Concert Review: Bobby Weir & Wolf Bros at Louisville Palace

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

I listened to Ace for the first time last month.  Hearing the 50th anniversary deluxe edition of Bob Weir’s 1972 solo album was a revelation.  I hadn’t known that the recorded versions of sturdy classics like “Mexicali Blues,” “One More Saturday Night” and “Playing in the Band” first appeared on Ace.

The live version of the album featuring Weir’s current Wolf Bros band included in the reissue is so good that it inspired this skeptic to buy a ticket to catch Weir’s show at Louisville Palace on Saturday, February 25.  It was a sound decision.

Unlike the Grateful Dead and Ratdog concerts I (reluctantly) attended in the previous millennium, the performance attended by a near-capacity audience of about 2,500 was inspired.  The ten-piece ensemble sounded like a rugged garage-rock band that managed to grow old gracefully without losing its endearingly rough edges.

The show opened with my favorite Dead song “Bertha” and closed with the apropos “One More Saturday Night.”  If only the alleged fans had been as sophisticated as the musicians.  The incessant blathering of a third of the audience marred the otherwise miraculous evening.

Concert Review: UMKC Conservatory’s “Proving Up” at Spencer Theater

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

Recreational marijuana has been legalized in Missouri.  I’m not tempted when I drive past bustling dispensaries.  A matinee performance of an enthralling new opera yesterday demonstrated that I’m fully capable of attaining blissful, extra-sensory states without the use of intoxicants.

I felt like a monster when I selected a third-row center seat in Spencer Theatre on Saturday, February 18.  Most of the 100 other people at the free production of Missy Mazzoli’s "Proving Up" opted for seats in the back.  My transgression paid off.

Sitting 20 feet from the action in the Cather-esque tale of hardscrabble Nebraska homesteaders was an immersive experience.  The performers were obligated to make eye contact with the weirdo up front as they portrayed hope, grief, fear and devastation. I became part of the plot.

The orchestra played the inventive score with authority.  The vocalists were remarkable.  In fact, everything about the student production was first-rate.  Aside from a production of Arrigo Boito’s “Mefistofele” at Teatro dell’Opera di Roma in 2010, “Proving Up” is my favorite in-person opera experience.  No gummies necessary.

Book Review: Holy Ghost: The Life & Death of Free Jazz Pioneer Albert Ayler, by Richard Koloda

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I’m covered up in John Coltrane bootlegs.  I own a stack of Sonny Rollins boxed sets.  Reissues of Sun Ra’s self-released recordings featuring saxophonist John Gilmore extend more than two feet in my music library.  I have more Eric Dolphy than I know what to do with.  Yet I’d never attained a handle on the discography of Albert Ayler.

Holy Ghost: The Life & Death of Free Jazz Pioneer Albert Ayler, a recently published study by Richard Koloda, offers a comprehensive view of the controversial saxophonist’s output.  Understanding the sequence of events in Ayler’s unconventional life allowed me to better understand the recordings I hadn’t properly experienced and compelled further investigations into the nooks and crannies of his catalog.

Discovering why the sound quality of the otherwise spectacular 1965 album Spiritual Unity is atrocious, for instance, answers questions I’d harbored for decades.  More significantly, Koloda’s study led me to Slugs' Saloon.  The live 1966 set documents what may be the most invigorating improvised music I’ve encountered.  This is everything I’ve always wanted in music.

Concert Review: Voices of Mississippi at Yardley Hall

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The multimedia presentation staged at Yardley Hall on Saturday, February 12, shouldn’t have worked.  The languid drawl of a disembodied octogenarian narrator offered insights into a blend of grainy footage and live performances throughout the 90-minute show attended by several hundred people.

Yet the narrator was the gallant folklorist William Ferris and the six featured musicians possessed correspondingly auspicious talent.  What might have resembled a tedious TED Talk was instead a vital exposition of Mississippi culture.

The concept is inspired by Voices of Mississippi: Artists and Musicians Documented by William Ferris.  The Grammy Award-winning collection ranges from tracks by the blues icon Mississippi Fred McDowell to the beat poet Alan Ginsburg.  Saturday’s concert was similarly expansive.  

Shardé Thomas and Chris Mallory of the Rising Stars Fife & Drum Band, Luther and Cody Dickinson of the North Mississippi Allstars, the roots music mainstay Ruthie Foster and sought-after guitarist Marcus Machado didn’t play it straight.

Ferris’ footage of B.B. King was followed by the rarest of musical unicorns: a fresh version of “The Thrill Is Gone.”  Thomas’ vocals on the shopworn warhorse as well as the life-affirming fife playing she demonstrated on other selections were the concert’s biggest revelations.

Her collaborators were almost as good.  Ruthie Foster delivered a stunning a cappella reading of Son House’s “Grinnin’ In Your Face.”  The low-key guitar duels between Dickinson and Machado were tasteful.  The Kansas City vocalist Danielle Nicole made a fun guest appearance on “You Gotta Move.”

The frequent video segments could have been buzzkills had they not been so engaging.  Rather than resembling fusty outtakes from Martin Scorsese’s 2003 documentary on the blues, they added vitality.

Logic dictates that a performance by the same lineup at a roadhouse like Kansas City’s Knuckleheads would have been preferable. Yet almost everything about Voices of Mississippi defies blues convention.  The triumphant concert was a most pleasant surprise.

Radio Operator: Inside the Making of an Audio Feature

Original image of Barnaby Bright by There Stands the Glass.

My work with KCUR resumed with a feature about the Folk Alliance International Conference told through the perspective of the locally based band Barnaby Bright.  A few additional details and insights related to the construction of the story follow.

*The text and the audio components of the feature are distinct items. I encourage you to consume both elements.

*The principal characters in the story were uncommonly accommodating.  They’re lovely people.

*Longtime readers of There Stands the Glass understand that I’m not particularly fond of pop-tinged folk.  Yet I can’t get Barnaby Bright’s hook-laden songs out of my head.

*Fun bit of trivia: the notable operatic tenor Ben Bliss is the brother of Barnaby Bright’s Becky Bliss.

*I hadn’t previously realized that Barnaby Bright’s Nathan Bliss is an astounding musician.

*More bands would benefit from the addition of harmoniums.

*Carlos Moreno’s excellent images compensate for my incompetence as a photographer.

*Partly because I was required to self-isolate this week due to illness, KCUR editor Luke Martin did almost all of the heavy lifting.

Uptown Folk

Original image of Jake Blount by There Stands the Glass.

God willing, the actual purpose of my enormous time investment and, alas, personal health sacrifice at last week’s Folk Alliance International Conference will soon materialize.  Until then, I’ll share a blind item.

Jake Blount’s official showcase was packed.  I fruitlessly inquired about empty seats as I shuffled from the back of the room toward the stage.  I wound up sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with fans who claimed spots on the floor up front.  Discomfort was rendered irrelevant by Blount’s brilliance.  

Blount opened his enthralling set with a lament about the Middle Passage delivered over a grim drone.  I soon became aware of discontented harrumphing from a man seated immediately behind me who apparently didn’t care for Blount’s unconventional approach.

The protest wasn’t out of place.  I was almost certainly among a small minority at the conference who wanted to hear sonic disruption.  I turned to identify the malcontent at the conclusion of Blount’s set.  I was amazed and delighted to discover the dissenter was an octogenarian folk legend.

For the record, here’s a ranked listing of the artists responsible for my ten favorite performances at the conference: Jake Blount, Verónica Valerio, Sara Curruchich, Jennifer Knapp, Kris Drever, Kitty Macfarlane, OKCello, Barnaby Bright, Harry Manx and Talibah Safiya.

Album Review: Bob Dylan: Fragments- Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996-1997): The Bootleg Series, Vol. 17 (Deluxe Edition)

I resorted to desperate counter-programming as I drove home from pre-pandemic Folk Alliance International Conference sessions.  After being deluged with hours of banjo and conscientious protest songs, I felt compelled to queue up digital productions by the antisocial likes of Kevin Gates.  Not this year.  I’m all in on the six-hour and thirteen-minute reissue of Bob Dylan’s Time Out of Mind.  I loved the album as a new release in 1997.  It sounds even better now.  The former folkie’s ravaged voice, gothic blues and frequently hilarious lyrics reflect my current worldview.  My default soundtrack also led to a synchronized bout of serendipity.  A 16-minute version of “Highlands” began as I left the garage of a midtown hotel after midnight last week.  The song ended when I pulled into my driveway.  I too “feel like a prisoner in a world of mystery.”

Album Review: Meg Baird- Furling

I’ve placed special notations on a list of artists performing at this week’s Folk Alliance International Conference in Kansas City.  The music made by the likes of Sandy Denny, Roy Harper and June Tabor is my favorite form of folk.  Everyone with an official showcase at the conference working in that vein received a gold star.

Reverent of tradition yet constitutionally peculiar, those musicians created something new yet timeless five decades ago.  Naturally, I’m partial to the musicians who follow in their unconventional footsteps. While she’s two generations younger and from the Americas rather than Britain, Meg Baird builds on that legacy.

Her new album Furling is utterly enchanting.  The plaintive psychedelia of "Ashes, Ashes" and the wistful grooviness of "Will You Follow Me Home?" are worthy of Fairport Convention and Pentangle.  Baird won’t be in Kansas City, but I’ll be on the prowl for equally entrancing sounds this week.

January 2023 Recap: A Monthly Exercise in Critical Transparency

Screenshot of the trailer of Opera McGill’s production of Engelbert Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel by There Stands the Glass.

Top Ten Albums of January

1. Sebastian Rochford- A Short Diary

Sad-sack Satie? Sold!

2. Elle King- Come Get Your Wife

Sounds like home.

3. The Art Ensemble of Chicago- The Sixth Decade: From Paris to Paris

Roscoe Mitchell and Moor Mother are my favorite dynamic duo.

4. Daniel Pioro- Saint Boy

My review.

5. Mette Henriette- Drifting

ECM-core.

6. Fred Hersch and esperanza spalding- Alive at the Village Vanguard

My review.

7. Obituary- Dying of Everything

Don’t I know it.

8. Kali Malone- Does Spring Hide Its Joy

My review.

9. Lil Yachty- Let’s Start Here.

Surprise, surprise, surprise!

10. Véronique Gens and Orchestre National De Lille- Poulenc: La voix humain

Allô!

Top Ten Songs of January

1. Måneskin- "Kool Kids"

Rock and roll hilarity.

2. Bizzy Banks- "Ok Ok Ok"

Notarized.

3. Gloss Up featuring Icewear Vezzo- "From Cross the Way"

“Bouncin’ like them checks!”

4. Ice Spice- “In Ha Mood”

She’s no one-hit wonder.

5. Yahritza y su Esencia- “Cambiaste”

Change is the only constant.

6. Public Image Ltd- "Hawaii"

A beautiful sunset.

7. Belle and Sebastian- “Juliet Naked”

My favorite Nick Hornby novel.

8. Jill Barber- "Homemaker"

Tammy lives.

9. SleazyWorld Go- “Robbers and Villains”

Grimy side.

10. Boygenius- "$20"

Three is a magic number.

Top Ten Performances of January

1. Pretty Yende- Folly Theater

My review.

2. Mike Dillon and Brian Haas- The Brick

My review.

3. Miguel Zenón Quartet- Folly Theater

My review.

4. Oran Etkin- Polsky Theatre

My review.

5. Kinnor Philharmonic- White Theatre

My review.

6. No Treble- InterUrban ArtHouse

My Instagram photo.

7. OJT- Green Lady Lounge

My review.

8. Scott Looney, Kevin Cheli, Krista Kopper, Seth Davis and Evan Verploegh- Westport Coffee House

My review.

9. Venetophilia- Kansas City Public Library

My Instagram clip.

10. Charles Williams, DeAndre Manning and Mike Warren- Eddie V’s

The previous monthly survey is here.

Album Review: Kali Malone- Does Spring Hide Its Joy

I’m diligently working my way through Confessions, Saint Augustine’s exhausting chronicle of his conversion to Christianity in the fourth century.  Does Spring Hide Its Joy, Kali Malone’s new three-hour set of drones, provides ideal accompaniment.  I encountered a relevant passage as a particularly harsh phase of sound developed.  “As for the present,” Augustine wrote, “If it were always present and never moved on to become the past, it would not be time but eternity.”  Malone and her collaborators Stephen O’Malley and Lucy Railton capture a state of immutable limbo with Does Spring Hide Its Joy.