Potrzebie

Friday, November 20, 2009

Wood Chips 13: 1950s

Three from the 1950s: Cover of the Fordham humor magazine, a drawing on Craftint paper and a 1959 cover for The Cartoonist. Note the party guests not only include cartoonists and cartoon characters but also a strange hybrid of cartoonists who have morphed into their own characters. Click on "wood chips" label at bottom to see the previous 12 posts in this series.

National Cartoonists Society meeting on cover of The Cartoonist (1959)

Labels: craftint, ncs, wood chips

¶ 10:05 PM 0 comments

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

All knowledge on the head of a pin

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Here's a 13-minute video about WolframAlpha.

And here's 20 seconds:

An interview with Stephen Wolfram.

Labels: Wolfram, WolframAlpha

¶ 10:35 AM 0 comments

Friday, November 13, 2009

"The stuff that dreams are made of..."

1. Casablanca
2. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
3. Sunset Boulevard
4. Citizen Kane
5. All About Eve
6. Dracula (1931)
7. Animal House
8. Top Gun
9. Titanic
10. Dr. No
11. Animal Crackers
12. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
13. King Kong (1933)
14. Gone With the Wind
15. When Harry Met Sally
16. Goldfinger
17. The Silence of the Lambs
18. Soylent Green
19. Apocalypse Now
20. Forest Gump
21. Dead Poets Society
22. Caddyshack
23. The Godfather
24. Jerry Maguire
25. Wall Street
26. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
27. Marathon Man
28. Field of Dreams
29. The Shining
30. She Done Him Wrong
31. Grand Hotel
32. Dirty Dancing
33. A Streetcar Named Desire
34. Moonstruck
35. The Sixth Sense
36. Airplane!
37. 2001: A Space Odyssey
38. Taxi Driver
39. Cool Hand Luke
40. The Graduate
41. Some Like It Hot
42. On the Waterfront
43. Terminator 2: Judgment Day
44. Sudden Impact
45. Dr. Strangelove
46. Sons of the Desert
47. Apollo 13
48. Jaws
49. The Wizard of Oz
50. Chinatown
51. 42nd Street
52. The Terminator
53. Poltergeist
54. Scarface
55. Funny Girl
56. Rocky
57. Annie Hall
58. Auntie Mame
59. Yankee Doodle Dandy
60. The Jazz Singer
61. Network
62. Knute Rockne, All American
63. The Maltese Falcon
64. The Godfather Part 2
65. Psycho
66. To Have and Have Not
67. Dirty Harry
68. The Naughty Nineties
69. A Few Good Men
70. Planet of the Apes (1968)
71. Mommie Dearest
72. A League of Their Own
73. In the Heat of the Night
74. Now, Voyager
75. Bonnie and Clyde
76. Dog Day Afternoon
77. Beyond the Forest
78. Little Caesar
79. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
80. Midnight Cowboy
81. E.T. the Extra-terrestrial
82. On Golden Pond
83. It's a Wonderful Life
84. Love Story
85. White Heat
86. Shane
87. Frankenstein (1931)
88. The Pride of the Yankees

Labels: afi, quotes, ralph vidal

¶ 12:36 PM 0 comments

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

1959 Newport Jazz Festival

Streaming of the 1959 Newport Jazz Festival begins today with Joe Williams, Count Basie, Lambert, Hendricks & Ross! For previous LH&R posts here, click on "vocalese" in the labels below.

Just as the Basie set had built to an ecstatic peak, Williams introduces special guests Lambert, Hendricks and Ross, who leapt into the limelight just the previous year with their astonishing debut, Sing a Song of Basie on ABC-Paramount (later reissued on Impulse). Comprised of vocalese pioneers Dave Lambert, Jon Hendricks and Annie Ross, this invigorating trio specialized in setting lyrics (primarily penned by Hendricks) to existing and particularly memorable instrumental jazz solos. Ross was actually one of the first to successfully venture into vocalese with her 1952 hit "Twisted" (based on a famous Wardell Gray tenor sax solo). Her early experiments, along with those of fellow vocalese pioneers King Pleasure and Eddie Jefferson, marked her as a true innovator in vocal jazz. And when Ross joined forces in 1957 with Lambert and Hendricks - each of whom had been making notable strides on their own in the same vocalese direction - a powerhouse act was born. Their appearance at the 1959 Newport Jazz Festival came hot on the heels of their second triumphant release, The Swingers on the Pacific Jazz label (later reissued on EMI/Manhattan).

They enter with the jivey "It's Sand, Man" before tackling Basie's "Let Me See," Horace Silver's "Doodlin'" and the invigorating "Taps Miller." Williams joins them for a rousing rendition of Louis Jordan's "Rusty Dusty Blues," with Lambert, Hendricks and Ross providing backing vocal harmony and simulated horn pads. They deliver a soulful reading of Milt Jackson's "The Spirit-Feel," a tune that was also covered by Ray Charles the previous year at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival. And they wrap it up with a swinging "Avenue C," a Basie staple chockfull of clever Hendricks lyrics, before segueing to Basie's closing theme, "One O'Clock Jump," putting the capper on what was easily one of the most invigorating and memorable sets of the 1959 Newport Jazz Festival.

--Excerpt from Wolfgang's Vault notes

Usin' the phone booth,
Makin' a few calls,
Doodlin' weird things,
Usin' the booth walls.

Got me a big date,
Waitin' for my chick,
Puttin' my face on,
So she could look slick,

I enjoy procrastinating
'Cause I'm busy while I'm waiting,
Doodlin' away, doodlin away

Sittin' and dinin'
Dinner beginnin',
Started designin'
Usin' the linen

Photo: Charles O'Neal

At age 83, Annie Ross is still performing. Here she is in August 2009 after an outdoor Jammin’ on the Hudson at Harlem's Riverbank State Park with the park’s cultural director, Ruth Thomas (l.), and public relations person, Pat Vitucci (r.). Her current solo act includes "Twisted" and "Buddy, Can You Spare a Dime". Also at Riverbank State Park is Milo Mottola and Maria Reidelbach's Totally Kid Carousel, the "first carousel in the world designed by kids."

Labels: count basie, dave lambert, hendricks, jazz, lambert hendricks and ross, mottola, newport jazz festival, reidelbach, totally kid carousel, vocalese