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Special Guests At Jazz Fest

Chris Grell, Donna Grell, and Patty Cowie at the Rochester International Jazz Festival
Chris Grell, Donna Grell, and Patty Cowie at the Rochester International Jazz Festival

I got in to see my doctor on a day’s notice so that he could take a look at a tick bite that I have on my leg. I spotted the tick as I was getting ready for bed and suspect I picked it up when we walked in the woods that morning. I crushed it as I tried pulling it off and then dug the rest of it out with some tweezers. My doctor said there has not been a case of Lyme disease in Monroe County so he said keep an eye on it and if it acts up he will prescribe antibiotics. There is a lot of worrisome tick bite info online.

Went straight to the Jazz Fest from the doctor’s and started with Billy’s Band, a loungey, Russian Tom Waits-like combo. Worked our way over to the Xerox Auditorium to hear the Lynne Arriale Trio. She plays like Keith Jarrett, lyrical and relaxed and the band listens deeply while backing her.

Most fun of the night was out on Gibbs Street. There were too many people to hear the band so we hung out in the back by the merchandise booths. We got in line for a Downbeat photo session and a woman in front of me asked if she had just butted in line. I said I think so but that’s ok.” Turned out to be Dave Mahoney’s high school flame and a couple of other rockin’ women that I went to high school with. I grabbed a bootleg copy of their photo (above).

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Vuvuzela Time

Great Blue Heron in Eastman Lake, Rochester, NY
Great Blue Heron in Eastman Lake, Rochester, NY

Does the Great Blue Heron sound anything like a vuvuzela? Not really but I’m trying to make sense of this collision of coincidence. Rich sent us a photo of a Heron in Sausalito and we just spent some time watching one practice tai chi in Eastman Lake. The World Cup and the Rochester Jazz Fest both start today! I’m a little worried about how we’re going to keep up with our work in the next few weeks.

Maybe it is just the sort of distraction we need to wean us from obsessive Jazz Festival devotion. The organizers added a new venue, a tent in parking lot at Abilene. We were excited about hearing jazz over there but then found out all those acts are Americana, a categorization that bothers me. And the success of the last eight years seems to have only diluted the presence of American jazz. Still no Ornette, Pharoah, Joe McPhee, McCoy Tyner, Art Ensemble but Bernie Williams is here. We have the Club Pass and we’ll wander and we always find some cool stuff so I’m optimistic. Pay no attention to me.

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Sam’s Bike

Sam's bike in bushes out behind Bill and Geri's house
Sam’s bike in bushes out behind Bill and Geri’s house

We were having homemade pizzas in Bill and Geri’s backyard when I spotted this bike in the bushes. I had never seen Bill or Geri on a bike so I asked who it belonged to. Geri said their son Sam bought it but never rode it. Cool bike.

I offered to to go out to the Apple Sore with my dad because he wanted to buy an iPad. He spends so much time in his computer room he deserves one so can get out more like maybe to the living room. He bought the bottom of the line model without 3G. These things are selling so fast Apple ships them in sleep mode and when you switch them on you still have 96 per cent battery life left. He purchased a few apps while we were still in the store. Keynote and Sketchbook Pro.

He was going to borrow my laptop for his upcoming presentation on Brighton’s farms in the 1800’s. He’s building his slide show in Keynote and he wanted to continue work on the iPad. An Apple employee demonstrated the basics of the iPad app and sold us a cable to plug the iPad into the projection unit so he won’t need the laptop. We both wanted one of the Pogo Sketch pens that let you draw on the iPad like a tablet but they only had the pens in hot pink. My father went for the pink saying it would be hard to lose. I decided to wait and order a silver one online. I found one on Amazon but with shipping it was more than the pink one.

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To Chuck

Someone named Mike Weber took video at the annual Bob Dylan Birthday Bash. Chuck Cuminale started this tradition about thirty years ago and the last incarnation of his band, The Colorblind James Experience and now Hunu, carries the tradition on. It is always fun but a bit melancholy without Chuck. Chuck, real name James and really colorblind, was born a few days before or after Dylan and he was always one of Bob’s biggest fans but not all of Dylan. He was very particular. I know he liked this song because I remember Peggi singing it with him. That’s Ken Frank, CBJ bass player from the classic lineup, on bass in this video.

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Tribal Ritual

Scott McCarney and Skuta at Visual Studies opening for 52/52+ in Rochester, NY
Scott McCarney and Skuta at Visual Studies opening for 52/52+ in Rochester, NY

The lawns were going brown in May and now the golf course is flooded. Not that I’m golfer but we do cut across one of the holes when we walk and I am always on the lookout for balls. I have about ten gallons of them in the garage. I’m fairly certain of the quantity because I have stuffed them down the throat of those five gallon, bottled water jugs that are made of the toxic plastic. We had bottled water delivered when we were on trade but those days are gone and we are probably a lot healthier for it. We drink water straight from the tap now. Is that dangerous? I guess we could filter it but I wonder if you lose the minerals when you do that? Sometimes you get a chlorine hit but it usually tastes pretty good.

The path in the woods across the street was covered with tulip petals. Not the flower, they’re long gone. These are the blossoms of the tulip trees and we have a lot of them down here. I don’t remember ever seeing a tulip tree in the city. I think the rain filled the flowers and broke them off. We had a lot wind too so maybe that was a factor. The petals are green and orange and yellow. They look edible and are scattered on the path as if in preparation for some tribal ritual.

Artist’s books are a funny thing. They don’t always make for a good book. They are often something only an artist could love. Scott McCarney, though, is one of the best. He’s curated the current show at Visual Studies Workshop for his roommate from 26 years ago, when they were both students at VSW. Skuta who now lives in Iceland, created a book a week for a full year and 52 of them are on display here.

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Fictional Summer Reading List

Art books and Paul Dodd paintings
Art books and Paul Dodd paintings

Steve Hoy posted a comment to this blog a few weeks back asking if anyone had recommendations for some good fiction. Pete replied:

STEVE: “i just finished reading john irving’s last night in twisted river, and while it was good i kinda got antsy to finish it, unlike thomas bergers ‘ (my main man) 2nd little big man book, which i was sorry to come to the end. can anybody recommend some good american fiction?”

I’m the wrong one to ask because my favorite books are all picture books. I did, however, know who to ask. Pete LaBonne sent back a list that should get you through the summer.

PETE: “Sorry for not responding sooner, but I picked up a few Donald Westlake books and didn’t get around to it. Let me make it clear though, I don’t advocate the buying of books. Except maybe for Alaska Bear Tales by Larry something.

If you have to read anything other than William T. Vollmann:
From the old school there’s The Wild Palms by Faulkner, East Of Eden by Stienbeck, & The American Claimant by Twain.

I don’t know if you can consider Conrad & Nabokov american, Hugo was sure french though. While, and you can quote me on this, Flannery O’Connor left the nastiest and most beautiful legacy in the Catholic language, you know, except for the Petticoat Junction theme song.

Tristan Egolf (Lord Of The Barnyard) killed himself, as did David Foster Wallace (Infinite Jest). Saul Bellow died on his own. I haven’t seen anything new by D. Keith Mano (Take Five) in a long time or come to think about it or by Pete Hautman (The Mortal Nuts) but you never know unless you go to the trouble to find out. Thomas Pynchon is still alive and getting better. Mason & Dixon is great and so is Inherent Vice.

We do know all about Richard Bachman (of The Regulators fame).

Paul Theroux has written several great books, O Zone, Picture Palace, The Family Arsenal & probably something else I’m forgetting. While Theodore Rozak wrote only one masterpiece which would be titled Flicker.

Then there’s Robert Coover’s wonderful novel Gerald’s Party which I read three times. In fact I read most of these three times. While you’re in “C”, You might want to check out Cormac McCarthy if your library sometimes throws first names into it’s alphabetization scheme.

Then the shit starts getting nasty with Chuck Pahlaniuk which might have a misplaced “H”. Then it gets downright EVIL with Nykanen’s The Bone Parade.

But. There are two books which scared the HELL out of me; L.A. Rex by Will Beall and Alaska Bear Tales by Larry something.”

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To Dennis Hopper

We started out sitting with friends in the back of the room at Lovin’ Cup but had to move up when Amy Rigby and Wreckless Eric took the stage. We found a spot down front with Chris Schepp. That’s his cream soda bottle that gets placed in front of my camera in the movie above. I was drinking the Rocky Mountain IPA and it was way too strong for me. I propped my camera up on a jar with a candle in it, a lit candle, and I melted the bottom of my pocket Nikon. Ah, but we had a good time. These two are so charming, so relaxed on stage, so comfortable with themselves. They’re not afraid to stop songs, which they did twice, and their between song banter is worthy of Gracie and Allen. We came to these two through Wreckless Eric’s songs from the mid seventies. They were unlike anything else at the time and “Whole Wide World” sounds as good today as it did back then. In fact I prefer it today with just two guitars. Amy more than holds her own with beautiful songs.

They did both sides of their new single, two really odd songs, one Amy’s, one Wreckless’s. They have their own thing going on but ironically, their new cd is all covers. We bought a copy on the way out. In true Wreckless form none of the tags were there when I ripped it in iTunes so I had to enter my own. I misspelled ‘favorites” at first as the name of the cd is “Two-Way Family Favourites,” English style. It includes sensational versions of “Fernando” and “In My Room” and the Byrds song in the video which they dedicated to Dennis Hopper.

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Cubism & Bolt Cutters

Paul Dodd Crime Face watercolor 2010
Paul Dodd Crime Face watercolor 2010

I was in painting class last night, listening to Fred Lipp explain the principals of Cubism as first explored by Cezanne, when Warren came in from the office to say my father was on the phone. My father told me that Peggi had called him from her downtown fitness club to say her locker had been broken into while she was swimming and her clothes and car keys had been stolen. My father said he was going to swing by the gallery and pick me up so I could give Peggi my keys and check on the car. I walked out of painting class waited for my dad out on Goodman Street.

My father packed up some of my mother’s clothes and I passed them to Peggi who was wrapped in a towel. A few minutes later she came out of the women’s locker room with my mom’s clothes on and she confessed she wasn’t entirely certain which locker she had put her stuff in. There was only one locked locker in the area and it wouldn’t open with her combination. The lock did look like hers and she had become convinced that that maybe the lock was just acting up. The woman behind the desk suggested that they cut the lock off and see. She went in the back room and came out with big red bolt cutters and the two of them headed back into the women’s locker room.

They were unable to cut through the Master Lock so they cleared the women out of the room and I went in there. It took some doing but I popped the lock and there were Peggi’s clothes and her lock was in her gym bag! All she can think is that she picked up someone else’s lock last week, put it in her bag with hers and then put that lock on her locker when she went in to the pool.

Peggi dropped me back at class picked up the Cubist discussion where we had left off.

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The Illest Setup In The City

Low Rider in parking lot at Charlotte beach
Low Rider in parking lot at Charlotte beach

Our neighbors were headed home from the beach when an SUV pulled in front of them. A guy hopped out and offered to sell them his homemade cd for ten bucks. They made another offer and came home with the goods and then let us borrow the unlabeled cd. It was produced by Bricksonion and his studio is in his car! The same car that pulled in front of our neighbors. If you get the itch to lay down a few tracks, give a call. Check out his YouTube Channel and you’ll see local rappers performing in his car.

Bricksonion (“like Smithsonion”) wasn’t around when the Stones recorded “Exile On Main Street” but it too was recorded by a mobile unit. I’m reading the 33 1/3 book on “Exile” now and it’s coinciding nicely with all the press from the re-release of that double lp. This 33 1/3 series would make good ebooks. Wish this one wasn’t so tedious. It doesn’t even make me want to put the lp on. It wasn’t the Stone best either.

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Last Night, Tomorrow Night

I just checked back with the Amy Rigby/Wreckless Eric video that I took when they were here last year. I expected more that 478 views but there are two other versions of “Dancing With Joey Ramone” up there. I wish I could inflate their numbers. This is a sensational song. They’ll be back in town tomorrow night at the Lovin’ Cup in Henrietta and they are not to missed.

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She’s An Artist. She Don’t Look Back.

Barbeque fans at Charlotte Beach in Rochester, New York
Barbeque fans at Charlotte Beach in Rochester, New York

Our friends and neighbors, Rick and Monica, lent their vintage VW bus to Jeff Spevak this weekend. Jeff didn’t go anywhere in the bus. He just used it as a prop behind their designated area in the fenced off section of Charlotte beach where the Roc City Barbeque Event took place. Jeff smokes meat like a pro and won a contest in Memphis last year. His crew is called the “Smokin’ Dopes”.

We road our bikes over there on Saturday and were pretty confused by the whole thing. We paid five bucks to get in. Contestants travelled from all over the country and pay 250 to compete. But we can’t try what they grill because of Heath Department rules? Some vendors were allowed to sell but they weren’t competing. We had a delicious slice of grilled pineapple and Dundee beer from the VW van and rode back home.

We ran into Jeff later that night at the annual Bob Dylan Birthday Bash and we heard he won a 300 dollar award and trophy for his poblano pepper hamburger. Peggi, backed by her band, sang a beautiful version of “She Belongs To Me.”

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Busker Battle

Street musician at the City Busker show in Rochester, NY
Street musician at the City Busker show in Rochester, NY

We saw about half of the buskers on East Avenue before we found the tent where the folks from City Newspaper were handing out the guitar picks that you were supposed to vote for your favorite buskers with. This was a pretty cool cool event and we had no trouble at all handing out the five picks we were given. This guy switched between accordion and washboard. He had taps on the front of his shoes and an assortment of funky percussion attached to his washboard.

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The Future Is Not Here Yet

Robert Meyerowitz's car and dog at Cobbs Hill in Rochester, NY
Robert Meyerowitz’s car and dog at Cobbs Hill in Rochester, NY

I met Robert Meyerowitz, former City Newspaper music critic, at Cobbs Hill for tennis. I hadn’t played in ten years or so. I think the last time was with Pat Lowery from SLT. I held my own but really fell apart when Robert tried to show me how to serve. And I managed to knock a few balls over the fence. Robert drove here from Alaska and he may be headed to Washington to take some sort of government job.

We had a company ask us to look at their website because they weren’t happy with its performance. The site was designed by company in China and I spent about an hour there marveling at their graphic sense.

Peggi read a book review in Sunday’s paper for “Last Call, The Rise and Fall of Prohibition.” My grandfather ran a speakeasy in the city and the book sounded interesting so we tried ordering it on the iPad. We couldn’t find it at Apple so we went right to Simon & Schuster’s site and bought the epub version as a download but the only thing that was downloaded was an html document that launched in our browser and took us to a page with three lines of code.

We received an email confirmation from Simon & Schuster so the credit card part cleared fine but we didn’t have the book. We sent an email to them and they said we would hear from them in 48 hours. That never happened so I called and talked to a woman who took my name and number and told me someone would call. I said, “Really? Someone from Simon & Schuster is going to call me?” And she said, “Well, I certainly hope so.”

I let a few days go by and no one called so I called S&S again this afternoon and talked to Julius. He wanted to credit our account be couldn’t find our order number in their system. In fact he said,”I see no orders all for the epub version of this book.” I spent about a half hour on the phone with him while he tried to contact the guy in charge of downloads. He was unable to reach him on his Blackberry so I told Julius I had to get back to work. He promised he would get back to me. We went down to the pool for a dip and when we returned I found this email.

Thanks for contacting us.  Unfortunately, eBooks purchased from SimonandSchuster.com require Adobe Digital Editions in order to be downloaded and properly viewed.  At this time, Adobe Digital Editions is not compatible with the iPad.  Because of the difficulty, I have issued a full refund for your purchase.  Please allow up to 30 days for this to be fully visible on all of your credit card and/or banking statements.

I’m very sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.
Sincerely,
Stephen
SimonandSchuster.com

I know our friend, Martin, is deeply interested in this topic so I took notes.

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Out For Bid

I usually start a post here by looking at my photos but I just stuck my Ultra II SanDisk card in the card reader and it was empty. There is always the iPhoto library or Flickr.

We took our first swim in the street pool this afternoon. I think this the first time we’ve been in in May. The temps are in the high eighties and the water is 73 degrees already. Group dynamics are a funny thing but that’s what makes the world go ’round. A tree needed to be taken down and some people in the pool group wanted the job to “go out for bid” and others wanted just drop the thing. What could be more fun than taking down a tree? Especially when there’s an engineer in the group.

I had three spices on our grocery list to pick up at Wegmans today. It takes some time to sort through the competition. Unlike other products they don’t sit on the shelf next to one another. They are arranged by brands. McCormicks is like the Microsoft of spices and it’s tough to find generic spices. Comparing unit pricing is impossible without a pocket calculator as some are priced per ounce and others by the pound. And the little plastic bottles keep getting smaller. When I settle on one I usually buy two so I don’t have to sort it all out again.

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33 + 45 = 78

Onion and pepper in the pan
Onion and pepper in the pan

It seems all good home cooked meals begin with onions and peppers. Agreed?

Roy Sowers goes to a lot of garage sales. And he likes to share the curiosities he picks up. He comes to see the band a lot and in the last year he has given us an old Miles lp, a drum case, Dr. John’s “In The Right Place” and a Benny Goodman lp with Gene Kruppa on drums. A few weeks back he gave us a 78rpm Count Basie set. I was pretty sure our Stanton turntable could do 78s but when I got home I couldn’t find the setting. I considered recording the lp at 45 and speeding the files up on the computer but I returned the recordings to Roy.

While listening to the stack one dollar lps that scored at Record Archive I spotted the 78 setting on our turntable. You press 33 and 45 at the same time and of course, you get 78. I never put this together until now.

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Air Is Now A Dollar

Vinyl records purchased at Record Archive Sidewalk Sale in Rochester, NY
Vinyl records purchased at Record Archive Sidewalk Sale in Rochester, NY

Peggi headed out to pick up her mom and stopped to talk with our neighbor who’s putting up a new fence to combat the deer. He pointed out that our left rear tire was low so Peggi turned around and asked me if I wanted to pump it with our bicycle pump. I had done this before but it’s a lot of work so I suggested she stop at the corner and visit the 50 cent air machine. When she returned home with her mom she informed me that “Air is now a dollar.”

This reminded me of the conversation I had with John on Saturday night as we sat around the picnic table out behind Abilene next door to world’s loudest air conditioner. John is an antique dealer and he was telling me that he could buy anything for a dollar. “Everything can be bought for a dollar.” “Things used to be rare,” he said. “Now, nothing is rare.” He pointed to the Labatt Blue bottle in front of him and said, “If they stop making this beer I could still buy it online.” I knew John was right but it still sounded astonishing.

We had been at Record Archive’s Sidewalk Sale on Saturday morning and they had a row of tables set up with $1 CDs and $1 LPs. Jeff Spevak was just finishing sifting through the boxes of vinyl. He told us, “I got all the good stuff.” I couldn’t tell if he was kidding or not but he did have a nice looking George Jones lp in his stack. We found fourteen treasures and sure enough each one was a dollar.

The Last Poets lp is beyond astonishing. “White man’s gotta god complex.” And the “Flamenco Moods” record turned out be a hard core mournful flamenco mood. Already had Peggy Lee’s “Is That All There Is” but it too was only a dollar.

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Like A Hurricane

Neil Young "Trunk Show" at the Dryden Theater in Rochester, NY
Neil Young “Trunk Show” at the Dryden Theater in Rochester, NY

I’m sure there will plenty of seats left at the Dryden Theater tonight where they are screening Shakey Productions newest release, the Jonathan Demme concert film, “Trunk Show” with Neil Young and Crazy Horse. Last night was the official Rochester premier and we got there about an hour early. Heather and Gretchen were just ahead of us at the ticket booth and we watched the projectionist lug the film canister up the stairs to the booth. The theater never never did fill up but it hardly mattered. It felt like we in Philadelphia where the show was being filmed.

Neil Young "Trunk Show" at the Dryden Theater in Rochester, NY

The Dryden has a state of the art sound system and they aren’t afraid to crank it. Neil’s guitar sounded amazing. What is in that giant red stomp box? He pushed Crazy Horse to the limit and made Ben Keith (Grandpa in “Greendale”) look lost most of the time. He was so distracting I kept closing my eyes. He redeemed himself with his beautiful keyboard playing on “Like A Hurricane”. The title of this song alone pretty much sums up the energy Neil brings to a performance.

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Transcendental Landscapes

Charles Birchfield Watercolor Show Poster from Museum of Modern Art
Charles Birchfield Watercolor Show Poster from Museum of Modern Art

There are only two days left to see the Charles Burchfield Watercolor Show in Buffalo. The show was put together by the Hammer Museum at UCLA and it travels to New York next but seeing it in in Buffalo, where Burchfield worked as a wallpaper designer (his “hack” job), is a special treat. Burchfield paints “the healthy glamour of everyday life.” Passages from his journals accompany each of the paintings. He was a marvelous painter and writer. The show includes his compulsive doodles, a notebook of drawings called “Conventions for Abstract Thoughts” and rooms full of his transcendental landscapes. My favorite painting was of an oak leaf in his neighbors snow coverd front lawn, “The Constant Leaf.”

The Burchfield Penny Museum here, across the street from the Albright Knox, is brand new building. Their state of art men’s room use Sloan Technology on their “zero-water consumption urinals”. Thank god the water fountains were not similarly equipped.

A trip to Buffalo would not be complete without a visit with Mark from PosterArt. We started talking about the old days and he went in the back room and returned with a stack of “Closet Punk Productions” posters that he designed when he was booking bands at the Continental. A lot of them had dates one day earlier or later than the posters on the Scorgies website.

Mark recommended Coles, down the street on Elmwood for something to eat. This place has been around since the thirties and the outdoor tables were the perfect perch for taking in the Buffalo vibe. “Anarchy in the UK” was playing on the sound system as we sat down. Back on the thruway, pointed at Rochester, the trees looked Burchfield trees.

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Run On Sentences

Margaret Explosion performing at "Live Dive" CD release party upstairs at Abilene in Rochester, NY. Photo by Brian Peterson.
Margaret Explosion performing at “Live Dive” CD release party upstairs at Abilene in Rochester, NY. Photo by Brian Peterson.

We don’t set the alarm. We wake up when we wake up. Of course we work pretty late on occasion. Sometimes that’s before Rick and Monica and sometimes they are already at work when we crawl out. Rick brings our paper up to the door if he’s up first and I bring theirs to the door if I’m out there first. I have developed a sneaky approach to their doorstep that doesn’t set their dog alarm off but sometimes the dogs sense me and let loose. This morning I was headed up their driveway in my pjs and slippers, multitasking (brushing my teeth and reading the headlines as I walked), when the garage door popped open. Monica backed out and rolled down her window. I think she asked me how I was or something but I all I could manage was “Ugh Um.”

At last night’s Margaret Explosion (a five piece last night) gig I was still thinking about the post I made here before leaving the house. Although that post was filed under the “Notes on Painting” category it applies perfectly to what I feel we are trying to do with our musical collective. Start with an idea, only add things that improve on, develop or add to the expression. And if it’s not adding value, like my painting teacher says, “shut up.” I believe it to be a useful template but I am only the drummer. We have one more Wednesday at the Little and we will be off for the summer. James Nichols will be joining us on piano.

“And that’s the way I play. I play for the benefit of the band.” — Baby Dodds, New Orleans drummer

Here is Margaret Explosion – Dance Trance from the gig pictured above

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More Words Does Not A Better Sentence Make

Paul Dodd Crime Face - watercolor 2010
Paul Dodd Crime Face – watercolor 2010

“You’re having fun with this” Fred said when he worked his way around the class to get to my spot. “I am?,” I said. I actually felt like I was pulling my hair out all week, full of doubt that I was able to put the head on the paper. I want to physically place the severed head in this artificial construct of a space but I’m left with the realization that I cannot.

I expressed these concerns to Fred in less graphic terms and a rather long discussion took place. Of course Picasso, Matisse and Guston were all in there as examples of artists who made it their life’s work to describe form.

“What is the point of these paintings,” he asked. “To convey the expression,” I offered. He looked down at my recent watercolors (click on photo above for example). “Well, you’ve got it.” he countered. He argued that my frustration comes from my compulsion to get form down when it is not the point. “If the intent is to convey form, you should work on that.” True to form I said, “But I would like more form.” And true to his teacher form he said, “You could do it with less!” “If something doesn’t add to the expression you’re after, don’t paint it. You gotta know when to shut up.”

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