Author Archives: grnarrow

Holy snapshots…this is pretty cool and the music with it is well chosen.

ENJOY.

MisterG

Remember Eddie Mathews‘ dramatic 10th-inning homer from game four of the 1957 World Series, or Paul Molitor’s record-setting five hits in the opener of the 1982 World Series? Relive the excitement of the zenith years of Milwaukee’s champion baseball teams — the Braves and the Brewers — in the new exhibition, World Series Wisconsin, available for view July 17 through December 2, 2007 at the Wisconsin Historical Museum. Included are dozens of authentic, game-used objects — jerseys, jackets, caps, helmets, bats, balls, gloves, spikes, and more — many of them from the peak seasons of 1957 and 1982, and many actually worn and used by such baseball greats as true homerun champion (IMO) Hank Aaron, Eddie Mathews, Red Schoendienst, and Warren Spahn of the Braves, and Rollie Fingers, Paul Molitor, and one of my personal favorites, Robin Yount of the Brewers. Original artifacts from Milwaukee County Stadium, fan souvenirs, historical photographs, and original radio broadcast clips and television footage also help bring the excitement of these victory seasons to life. It is a very cool collection and I was pleased to get the opportunity to make it apart of my day. If you are in the area and like baseball, you’ll dig it. Unless perhaps you were are a fan of the 1957 New York Yankees, who after calling the 1957 Milwaukee Braves “BUSH LEAGUE” lost to that very same team to lose the World Series.

’56 & ’57 Road Jersey worn and autographed by Hank Aaron

By his 30th birthday, Max Roach was already considered the greatest jazz drummer ever by his peers. By the time he died this week, the 83-year-old master percussionist was known worldwide as much more: innovator, activist, teacher, genius. Roach, whose rhythmic innovations and improvisations defined bebop jazz during a career marked by expectations defied and musical boundaries ignored, died late Wednesday in a Manhattan hospital after a long illness. “Max was one of the founders and original members of the A-Team of bebop,” said fellow music legend Quincy Jones. “Outside of losing a giant and an innovator, I’ve lost a great, great friend. Thank God he left a piece of his soul on his recordings so that we’ll always have a part of him with us.” In 1988, he became the first jazz musician ever honored with a MacArthur Fellowship – receiving a $372,000 “genius grant.” The creatively restless Roach, who debuted with Ellington’s band as a self-taught 16-year-old drummer in 1940, challenged his listeners and himself by making music that connected the jazz of the pre-World War II era with the beats of the hip-hop generation. His place in the pantheon of jazz greats long since secured, Roach collaborated with drummers from around the world, with a string quartet that featured daughter Maxine, and with rapper Fab Five Freddy. “I try to show my students the correlation between hip-hop and Louis Armstrong,” he once said. “That’s how well-rooted hip-hop is, coming out of an environment where people were denied any kind of cultural enrichment.” The North Carolina native was born on Jan. 10, 1924, and moved to Brooklyn with his family four years later. A player piano left by the previous tenants gave Roach his musical introduction. But he was looking for another instrument while singing with the children’s choir at the Concord Baptist Church. Roach found a snare drum, and was quickly hooked. His father gave the eighth-grader his first set of drums, and Roach was drumming professionally while still in high school. He would take often the nickel train ride from Brooklyn to Harlem, listening to the music spilling out of the Apollo Theater or the Savoy Ballroom. While there, he befriended saxophonist Charlie Parker and trumpeter Dizzie Gillespie as the burgeoning bop movement took flight. By 1942, he was playing behind Parker in a Harlem after-hours club; two years later, Roach joined Gillespie and Coleman Hawkins in one of the first bebop recording sessions. What distinguished Roach from other drummers were his fast hands and ability to simultaneously maintain several rhythms. By layering different beats and varying the meter, Roach pushed jazz beyond the boundaries of standard 4/4 time. His dislocated beats helped define bebop.Roach’s innovative use of cymbals for melodic lines, and tom-toms and bass drums for accents, helped elevate the percussionist from mere timekeeper to featured performer – on a par with the trumpeter and saxophonist. “One of the grand masters of our music,” Gillespie once said. Through the jazz upheaval of the 1940s and ’50s, Roach played bebop with the Charlie Parker Quintet and cool bop with the Miles Davis Capitol Orchestra. He joined trumpeter Clifford Brown in playing hard bop, a jazz form that maintained bebop’s rhythmic drive while incorporating the blues and gospel.
In 1952, Roach and bassist-composer Charles Mingus founded Debut Records. Among the short-lived label’s releases was a famed 1953 Toronto performance in Massey Hall, featuring Roach, Mingus, Parker, Gillespie and pianist Bud Powell. Roach eventually expanded his repertoire and explored new challenges. He taught at the University of Massachusetts, traveled to Ghana in search of new music, and performed with groups from Japan and Cuba. He also formed an all-percussion ensemble known as M’Boom, an ensemble of eight percussionists; a quartet that performed with a 22-member gospel choir; and a double quartet – his band, plus a string quartet – that included Roach’s daughter Maxine Roach on viola. Ignoring critics, Roach insisted rap had a place on music’s “boundless palette.” He is survived by five children: sons Daryl and Raoul, and daughters Maxine, Ayo and Dara.

Thank you Max Roach, R.I.P.

Thursday, August 16, 2007 through Sunday, August 19, 2007. Event time varies per day. The festival kicks off with a parade Thursday night; Thursday/Friday feature carnival, vendor booths and Friday night band in beer tent; Sat/Sunday = full activities with carnival, entertainment stage, steamed corn, fresh corn, vendor booths and games, live bands, petting zoo, craft fair, beer tent, kiddie korner and midget auto races Sunday night. $1 admission Sat / Sun. Angell Park, 100 Park St, Sun Prairie, Dane County. Call 608-837-4547. Man, the Midwest has such simple fun events for the entire family, I almost want to adopt a family for the end of this week to take here…well, I guess I won’t go that far.

Hall of Fame shortstop and longtime broadcaster Phil Rizzuto passed away at the age of 89 on Tuesday. The 1950 AL MVP, Mr. Rizzuto played 13 seasons with the Yankees, going to the playoffs in 10 of them. He would later serve as the team’s color commentator, both on radio and television, for 40 years. Mr. Rizzuto was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1994 after being voted in by the Veterans Committee. I am a 2004 World Champion Boston Red Sox fan, but I know a baseball persons person and “scooter” was it. He has infield soil in his veins and I wish to pay my respect to a man who seemed to live with it. I am sure Mr. Rizzuto is slated to start doing color for the big club in the BIG SKY league…..sometimes it’s about more than music.

Check out Mr. Rizzuto’s career statistics here.

This is a wild, weird and wacky (just what we lean towards at greenarrowradio) video. I look forward to hearing your comments about this one.

Dig it,
MisterG

The Wishlist Foundation is a nonprofit organization founded by Mike McCready of Pearl Jam for Crohn’s Disease and Colitus related charities. The Wishlist Foundation’s primary purpose is charitable, out of love for and thanks from Pearl Jam . Our mission is to bring Pearl Jam fans together for worthwhile causes while enjoying the music, friendship, community and events that Pearl Jam inspires. No member or volunteer benefits financially from the Foundation in any way. Proceeds from Wishlist Foundation projects are donated to tax-exempt organizations, such as our primary beneficiary, the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of America (CCFA). The folks here plan to provide support, education and donations through support, please visit their web site at www.wishlistfoundation.org

For even more info head HERE.

Who better than fans of Pearl Jam to help out.

Art Davis was blacklisted in the ’70s for speaking up about racism in the music industry, then later earned a doctorate in clinical psychology and balanced performance dates with appointments to see patients. Known for his stunning and complete mastery of the instrument, Davis was able to jump between genres. He played classical music with the New York Philharmonic, was a member of the NBC, Westinghouse and CBS orchestras, and played for Broadway shows. The most enriching experience of his career was collaborating with John Coltrane. Described by jazz critic Nat Hentoff as Coltrane’s favorite bassist, Davis performed on the saxophonist’s albums including “Ascension,” Volumes 1 and 2 of “The Africa/Brass Sessions” and “Ole Coltrane.” Davis viewed his instrument as “the backbone of the band,” one that should “inspire the group by proposing harmonic information with a certain sound quality and rhythmic impulses,” Davis said in an excerpt from So What magazine posted on his Web site. He played with a long and varied list of artists: Thelonious Monk, Duke Ellington, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Louis Armstrong, Judy Garland, John Denver, Peter, Paul and Mary and Bob Dylan. By 1951 he decided to make music his career. He chose the double bass, believing it would allow more opportunities to make a living. At age 17 he studied with the principal double bassist at the Philadelphia Orchestra. But when he auditioned for his hometown’s symphony, the audition committee was so unduly harsh and demanding that the conductor Edwin MacArthur questioned their objectivity. “The answer was, ‘Well, he’s colored,’ and there was silence,” Davis recalled in a 2002 article in Double Bassist magazine. “Finally MacArthur burst out, ‘If you don’t want him, then you don’t want me.’ So they quickly got together and accepted me.”
This was a cat who found his home hanging right there, outside the box. A quality or trait I can only dream dream of matching.

So I was invited to be a part of a conference call with one of the original innovative wordsmyths of total coolth Mister Chuck D. of Public Enemy. I was able to be the first person from the U.S. press to ask him a question or two and I asked him more or less about the political natures of his new album…more on that disc to come……What a cool thing to have happen and I am thankful to Jolyn at the Brookes Company for the invite and for being a great hostess, and thanks to Chuck himself for making and taking the time…..Make some Noise.
So, the most important thing to take away from this isn’t that:”Damn that MisterG is too cool for school”, that goes without saying. The thing to focus on is my mentioning of the new Public Enemy album….get ready to get yours.