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Please go to the list from September 19th and choose what musicians you'd most like to hear for the Big 9-9 thru 2-10 summary!

Choose one or choose more than one, I don't care. Then LEAVE A COMMENT at this post, and tell me which one/ones you picked! Comments here are FREE. NO CHARGE-Y. Not like some of those other blogs are! Also, you don't need a Google©®™€₤$¥ account and you can be as anonymous as you like. Trolling and spamming are encouraged. If there's a musician that you want to hear who is not on the list (but who should be), tell me IN A COMMENT.  :D  A comment To THIS post  :D  Or to that other post, I don't care... the one that has the list on it.  I can figure it out. Please also comment in any language you wish. I don't care.

Just Checking In: AUSTIN LIVEBLOG = 2011-09-22

As you can see, everybody's having a great time here in the Live Music Capitol of the Local Group of Galaxies. Snapped this one with my iPhone and uploaded it on the go. Well, sorry... love to talk about it more, but I'm being whisked away to yet another show, and then a party, and another show, and then two band practices, and another party, and then 3 more shows, and a show. Then everybody will be headed by to the practice space to practice some more before the big show tonight, followed by the big after-show party, which will be a whirlwind of activity! Then it's back to the practice space to unload all the shit, and then everybody usually practices some more, because, you know, you're already at the practice space anyway. Then one more show, and we're done. Make sure we GET PAID. Then back to the practice space to unload all the shit again, and then you sit down (not for very long, maybe about 20 minutes - okay, sometimes it's more like 30) and you make a new set list together, as a band. Everything has to be very democrat. Then it's just one more quick run-through of the new set list, before doing just that one last little 3-song open mic at the local hipster coffee house. Then everybody goes home and goes to bed... hehehehehe... just as soon as that one last party is over. Then ya get up and ya do it again the next day. It's not a bad life, really. The worst part about it is all those hours of down-time when you're just waiting for somebody else to get their shit together... thank God I brought my iPod !

ANNOUNCEMENT: Blog Will Be In Suspended Animation, 2011-09-19 thru 2011-09-26

As I said in my previous post, I'll be out of town for about a week, so there won't be any activity around here. In my next post, probably on September 27th, I'll begin a 5- or 6-day roundup of all the days we haven't covered up until now, featuring just the most prominent musicians from all those days. Here are 114 musicians, some of whom you can expect to read about in those posts:

Al Jackson, Jr., Alfredo Kraus, Alicia de Larrocha, André Hazes, Anton Bruckner, Arrow, Arthur Ferrante, Baden Powell, Béla Bartók, Bessie Smith, Betty Carter, Bill Evans, Bill Monroe, Bola de Nieve, Bourvil, Boz Burrell, Bruce Palmer, Cecil Gray, Cheb Hasni, Christian Ferras, Chuck Rio, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Cliff Burton, Cootie Williams, Dane Rudhyar, DJ Mehdi, Duarte Lobo, Eddie Fisher, Emmanuel Chabrier, Engelbert Humperdinck (the composer, not the singer), Erich Leinsdorf, Etta Baker, Farinelli, Francesco Geminiani, François Couperin, Franz Xaver Süssmayr, Fritz Busch, Furry Lewis, Gene Autry, Gerald Finzi, Gilles Binchois, Gram Parsons, Harry Warren, Hazel Scott, Hemanta Kumar Mukhopadhyay, Hernando de Cabezón, Hildegard von Bingen, Ian Stuart Donaldson, Irving Berlin, Isaac Stern, Jaco Pastorius, Jacques Levy, Jan DeGaetani, Jan Werner Danielsen, Jean Françaix, Jean Sibelius, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Jim Croce, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy McCulloch, Jimmy Witherspoon, Joe Zawinul, Johann Strauss I, John Blow, John Bonham, John McCormack, Johnny Cash, Johnny Ramone, Jule Styne, Leonard Feather, Mahendra Kapoor, Marc Bolan, Maria Callas, Mary Ford, Mary Travers, Maurice Abravanel, Mauricio Kagel, Max Bruch, Miles Davis, Nick Reynolds, Nikos Skalkottas, Ossip Gabrilowitsch, Pablo de Sarasate, Paul Weston, Pauline Julien, Pepsi Tate, Pérez Prado, Peter Bellamy, Peter Tosh, Rafael Mendez, Richard Wright, Robbie McIntosh, Robert Casadesus, Robert Palmer, Roc Raida, Ronnie Dawson, Ronnie Hazlehurst, Rory Storm, Shawn Lane, Sir Malcolm Arnold, Skeeter Davis, Slim Dusty, Stanley Turrentine, Stig Anderson, Tino Rossi, Toma Zdravković, Urmas Alender, Víctor Jara, Vincenzo Bellini, Virgil Thomson, Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande, Walter Trampler, William Billings, Zeki Müren, and Zino Francescatti.

If all goes as planned, then by the time October 2nd or 3rd rolls around, I should at last be caught up! And then I'll begin again, this time devoting my daily posts to mainly the most notable musicians, with just a few of the more obscure ones mixed in to make things a little more interesting. Until I return, I want to thank all of you from...

Österreich
বাংলাদেশ 
Canada
Chile

Danmark

Suomi

France

Deutschland
Ελλάδα

香港

Magyarország

ভাৰত / ভারত / भारत / ભારત / ಭಾರತ,ಇ೦ಡಿಯಾ / ഭാരതം, ഇന്ത്യ / ਭਾਰਤ / भारतम् / ڀارت، / இந்தியா / భారత / దేశము / بھارت

Moldova

にほん / 日本

Pilipinas

România

Россия
Türkiye
Rìoghachd Aonaichte
ʻAmelika Hui Pū ʻia

... who've stopped by to check out the blog and see what it's all about. I've only just gotten started, and there's much more to come in the future, so stay tuned! Seriously, invest in a good digital tuner. If you're off by even a श्रुति, you could ruin the whole রাগ.

09-08: More Moondog 1956 | Story of Moondog 1957 - Gesualdo Madrigals / Christie - Alex North Spartacus 1960 - Beethoven Missa Solemnis Toscanini 1940 - Strauss Elektra Kleiber 1971

1613 – Don Carlo Gesualdo (Italian nobleman, lutenist, composer & murderer of his wife & her lover)
1637 – Robert Fludd (English mystic & doctor, debater with Johannes Kepler over harmonic theory of universe)
1706 – Romanus Weichlein (Austrian monk & composer)
1819 – Franz Stanislaus Spindler (German singer & composer)
1831 – John Aitken (Scottish-born American music publisher, silversmith, goldsmith & jeweler)
1838 – Pietro Rovelli (Italian violinist & composer)
1871 – Étienne-Joseph Soubre (Belgian composer)
1879 – Nikolai Zaremba (Russian music theorist & composer, teacher of Tchaikovsky)
1894 – Hermann von Helmholtz (German physician, physicist, psychologist & acoustician)
1899 – Václav Hugo Zavrtal (Czech conductor, composer & collector of Mozartiana)
1916 – Friedrich Baumfelder (German composer, conductor & pianist)
1917 – Charles-Édouard Lefebvre (French composer, pupil of Gounod, son of painter Charles Lefebvre)
1944 – Jan van Gilse (Dutch composer, conductor, pianist & organizer on behalf of Dutch composers)
1949 – Richard Strauss (German composer & conductor)
1960 – Jussi Björling (Swedish tenor)
1974 – Wolfgang Windgassen (German operatic Heldentenor)
1976 – Assen Karastoyanov (Bulgarian composer, conductor, teacher & writer on music)
1976 – Joaquín Zamacois i Soler (Chilean-born Spanish composer, teacher & writer on music)
1977 – Zero Mostel (American actor of stage, screen & musical theater)
1978 – Pancho Vladigerov (Bulgarian composer, teacher & pianist)
1984 – René Bernier (Belgian composer & teacher)
1991 – Jo Budie (Dutch Schlager orchestra leader)
1991 – Alex North (American soundtrack & stage composer)
1995 – Erich Kunz (Austrian operatic bass-baritone)
1997 – Derek Taylor (English journalist, writer, publicist & press officer for The Beatles)
1999 – Moondog [Louis Thomas Hardin] (American composer, street musician, poet & instrument inventor)

Well... I'm really sorry. I'm now 8 days behind. I really would need at least 2 or 3 other people working on this blog with me to be able to keep up with it the way I want to. Perhaps that will happen one day, but in the meantime, I'll have to make some changes around here. In the future, I'm going to be limiting my lists to just the most prominent figures on any given day - I hate to set an exact limit, but it will probably be in the area of 12 to 18 persons at the very most. It's kind of a shame, because I think some of the more obscure figures often have the most interesting stories surrounding them, but it really can't be helped. Further, the number of downloads will be curtailed a bit as well, to probably no more than 3 or 4 per day.

There's also something else. I'm going to be going out of town for about a week, so this blog will be on hiatus for about 8 or 9 days. When I return, probably on September 27th, I'll be doing a roundup of all the days up to that point that haven't been covered, i.e., Sep. 9th thru 26th - a period of 18 days! I'll be choosing just the very most famous musicians from each day - no more than 2 or 3 for any given day - it'll be a big post, possibly in several parts. Either tomorrow or the day after I'll be devoting a post specifically to an announcement of the hiatus...

So anyway... some very important musicians for September 8th. Two notable Bulgarian composers, curiously enough... perhaps the passings of Мистър Karastoyanov and Мистър Vladigerov had something to do with the a little overindulgence on September 6th, Unification Day, which marks the ceding of Eastern Rumelia to Bulgaria in 1885? In any case, among the truly famous musicians on our list is Moondog, the Viking of 6th Avenue, an eccentric street musician and an icon in the world of "outsider music," a kindred spirit, in a way, to both Harry Partch and Rahsaan Roland Kirk, also building his own instruments as they did - and doing so blind, as Kirk did - who managed to get married, land a record deal on Prestige, and become a famous musician with an impressive cult following, all while he was intentionally living as a homeless man on the streets of New York City. He's a legend who continues to inspire to this very day... (Read more below)

Then there's Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa and Count of Conza, a composer of many madrigals and a fair amount of sacred music, who employed very daring chromaticism in his later works (which has attracted the interest of many 20th-century musicians, especially Igor Stravinsky), and who was also the most infamous murderer in music history (unless you count Charles Manson as a musician). Gesualdo suspected his first wife of infidelity, and managed to catch her and the Duke of Andria in the act, after having pretended to go away on a journey. With the help of his servants, he stabbed them both numerous times with both knives and swords, and shot the Duke in the head. Afterward, he displayed their mutilated bodies outside his palace, with the Duke given the further humiliation of being dressed in Signora Gesualdo's nightgown. Gesualdo, being a nobleman, was immune from prosecution for his crimes, but he kept a crew of bodyguards around him for the remainder of his life to protect him from any revenge the families of his victims might seek. Interesting... Cecil Gray and Philip Heseltine (a.k.a Peter Warlock) wrote a book in 1926 called Carlo Gesualdo Prince of Venosa, in which they detailed the police reports from the time, which make for gruesome reading even today. And guess what, Cecil Gray's deathday is just one day after Gesualdo's, on September 9th... (Read more below) ... see you on the other side of the crime scene ribbon...

09-07: The Who 1974 Charlton Football Club - Britten War Requiem 1963 - Erma Franklin Soul Sister 1969 - Cecilia Bartoli Rossini Heroines

1741 – Henri Desmarets (French composer)
1775 – Johann Georg Holzbogen (German composer to Prince Clemens Franz de Paula of Bavaria)
1819 – Jean-Louis Duport (French composer & cellist)
1838 – Joseph Panny (Austrian composer & violinist)
1845 – Isabella Colbran (Spanish dramatic coloratura soprano sfogato & song composer, wife of Rossini)
1872 – Antoni Stolpe (Polish composer & pianist)
1881 – Sidney Lanier (American poet, composer & flutist)
1902 – Franz Wüllner (German composer & conductor)
1916 – Junius W. Hill (American organist, teacher & music editor)
1925 – John Wesley Work, Jr. (American collector of African-American folk songs, songwriter & director of Fisk Jubilee Singers)
1944 – Eduardo Sánchez de Fuentes (Cuban composer, music folklorist & author)
1971 – Ludwig Suthaus (German operatic Heldentenor)
1977 – Gustave Reese (American musicologist & teacher, medieval & Renaissance specialist)
1978 – Cecil Aronowitz (South African-born British violist, founding member of Melos ensemble)
1978 – Keith Moon (English rock drummer, The Who)
1978 – Charles Williams (English composer & conductor of soundtracks & light music)
1983 – Hans Münch (Alsatian conductor, composer, cellist, pianist, organist & teacher)
1986 – Vladimir Vlasov (Russian composer & conductor)
1989 – Mikhail Goldstein (Ukrainian composer & violinist)
1991 – Archie N. Menzies (American playwright & composer, Under Your Hat)
1992 – Indra Kamadjojo (Javanese-born Dutch dancer & actor)
1994 – Eric Crozier (English librettist & stage director, associate of Britten)
1996 – Niccolò Castiglioni (Italian composer, pianist & writer on music)
2001 – Igor Buketoff (American conductor, arranger & teacher)
2002 – Erma Franklin (American gospel & R&B singer, older sister of Aretha)
2003 – Warren Zevon (American rock & folk singer-songwriter, guitarist & pianist)
2005 – Sergio Endrigo (Italian singer-songwriter)
2008 – Dino Dvornik (Croatian singer, songwriter, record producer & actor)
2008 – Peter Glossop (English operatic dramatic baritone)
2008 – Nagi Noda (Japanese pop artist & video director)

A lot of Brits here, in particular three who interestingly had connections to composer Benjamin Britten: Eric Crozier, who wrote libretti for and worked closely with Britten in the production of a number of his operas; violist Cecil Aronowitz of the Melos Ensemble, who comprised the chamber group in the premiere performance and recording of Britten's War Requiem in 1962–63 (and it was also for Aronowitz that Britten arranged a string-orchestra accompaniment in 1976 of his Lachrymae (1950), originally written with piano accompaniment for William Primrose); and baritone Peter Glossop, seen above in one of his signature roles, Verdi's hunchbacked jester Rigoletto, whose other roles included Balstrode in Britten's Peter Grimes, and the title role and Mr. Redburn in his Billy Budd - Glossop also sang Billy Budd on two recordings of the opera, the first a television film transmitted by BBC-2 on December 11th, 1966 (conducted by Charles Mackerras, with Peter Pears as Vere, Robert Langdon as Claggart, and John Shirley-Quirk as Redburn), and the second a studio audio recording for Decca from the following year, with the same cast conducted by the composer... (Read more below)

Also from the world of opera, Isabella Colbran, spouse of Gioachino Rossini between 1822 and 1837, and the soprano sfogato (basically, an alto or mezzo with a very extended upper range) for whom he wrote leading roles in about a dozen of his operas between 1815 and 1823, including Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra, Otello, Armida, Ricciardo e Zoraide, La donna del lago, Maometto II, Zelmira, and Semiramide. Unfortunately, Colbran's voice already began changing and showing signs of strain by 1817 (perhaps the wear and tear caused by a mezzo or alto singing in a high soprano range!), and by 1824 she had decided to retire completely from the opera stage. Rossini himself retired from the opera business after William Tell in 1829, apparently deciding that after 20 years he'd had quite enough of the exhausting work of putting on operas. Colbran and Rossini would live on another 20 years and 40 years after their respective retirements... (Read more below) ...see you on the other side of the injured vocal cords...

09-06: Atari Teenage Riot The Future of War 1987 - Jeff Beck Truth 1968 - Nico Chelsea Girl 1968 - Hanss Eisler Deutsche Sinfonie - Ernest Tubb Say Something Nice To Sarah 1972 - Marcel Journet 78s 1906-1919

1811 – Julien-Amable Mathieu (French violinist & composer)
1819 – Georg Druschetzky [Jiří Družecký] (Bohemian composer, oboist & timpanist)
1831 – Johann Ernst Friedrich Wollank (German composer)
1933 – Marcel Journet (French operatic lyric bass)
1937 – Henry Hadley (American composer & conductor)
1949 – Walter Widdop (English Heldentenor)
1952 – José Forns y Cuadras (Spanish musicologist & author)
1956 – Felix Borowski (English-born American composer, music critic, teacher, pianist & violinist)
1962 – Hanns Eisler (German-born composer, pupil of Schoenberg, friend & colleague of Brecht)
1965 – Konstantin Mostras (Russian violinist & composer, pupil of Auer, teacher of Galamian)
1966 – Luigi Perrachio (Italian composer & pianist)
1968 – Karl Rankl (Austrian-born British conductor (Covent Garden) & composer (pupil of Schoenberg & Webern))
1973 – Sir William Henry Harris (English organist, choirmaster & composer, New College & Christ Church, Oxford & St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle)
1977 – Paul Burkhard (Swiss composer & songwriter, "O mein Papa")
1977 – Guido Pannain (Italian musicologist, author & composer)
1978 – Tom Wilson (American record producer)
1979 – Ronald Binge (English composer & arranger of light music)
1981 – Joseph Yasser (Polish-born American music theorist, organist & composer)
1984 – Ernest Tubb (American country singer, songwriter & guitarist)
1985 – Léon Orthel (Dutch composer, pianist & teacher)
1985 – Franco Ferrara (Italian conductor & teacher of many conductors)
1985 – Johnny Desmond (American jazz & pop singer)
1990 – Tom Fogerty (American rock guitarist, songwriter & singer, older brother of John, CCR)
1994 – Max Kaminsky (American jazz trumpeter & bandleader)
1994 – Nicky Hopkins (English session keyboardist & vocalist, Rolling Stones et al.)
1995 – Joanne Gail Abbott (MTV executive)
1996 – Esther [Ester] Soré (Chilean popular singer & actress)
1998 – Ric Segreto (American pop singer, actor, teacher & journalist, active in the Philippines & Guam)
2001 – Carl Crack (Swazi-born German techno musician, Atari Teenage Riot)
2007 – Luciano Pavarotti (Italian operatic lyric tenor)

Weren't we just talking yesterday about the tragic recent passing of Salvatore Licitra, who'd been hailed as "the New Pavarotti," and who'd made his Met debut as a stand-in for Pavarotti on just 2 hours' notice? And now look who's on our list... the old Pavarotti! And the image I used of Luciano is of him making his curtain call for the same role Licitra sang that night: Cavaradossi from Puccini's Tosca... I'll bet you're grateful I used that pic instead of the usual concert-performance-in-formal-attire-with-white-hanky photos we're used to seeing of the great and now 4-years defunct tenor. I was tempted to make a mini-collage of him in photos alongside various pop stars... Michael Jackson, Bono, Julio Iglesias, Vanessa Williams... aren't you also grateful I resisted that impulse?

And weren't we just remembering Gisele MacKenzie yesterday? Well, turns out that one of the most memorable television appearances by singer Johnny Desmond, whom we remember today, was with Boris Karloff in 1957, on guess whose show on  NBC... that's right, The Gisele MacKenzie Show!

And wasn't it just a week ago that we were remembering Carl Wayne from the Move, specifically with their 1968 album that included session keyboardist Nicky Hopkins on a few tracks? And so who makes it to the list today? Yep, it's the "Sixth Stone" himself... (Read more about him below)

And then in the comments to the post from a few days ago in which we remembered Feldman and Partch, weren't Wes and I (Say "hi" to Wes everybody - he's the one person who reads this blog - say "hi" to yourself, Wes) discussing equal divisions of the octave, in which I mentioned 19-tone equal temperament? And now along comes none other than Joseph Yasser, one of the main theorists to suggest this very tuning way back in the 30s, and poops on September 6th!

Well, it's all uncanny or whatever, and if you like you can imagine me as Jack Palance from Ripley's Believe It Or Not with that creepy grin on my face, talking about how very uncanny it is. Oh, and Jack Palance. I'll bet you're just dying (like just about everyone we ever talk about has) to know what day he met his maker, aren't you? You'll never guess... it was... it was... November 10th. Why, that's only about a month away! It's positively canny, I tell you!
 

09-05: Antonio Mairena : Actuaciones Historicas - Mahler 5 & 8 Solti - Wolfgang Fortner : Triplum etc. Wergo 1967

1629 – Domenico Allegri (Italian composer & singer, younger brother of Gregorio)
1734 – Nicolas Bernier (French musician & composer)
1803 – François Devienne (French composer, flutist & teacher)
1890 – Ludwig Deppe (German composer, conductor, pianist & teacher)
1910 – Franz Xaver Haberl (German priest, church musician & musicologist, friend of Liszt)
1910 – Julian Edwards (American composer & popular songwriter)
1921 – Joseph Mann (Polish-born Austrian operatic tenor)
1962 – Alessandro Granda (Peruvian operatic tenor)
1964 – Giórgios Kokoliós (Greek operatic tenor)
1965 – Stephan De Jonghe (Belgian musicologist)
1969 – Mitchell Ayres (American conductor, arranger & composer, Perry Como, The Hollywood Palace)
1969 – Henk Bijvanck (Dutch composer)
1973 – Petre Ştefănescu Goangă (Romanian baritone)
1975 – Georg Ots (Estonian baritone of opera, art song, folk song & film)
1980 – Don Banks (Australian composer of concert, jazz, & commercial music)
1983 – Antonio Mairena (Spanish flamenco singer)
1987 – Wolfgang Fortner (German composer, conductor & teacher)
1993 – René Klijn (Dutch pop singer & photo model)
1994 – Billy Usselton (American jazz tenor saxophonist, clarinetist & oboist)
1995 – Pigmeat Jarrett (American blues singer & pianist)
1997 – Sir Georg Solti (Hungarian-born British conductor)
2003 – Gisele MacKenzie (Canadian-born American pop singer, violinist, actress & TV personality)
2007 – Saint Thomas [Thomas Hansen] (Norwegian alt-country singer, songwriter & guitarist)
2011 – Salvatore Licitra (Italian operatic tenor)

Sometimes you go with what you can. For Domenico Allegri's much more famous brother Gregorio (he of the sublime, if not entirely his own, Miserere), there is a good etching of his likeness. For Domenico, we have a receipt from his employer.

The most recent addition to our list of names is that of Salvatore Licitra, an excellent tenor whose star only began rising about 12 years ago. Things really picked up for his career in 2002, when he debuted at the Met unexpectedly, substituting for Pavarotti as Cavaradossi in Tosca after the ailing legend cancelled at the last minute. He passed away this September 5th after a motor-scooter accident in Sicily that left him lingering in a coma for several days. Our condolences to his family, friends, and many colleagues, who mourn the tragic loss of a singer who has been dubbed "the New Pavarotti," and a tenor "worthy of the great Italian tradition."

Our next most recent passage was that in 2007 of Norwegian alt-country artist Saint Thomas, who died as a result of an unfortunate deadly combination of prescription drugs, at the age of 31. He was another artist who'd only recently begun to achieve international attention, touring with Lambchop in Europe and Of Montreal in the U.S. during the mid-00s.

On a brighter note, our long-awaited major Mahler conductor has finally shown up, in the form of Sir Georg Solti, whose tenure at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra rivalled those of the legendary Frederick Stock and Fritz Reiner years. An energetic conductor of both concert music and opera, his Wagner Ring cycle (with the Vienna Philharmonic) and Mahler symphony cycles are treasured by many, if not to everyone's taste. But pretty much everyone agrees that his Mahler 8th from 1971, with its superb roster of vocal soloists, is one of the very best available... (Read more below)