TONY RICE

One of the beautiful things about lugging this humongous music collection around with me for 40 years is that every once and awhile I dig something up that not only takes me back to those first moments when some attractive new sound or song or style pinned me to the wall and forced me to re-investigate what all of this vibration of air was all about but also brings me a bit of fresh perspective about the timelessness of great music.

I remember distinctly the first time I heard bluegrass cross-picking master Tony Rice. I was working at San Diego State on the Cultural Arts Board, and our gig was to spend the University's money booking music, poetry, lectures and such onto campus for the edification and entertainment of the student body. I'll dive into that whole scene in a devoted blog at some later date but for now, let's just say we got a ton of music to whittle our way through each month to plan the semester ahead.

One LP that came across my desk was by a guy whose name I knew from my time in the trenches as a fledgling Dead Head--mandolinist David Grisman. I'd only heard his album with Old & In The Way at this point which was at the time the biggest selling bluegrass record in history thanks to the fact the the Grateful Dead's centerpiece Jerry Garcia was the resident banjoist in the band. So this album, along with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's groundbreaking release Will the Circle Be Unbroken were about all the average rock n roll fan knew of bluegrass and traditional country music.

So when I popped on Grisman's then new release, HOT DAWG, I was floored. Not only was this my first exposure to the legendary violinist Stephane Grappelli, and Grisman Quintet bandmates Mike Marshall, Darol Anger, Todd Philips, and a guitar player who caught my ear and did not let go for a long tie tehreafter, the amazing Tony Rice.

This was not only an album of impeccable playing and arranging but it swung like crazy and set the stage for what would soon be called the New Acoustic movement melding bluegrass instrumentation, dexterity and speed, the swinging harmonies of the 30s music of the Hot Club of France, and an ear for great melodies and outrageous instrumental chops but also the open-minded and expansive repertoire that would change the face of acoustic music for years to come.

And in the middle of the mind-blowing record was the sheer stunning beauty of Tony Rice's fingerpicking. The fluidity and far-ranging and daring choices upped the ante on the great crosspickers of the previous two generations, Doc Watson, and Clarence White, both innovators in their own right. There were subtle nods to Charlie Christian, to the great jazz plectrists of the bop and post-bop eras but all within the context a a folky bluegrass root system.

As a fledgling guitarist who knew all the chords that flew by on his left hand, there was no hope of my understanding just what that miraculous right hand was up to. Like trying to watch a hummingbird's wings. Pointless. The difficulty of playing cleanly and quickly on the acoustic guitar is quite a bit more extraordinarily difficult than on the electric where you allow the volume and tone to do much of the work for you.

Like the first time I heard Jim Hall's album CONCIERTO or Bola Sete's exemplary OCEANS: SOLO GUITAR VOL. 1, I immediately knew I was hearing music that would remain a major part of my life's soundtrack from then on. All three of these records make my Desert Island selections, no question.

Funny thing is, I don't recall whether we booked the band with Tony or not though I remember going up to the Biltmore in L.A. for a booking convention and being floored by the DGQ as well as laughing my ass of to a then-funny unknown comic named Jay Leno. We did have the DGQ at SDSU in the next year or so, I believe.

So today listening to an advance of a wonderful new CD by guitarist Clay Ross, I heard his rendition of Norman Blake's "Church Street Blues" and was taken back to the recorded version by Rice. I listened it twice and on a whim headed to YouTube to see if I could get a glimpse of the hummingbird's right hand. After the third pass, I manually closed my gaping maw and moved on to the wonderful exploratory solo version of the folk classic "Shenandoah" and then onto one of Rice's favorite cover tunes, Gordon Lightfoot's "Cold On The Shoulder". Rice no longer sings so some of these videos are a tad sad for me but the smoothness of his right hand as he arpeggiates some of thes perfectly timed runs is truly a blessing to rediscover.

Enjoy and pick up any of Tony Rice's music. You can't go wrong

Buy HOT DAWG cheap here! Do not wait! Get it Now!


CHURCH STREET BLUES - Tony Rice solo guitar and vocal


DAVID GRISMAN QUARTET "E.M.D." Grisman/Rice/Mark O'Connor/Rob Wasserman


SHENANDOAH - Tony solo from the film Bluegrass Journey



BLUE RAILROAD TRAIN - Tony w/ Mark O'Connor, Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush and Ronnie Simpkins


A blistering FREEBORN MAN for you bluegrass fans out there...Tony, Bela FLeck, Jerry Douglas, Mark O'Connor, Sam Bush...


COLD ON THE SHOULDER w/ Tony, Jerry Douglas, John Hartford, Vassar Clements, Mark O'Connor, Roy Huskey, Jr.

BESTS OF 2008 - Movies, Music, Food, Concerts...

FAVORITE FILMS OF 2008
Saw 278+ movies in 2008, close to 70 in theaters

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE
THE FALL (though I think it was officially released earlier)
THE CHILDREN OF HUANG SHI
IN BRUGES
CHOKE
RACHEL GETTING MARRIED
TOWELHEAD
TELL NO ONE
WHAT JUST HAPPENED
BURN AFTER READING
THE DARK KNIGHT
STEP BROTHERS
A GIRL CUT IN TWO
TROUBLE THE WATER
VANTAGE POINT
VICKY CHRISTINA BARCELONA

FAVORITE CDs OF 2008

Ryan Adams & The Cardinals -- Cardinology
Greg Osby – 9 LEVELS
Charles Lloyd Quartet – Rabo de Nube
Bob Dylan – Tell Tale Signs: the B ootleg Series Vol. 8
Jimmy Herring - Lifeboat
Orchestra Baobab – Made In Dakar
Rudresh Mahanthappa - Kinsman
Grateful Dead – WINTERLAND – November 1973 (boxed set)
SF Jazz Collective – Live 2008
Wood Brothers – Loaded
Sara Serpa – Praia
Lionel Loueke - Karibu
Dave Holland Sextet – Passing It On
Francisco Mela – Cirio
Mad-Sweet Pangs – Witness & Wait
Todd Sickafoose – Tiny Resistors
Neil Young – Sugar Mountain Live at Canterbury House 1968

FAVORITE RESTAURANTS of 2008

Arroyo Chop House, Pasadena, CA
HARU, Philadelphia, PA
Indonesia Restaurant, South Philadelphia, PA
Fresh, Culver City, CA
Palomino, Westwood, CA

FAVORITE CONCERTS OF 2008
Saw 63 concerts, a light year for me

Wilco -- 8/10/08 – Grand Opera House, Wilmington, DE

Ornette Coleman – 2/15/08 -- Portland Jazz Festival, Schnitzern Theatre, Portland, OR

Bruce Springsteen for OBAMA -- 10/4/08 -- JFK Parkway, Philadelphia, PA

Ryan Adams & The Cardinals – 1/22/08 – Bridges Auditorium, Claremont, CA

Charles Lloyd Quartet – 3/28/08 – Herbst Auditorium, San Francisco, CA

JAZZ FOR OBAMA – 10/1/08 -- Roy Haynes, Hank Jones, Joe Lovano, Roy Hargrove, Kurt Elling, Jeff ‘Tain’ Watts, Christian McBride, Charlie Hunter, Doug Wamble, Aaron Goldberg, Brad Mehldau, Dianne Reeves, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Roberta Gambarini, Stefon Harris, Stanley Jordan, Bilal, Robert Glasper, Matt Penman, Derrick Hodge, Willie Jones III, Steve Turre – New York, NY

Cecil Taylor, solo piano – 2/27/08 -- Portland Jazz Festival, Portland, OR

Dave Holland Sextet -- 10/10/08 -- New York, NY

Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band – 4/7/08 – Honda Center, Anaheim, CA

John Beasley’s Jazz Circle w/ Buster Williams, Jeff “Tain” Watts, Bennie Maupin -- 12/15/08 -- Jazz Bakery, Los Angeles, CA

Mad-Sweet Pangs -- 11/15/08 -- Recher Theater, Towson, MD

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA's INAUGURAL ACCEPTANCE SPEECH

Can't think of a more mindblowing day in my lifetime...now granted seeing The Beatles on Ed Sullivan just 4 short months after being home sick and watching JFK shot on TV, was quite a relief from what I was feeling as a 7 year old who dreamed nightly of missiles coming down on us (oh those duck-and-cover drills scared the shit out of me) and The Fab Four opened a world of youth and hope and fun before me even at that young, impressionable age.

I had learned how to read off of Presidential flashcards. My parents, even then die-hard Republicans had taken me to a Goldwater rally, but Kennedy was MY first President. I was too young to know or care about Ike.

And the Beatles and Dylan and the counter-culture, the youth culture of the Civil Rights years, the anti-war movement, the music that was our soundtrack kept me intersted and hopeful and pissed off through that time as an inquisitive young pre-teen and teenager. The slogans of the time though simple and sometimes naive, still resonante with me and my generation in different byut vibrant ways--somehow "All You Need Is Love" set the stages for my investigations into Buddhism and Eastern thought..."War Is Over, If You Want It" has always been a beacon of hope in what seems to have been some sort of ongoing war somewhere in the world for as long as I can recall...

And though the disillusionment of the deaths of MLK and RFK and the riots in Chicago took the wind out of the sails of the idealism of the 60s, the sheer force of will that a people's consciences could help to stop the Vietnam War and could help to bring down the illicit wrongdoing behind Nixon's presidency gave me faith once again...faith that found glimmers in a peanut farmer who was culturally our style but who couldn't muster up what it took for the fight he needed to fight, thru the facade of Reaganism, the clandestine meanderings of GHWB, the hope and charisma of the Clinton years gone down in a hail of hypocritical attacks that forced the public's eye away from real issues into foaming holier-than-thou soapboxing, to the Prodigal Son's comeplte and utter ineptitude in the name of God and Daddy...

Remember that the moon landing was a beautiful, boundary shattering moment that came on the heels of the violence of 1968 and which for a brief moment showed us a look back at Earth in all of it's fragile beauty and made us feel the hand of creation and its hope and the miracle of our existence.

"...Picture a bright blue ball, just spinnin', spinnin' free / it's dizzying, the possibilities..." of course, the next line to that Grateful Dead song is "ashes, ashes, all fall down.*" And there have been many dark hours since the astronauts looked back and saw us staring up at their other worldly achievement.

Well, hold today's moment of hope close and cherish it and let's see if the magnificent, perspective shattering moment that today signifies can hold its water. My prayers are with President Obama (sounds damn good, doesn't it). I pray you will have more strength than you will ever need, more wisdom than you'll have time to use, and more open-minded, human compassion, insight and love than any mortal man before you. You just may need it. Here's to a brave, and diligent and dedicated man. Be your best and push beyond it. Ball is in your hands and there is a full court press on. Make your shot count, sir.





*Lyrics from "Throwing Stones" by John Barlow (c) Ice Nine Publishing

MISUNDERSTANDINGS

A joke for the day...

"THE BOTTLE OF WINE"

For all of us who are married, were married, wish
we were married, or wish we weren't married, this
is something to smile about the next time you see a
bottle of wine:

Sally was driving home from one of her business trips in Northern Arizona when she saw an
elderly
Navajo woman walking on the side of the road.

As the trip was a long and quiet one, she stopped the car and asked the Navajo woman if she
would like a ride.

With a silent nod of thanks, the woman got into the car.

Resuming the journey, Sally tried in vain to make a bit of small talk with the Navajo woman.
The old woman just sat silently, looking intently at
everything she saw, studying every little detail, until she noticed a brown bag on the seat
next to Sally.

'What in bag?' asked the old woman.

Sally looked down at the brown bag and said, 'It's a bottle of wine. I got it for my husband.'


The Navajo woman was silent for another moment or two.

Then speaking with the quiet wisdom of an elder, she said:

'Good trade.'

####

Then there's the other side of the story...



RICHARD THOMPSON solo version of "I Misunderstood" live in Seattle 1990

and a nice 'lil lo-fi rare audio track from DEREK & THE DOMINOS live at Curtis Hixon Hall, Tampa, FL featuring Duane Allman

2009 SCHLOCK TREATMENT

Well, it has been a few months and I've decided to try a few new tricks here to get myself blogging at STMonkey more often. I know, so many distractions...that evil thing called work, those distractions like eating, playing gigs, sitting on Facebook and MySpace for hours, watching the entire Season Six of 24 before Season Seven starts...having a different book and magazine next to each chair I may plop in (and this includes the front seat of my car, the commode, the bed...even the rocker on my front porch)...chasing girls..the usual distractions.

So I'm taking a turn from some of my fellow bloggers and I think I will use this place as a dump for whatever cultural claptrap comes across my desk each day as well as the occasional diatribe, cd or concert or book review etc. I always seem to wait until I have a huge writing urge and those tend to get divided between my letters to friends, my journals, my sex blog (don't ask) and random assorted networking rambles...so my promise is to attempt a more frequent attentiveness and instead of just letting some of this stuff flow by, I'll stick it here and see what happens.

Of course, I will love any feedback you can give. If it is just easier to post this stuff on MySpace or Facebook, I may just wind up there but at least here it will be a concentrated view as opposed to shifting through news of my band, my friends' daily personal issues, etc.

So here are a couple of things of interest (to me anyway)...come back again, subscribe, hang out...

The DEAD to play Barack's Inagural Ball

http://www.rollingstone.com/rockdaily/index.php/2009/01/15/barack-obama-selects-the-dead-for-inauguration-ball-it-was-quite-an-honor/

Okay but I think some of the guys played at Clinton's Inauguaral...any one recall? So what WILL they play? Songs from the set list from the 10/13 ROCK FOR CHANGE show may give some clues...Help On The Way...Throwin' Stones...Dark Star...Not Fade Away...Playin' in the Band...all somehow appropriate. Any other ideas? I say GOLDEN ROAD works...

Elvis Costello sings the Grateful Dead tune LOSER

Years ago, when I first heard a tape of Elvis' live version of the Dead's SHIP OF FOOLS I was blown away by what a great match it was for his voice and style. This is cool too is a tad raggedy. Looks from the backfrop like it was from Golden Gate Park but I'm not sure. That would indeed be appropriate. Elvis is one of the great music fans out there. A huge collector with a vast knowledge of so many styles and genres. I was pleased to be in the studio with him on a couple occassions for a Mingus Orhetra session where he wrote lyrics to and sang a relatively obscure Mingus tune, Invisible Lady. I also had a chance to be in on the session for Elvis's performance on Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz show on NPR and he was a fabulous guest. Gracious and full of insight into the jazz tunes and standards he played with Marian that day. Very cool. Check out his talk/music show on Sundance Channel, SPECTACLE. Possibly the best music show on TV since NBCs NIGHT MUSIC years ago.





Ryan Adams Quits the Music biz


http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/news/148460--ryan-adams-is-quitting-music-says-ryan-adams

Ok, so many of you know I think Ryan Adams is the best damn songwriter out there these days. Yeah, I dig Ray LaMontagne as well but Ryan is the man. Prolific as can be, stylistically interesting like Neil Young, Todd Rundgren, and many of the best "artists" before him. The Bowie's, the Willie Nelson's...guys who always sound like themselves, have an identity but are not afraid to push the envelope some every time out. Artists who were there influences out in the open but always add something totally unique and intriguing everytime out.

Now MANY famous artists retire, some over and over agin, just to find life out of the spotlight boring and suddenly realize that they are gonna be creative no matter what so they may as well share it with the world...Artie Shaw and Elton John retired numerous ties...Bowie, Tina Turner, Dylan, Charles Lloyd and many of them have come back and given us some of their most timeless work.

See ya in a bit, Ryan. We'll miss ya while you're gone, and we'll look forward to your return. I'm sure it will be not a minute too soon.


(Photo at top of me, Marian McPartland and Elvis Costello courtesy of RJ Capek)