Dirt Road Anthems

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

As a Prius-driving, New York Times subscribing jazz blogger, I often forget I’m a hillbilly at heart. Returning to dirt roads in the middle of Kansas activates my intergenerational agricultural sensibility. I feel at home in the absolute middle of nowhere. My life partner and I recently added almost 2,000 miles to an odometer. A soundtrack of spirited gospel, old-timey folk, scratchy honky tonk and contemporary country felt compulsory as we drifted on the outskirts of towns including Colby, Fort Dodge, Garden City and Pratt. In addition to relishing hour after hour of Willie Nelson and George Strait, we sang along with Luke Bryan, the Dixie Chicks, Freddy Fender, Dolly Parton and Doc Watson. Revisiting timeless hymns was no less restorative. Yet my insatiable craving for Ray Price dissipated as suburbs replaced pastures as we neared our increasingly inharmonious residence.

May 2022 Recap: A Monthly Exercise in Critical Transparency

Screenshot of soprano Sara Blanch in the trailer of the Donizetti Opera Festival’s staging of Gaetano Donzetti’s La fille du régiment by There Stands the Glass.

Top Ten Albums (Released in May, excluding 5/27 titles)

1. Mary Halvorson- Belladonna

My review.

2. Ches Smith- Interpret It Well

My review.

3. Bad Bunny- Un Verano Sin Ti

Summer soundtrack sorted.

4. Leikeli47- Shape Up

Fit.

5. John Scofield- John Scofield

Sublime solo set.

6. Shabaka- Afrikan Culture

Hushed Hutchings.

7. Daniel Villarreal- Panamá 77

International Anthem indeed.

8. Mary Halvorson- Amaryllis

My review of the companion album.

9. Andris Nelsons- Strauss

My review.

10. Kendrick Lamar- Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers

The transformation of King Kendrick into Captain Obvious is a hard pill to swallow.

Top Ten Songs (released in May)

1. Charles Stepney- “Daddy’s Diddies”

My favorite sound.

2. Tank and the Bangas with Lalah Hathaway and Jacob Collier- 

“Where Do We All Go”

Fulfillingness’ second finale.

3. Becky G- "Kill Bill"

Dead.

4. Dougie B- “I’m Back”

Bumpin’ me against the wall.

5. Flee Lord with Mephux- "Out the Mud"

True grit.

6. Hollie Cook- “Happy Hour”

Red Stripe special.

7. Ty Segall- “Saturday Pt. 2”

A stroll in Itchycoo Park.

8. Belle and Sebastian- "Do It for Your Country"

Ask not.

9. Flora- "Hey"

Ya.

10. Kevin Morby- “A Coat of Butterflies”

Hallelujah.

Top Ten Performances of May (and the last weekend of April)

1. Little Joe y La Familia at the Guadalupe Center

My review.

2. Samantha Ege at the Folly Theater

My review.

3. Logan Richardson + Blues People at the Ship

My review.

4. High Pulp at the recordBar

My review.

5. Isata and Sheku Kanneh-Mason at the Folly Theater

My Instagram snapshot.

6. The Lyric Opera of Kansas City’s “Tosca” at Muriel Kauffman Theatre

My review.

7. Kind Folk at the Black Box

My Instagram clip.

8. Drew Williams, Brandon Cooper and Seth Andrew Davis at Charlotte Street Foundation

My Instagram clip.

9. Brian Scarborough Quintet at Westport Coffee House

My Instagram clip.

10. Guitar Elation at Green Lady Lounge

The dueling guitars of Brian Baggett and Danny Embrey.

Last month’s survey is here.

Kansas City's Ten Best Music Venues

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

Uninformed trash talk in the comment section of a radio station’s social media post about a local music venue irritated me last week.  While I’m not free of bias, my longtime patronage of performances ranging from rap to opera makes me uniquely qualified to assess Kansas City’s live music landscape.  Additional commendable spaces would obviously be included on an expanded list.  The primary genres associated with each establishment are in parentheses.

1. Knuckleheads

Improbably transforming from a motorcycle repair shop into a sprawling music complex with four stages, Knuckleheads is the authentic roadhouse the House of Blues franchise pretends to be.  (Blues, country, oldies.)

2. Green Lady Lounge

Kansas City’s most popular presenter of jazz features more than 70 hours of live music every week.  The adjacent Black Dolphin and Orion Room supplement the primary stage.  (Jazz.)

3. The Ship

The bohemian West Bottom establishment renowned for good vibes just added a larger stage to an upscale annex.  (Soul, country, jazz.)

4. Starlight Theatre

Kansas City doesn’t possess the natural splendor of cities like Denver and San Francisco, but the expansive al fresco amphitheater in Swope Park is very pretty.  (Musicals and popular touring acts.)

5. recordBar

Every big city has a go-to rock club.  An excellent sound system and loyal staff help make the downtown venue Kansas City’s top intimate room for touring bands and local rock-and-rollers.  (Rock, hip-hop, pop.)

6. The Folly Theater

The absence of a Kansas City landmark on this list isn’t an oversight.  Cowtown’s arts scene has its own version of the fable about the unclothed emperor.  The Folly Theater has substantially better acoustics than the two halls of the more prestigious performing arts center.  (Classical, jazz, oldies.)

7. Westport Coffee House

The theater below the coffee shop is Kansas City’s finest listening room.  There’s no need to go hungry or thirsty as music is played.  Burgers and drinks are available in the adjacent tavern.  (Jazz, poetry comedy.)

8. The Blue Room

On its best nights, the venue operated by the American Jazz Museum offers the sounds and ambience that travelers from Europe and Asia hope to experience while visiting Kansas City.  (Jazz, soul, blues.)

9. BB's Lawnside Blues & BBQ

The authentic Kansas City- not the splashy metropolis depicted by tourism bureaus- is exemplified by the earthy roadhouse serving up savory barbecue and beer-soaked blues.  (Blues.)

10. The Black Box

The flexible indoor/outdoor space in the West Bottoms is a relative newcomer to Kansas City’s live music scene.  (Rock, hip-hop, jazz.)

Album Review: Mary Halvorson- Belladonna

My first experience with the contemporary classical sound known as new music was a bitter disappointment.  At a time in which my music budget was extremely limited, I took a flier on Anthony Davis’ 1987 album Undine.  Rather than the cutting-edge jazz I’d expected, the long out-of-print release on the Gramavision label contains a pair of challenging compositions in the vein of Morton Feldman.  I didn’t get it.

Mary Halvorson’s thrilling new Belladonna album compelled me to return to Undine for the first time in more than 30 years.  The discordant strings that struck me as an incomprehensible slap in the face in the 1980s now sound entirely natural.  I was uniquely prepared, consequently, for Belladonna.  Featuring the guitarist’s squiggly freakouts over the similarly strident work of the Mivos Quartet, Belladonna is an adventure in dissonance.  

I came to Halvorson’s distinctive attack about a year before the only time I’ve seen her perform.  It’s since become obvious that Halvorson is one of the most important musicians to emerge in the first quartet of this century.  Belladonna, and to a lesser extent its companion album Amaryllis, is precisely the sort of confrontational sound I’ve spent three decades unknowingly preparing to appreciate.

Concert Review: Samantha Ege at the Folly Theater

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

Millions of people heard Scott Joplin’s 1902 composition “The Entertainer” for the first time in 1973.  Recorded for the soundtrack of “The Sting,” Marvin Hamlisch’s rendition was a fluke hit.  I was among the dumbstruck listeners who asked “what is this amazing music, and why haven’t I heard anything like it before?”

I had a similar experience at the Folly Theater on Sunday, May 15.  Samantha Ege didn’t play ragtime at her free piano recital for an audience of about 200.  Instead, the British musicologist revived the neglected compositions of African American women.  Selections by the likes of Florence Price sounded as if Claude Debussy had moved to Chicago to become the music director of an African Methodist Episcopal congregation.

The obscurity of the seamless melding of European classical music with American blues and gospel is a cultural crime.  In the remarkably sensitive hands of Ege, the works of Price, Margaret Bonds, Zenobia Powell Perry, Betty Jackson King and Nora Holt seem no less delightful or significant than the output of George Gershwin and Aaron Copland.

Album Review: Andris Nelsons- Strauss

The classical music industry’s proclivity for size is impressive.  Strauss is a case in point.  Andris Nelsons’ new release on Deutsche Grammophon features the conductor leading the Boston Symphony and Leipzig Gewandhaus in an eight-hour and 32-minute marathon of works by Richard Strauss.  Featured soloists include cellist Yo-Yo Ma and pianist Yuja Wang.  Absorbing the vast expanse provided me with considerable time to attempt to figure out how a single composer can be responsible for the worst sorts of classical schmaltz, jarring moments of jarring avant-garde noise and futuristic litanies.  I hope to one day fully understand Strauss’ fantastic achievement.

Doomsday Jazz: The End Times Improvisations of Oren Ambarchi and Ches Smith

The majority of Earth-bound humans would opt for one of two obvious courses of action should they be given sufficient warning the end is nigh.  Some might choose bacchanalian indulgence and lawless decadence.  Ches Smith has them covered.

Interpret It Well, the unsettling new album by the innovative percussionist, conveys the sense of nausea induced by existential excess.  Three distinguished accomplices- violist Mat Maneri, guitarist Bill Frisell and pianist Craig Taborn- enable Smith’s queasy course.

Even idealistic listeners are likely to associate Ghosted with abhorrently riveting experiences such as driving past a ghastly car accident or spending Saturday night in the waiting room of an overtaxed emergency room.

Preparing for destruction will inspire others to summon a higher power.  The inventive guitarist Oren Ambarchi’s hypnotic new album with bassist Johan Berthling and percussionist Andreas Werliin might serve as a nonsectarian hymn.  

The successful melding of Malian folk music, the Islamic adhan, Indian classical music and Terry Riley-style minimalism suggests that Ghosted is the ultimate rarity: a good “world music” album.  In truth, the trio creates interstellar jazz.

Two extraordinary music videos interpret the differing apocalyptic perspectives.  Ambarchi’s "II" consists of everyday scenes of nature.  "Protect Your Home", a short film depicting literal doomsday scenarios, is set to the title track of Interpret It Well.

Concert Review: Little Joe y La Familia at the Guadalupe Center

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

I dragged my decrepit carcass to the Guadalupe Center to catch Little Joe Hernández on Saturday, May 7.  The fond memory of a 2019 concert compelled me to overcome crippling fatigue.  The extraordinary energy of the 81-year-old known as The King of the Brown Sound reinvigorated my body and soul. In truth, my disposition revived even before Little Joe y La Familia performed.  Joining the approximately 1,500 cheerful revelers at the free street festival was therapeutic.  Supported by an elite eight-piece band and filled with feisty humor, Hernández made bawdy asides and chided the members of the audience who remained seated. Like Hernández, I couldn’t understand how people resisted joining me at the front of the stage. Hearing potent renditions of hits from 57 years ago by the original artist always represents an irresistibly bewitching opportunity to travel through time and space.

Concert Review: The Lyric Opera of Kansas City’s "Tosca" at Muriel Kauffman Theatre

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

I didn’t know what to make of the lovely family seated near me in the cheap seats of Kansas City’s splashy opera house on Friday, May 7.  After witnessing scenes of torture, attempted rape, murder and suicide in Giacomo Puccini’s provocatively melodramatic 1900 opera “Tosca,” two perfectly behaved little girls in matching dresses and their doting parents walked out of the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts as if they’d just taken in a showing of Disney on Ice.

The Lyric Opera of Kansas City’s production rattled me.  “Tosca” was the first professional opera I’d experienced in-person since 2019.  As documented extensively at this site, I came to opera late in life.  I immersed myself in the form during the pandemic.  When I finish watching the Hungarian State Opera’s mesmerizing new four-hour rendering of Richard Wagner’s “Parsifal,” I’ll have taken in 303 online operas in the past two years.

The initiative altered my expectations. Having seen Luciano Pavarotti play the ill-fated painter Mario Cavaradossiin in two filmed productions of “Tosca,” my standards are now unreasonably high. Only Marina Costa-Jackson’s turn in the title role didn’t disappoint me last night. Other positives: the Kansas City Symphony was electrifying, the lighting was excellent and the informal banter among patrons in the peanut gallery was refreshing.

Album Review: Pavement- Terror Twilight: Farewell Horizontal

I was never entirely sold on Pavement during the band’s 1990s heyday.  I loved college radio staples like “Range Life” but roughly half of the band’s deeper cuts irritated me.  I was suspicious of Pavement’s ironic sensibility and its affinity for jam band aesthetics.

My affection for all 161 minutes of Terror Twilight: Farewell Horizontal, the new expanded version of Pavement’s 1999 album, indicate I’ve become substantially less stodgy.  It helps that I’m now able to recognize primary songwriter Stephen Malkmus’ channeling of literary titans like Don DeLillo while he and his band mates noodle.

“Major Leagues” and “Spit on a Stranger” have aged into a bespoke form of classic rock while the skepticism I once felt for tracks like “Speak, See, Remember” has been replaced with unqualified admiration. Besides, the knowing smirk that once annoyed me now seems like the only appropriate affectation for indie-rock musicians.