the professor of music at the University of Miami who did the arrangements, an amazing jazz bassist and drummer, and a superb 3 piece horn section.

miller big band

Steve Miller was inducted into the Rock N’ Roll hall of fame on Friday evening in New York and so put on this special show while in town.  Apparently he does a lot of work with Jazz at Lincoln Center to create learning programs on jazz and blues music.  I downloaded the New York subway app and so was able to easily navigate from Wall St to the Upper West side for the concert.

miller vaughan

On Thursday I had a full day of meetings at 175 Water Street.  As soon as they finished, I headed over to the Blue Note jazz club in Greenwich Village (using my new subway skills) to see John Scofield, a jazz guitar master.  I sat next to an older lady who had taken guitar lessons from the same teacher as Scofield in Wilton, Connecticut.  She knew the music really well and was a wealth of interesting information.  The food at the Blue Note was suprisingly good.

scofield

John Medeski from the Medeski, Martin, Wood band sat in on grand piano and Hammond B3 organ.  He is an excellent technical player and at the same time extremely creative in his solos.

Friday was mostly a travel day.  I registered my best time yet (10 mins) on the USA today crossword puzzle during breakfast at the Andaz hotel.  My flight was delayed due to a maintenance issue with the inbound flight from Chicago so I ended up switching to an alternate flight and wasn’t too late in arriving home.

crossword

Saturday morning included a workout and our dance lesson.  We practiced forward and reverse turns in the swing and bolero dances.  Kathleen also forced Keith to learn the man’s spin.  She also commented on how subtle and delicate Keith’s lead signals for spins were 🙂

For lunch we tried a new place in downtown McKinney called “Rye”.  What a great find – great cocktails and food.  We started with goat cheese stuffed paquito peppers (even better than the ones at Cafe Malaga), then a pork and vegetable soup, and we split the burger.  Their Manhattan was even better than the ones I make at home.

Rye rye_craft_food_and_drink_rye_burger

On Saturday night we attempted to watch the movie “Bridge of Spies”, starring Tom Hanks.  Various interruptions caused me to fall asleep without finishing it – will try again on Sunday.

On Sunday I took Penelope for her annual inspection (passed with flying colours) and a bath.  Then went for a swim, soak and steam at the health club – managed 70 laps which is close to a mile.  Then I relaxed watching the Masters golf tournament from Augusta, GA.

New York Carnegie Hall Trip – March 2016

Friday, March 25

Arrived in New York on Friday afternoon and checked into our hotel on the Upper West Side (6 Columbus). It was opposite the Time Warner Center which housed a fancy mall, health club, some nice restaurants, Whole Foods, and Jazz at Lincoln Center. Columbus Circle is on the South end of Central Park. The hotel was very convenient for Carnegie Hall and Central Park.

Had aFilo drink in the Library Bar at the Hudson Hotel – they made good Manhattans.

We found a really excellent and tiny tapas restaurant, Filo. Tried 4 things on the menu and enjoyed them all – Burrata, Mushroom Tacos (Keith’s favorite), Lamb Ribs, and Mussels.

 

Saturday, March 26

We enjoyed a workout at the Equinox health club across from the hotel. Then headed to see the musical “Beautiful”, which is about Carole King’s life and music. We both loved the musical. It had great dialog, humor, music, settings, and ensemble cast.

After the musical we had a drink Carole Kingand snacks at Bar Centrale which is a speakeasy (bar/restaurant that doesn’t have a sign or indication that it’s there – just looked like a normal house) near Broadway.

Diana’s Mom, Clorinda, arrived smoothly on Saturday evening. Her driver got out and gave Diana a hug and told her how much she’d enjoyed driving her Mom.

Sunday, March 27th (Easter Sunday)

Diana and her Mom went to Hackensack, NJ to visit Clorinda’s high school friend Jojo. She hadn’t been back there in 70 years. They had breakfast at the “Chit Chat Café”, drove by Clorinda’s childhood home, and attended Easter mass at the church she attended as a child. Diana found it interesting that the Catholic mass was conducted by an Indian priest with a strong accent. Clorinda sang a hymn as people were entering for the 2nd service.

Diana did a great job of navigating her rental car out of Manhattan and over to Hackensack and back. They drove over the Washington bridge which was opened for traffic on the day Clorinda was born.

Central Park 1Meanwhile, Keith explored Central Park. He walked about 8 miles up the East side across and down the West side. He found the statue of Robert Burns, the Guggenheim museum, and the huge reservoir on the North end of the park. He passed several baseball fields and children’s Central Park 2Central Park 3playgrounds throughout the park. The “Imagine” mosaic is a tribute to John Lennon in an area of the park called “Strawberry Fields”.

Imagine

 

Sushi Damo

That evening we had sushi at “Sushi Damo”.   We laughed because that’s what we call Diana’s youngest brother Adamo. After dinner we wandered through the Time Warner Center and peeked into Dizzy Gillespie’s jazz club at Lincoln Center. There was a great band playing with a great view of the city behind them.

 

Monday, March 28th

CarnegieThis was the day of the big Carnegie Hall performance. We sat in the fancy boxes on the first level up from the orchestra section. The band did an amazing job and the sound was fantastic. The call it the Stradivarius of concert halls and I can see why – you could hear every individual instrument perfectly and very clearly. Here’s the poster for the concert.

After the performance, we had lunch at an Italian restaurant, Trattoria Dell Arte, right across from the hall.

Trattoria

Landmark 1On Monday evening we met up with some friends who live in New York at Landmark restaurant. It was a very nice French restaurant and we were lucky enough to get one of the “Dome of Silence” tables which made it easier to talk. Excellent moules frites, lamb chops, and boudin noir. They brought green apple flavored candy floss after dinner. Here’s Diana’s Mom enjoying some and getting a chuckle out of it.

Landmark groupHere’s a picture of the gang. Diana, Keith, Mary, Chuck, Olga, and Clorinda. Teodor was taking the picture. It was a very memorable dinner catching up with old friends and introducing them to Clorinda.