Regina Carter on Saturday, MacArthur Genius & Jazz Violinist

Sat. Afternoon 2/11: WAMC's Joe Donahue live in conversation with MacArthur Genius, Jazz

Violinist Regina Carter, FREE EVENT
February 11 (Saturday):
Regina Carter, jazz violinist
Conversation — 4:30 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center, UAlbany Uptown Campus, 1400 Washington Ave., Free Parking.
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Classically trained, Regina Carter is considered the foremost jazz violinist of her generation. She studied at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston and Oakland University. She lived and played in Germany and Detroit before moving to New York City to play with the New York String Trio for six years. She then launched her career as a band leader, releasing several albums of contemporary jazz, and drew attention for her work on the recording of Wynton Marsalis’s composition “Blood on the Fields” which won a Pulitzer Prize. She toured with Marsalis in 1997 and went on the road with jazz vocalist Cassandra Wilson in 1998. In 2001, Regina became the first jazz musician and the first African-American to play the 250-year-old Guarneri violin once owned by Niccolo Paganini when she performed in a special benefit concert and recorded her CD, Paganini: After a Dream, a mix of classical music and jazz. In 2006, she was selected as a recipient of the MacArthur “Genius Award.” Her current project is “Simply Ella,” celebrating the centennial of Ella Fitzgerald’s birth, which she will perform at The Egg at 8 p.m. on February 11.
For more about the conversation contact the Writers Institute at 518-442-5620.
(For ticket information contact The Egg Box Office at 518-473-1845.)

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Film Showcases Jerome Kern's Songwriting

Lovely to Look At (1952) will be screened this Friday in honor of Valentine's Day as part of the New York State Writers Institute's Classic Film Series.

The film features 10 songs by major American songwriter Jerome Kern including "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes," "I Won't Dance," the title song "Lovely to Look At," "I'll Be Hard to Handle," "Opening Night," "Lafayette," "Yesterdays," "You're Devastating," "The Most Exciting Night," and "The Touch of Your Hand."

Complete film series:  http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/programpages/cfs.html

From Jerome Kern tribute page at Stanford University:

More than fifty years after his passing, the music of Jerome Kern remains a cornerstone of the Great American Songbook, having survived the fads and fashions of four generations—it continues to be performed on the Broadway stage and recorded by major artists. Known for creating the musical Show Boat, Jerome Kern composed his enduring classics for both stage and movie musicals; works such as “The Way You Look Tonight,” “Old Man River,” “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” and more.

More: http://riverwalkjazz.stanford.edu/#program/magic-jerome-kern-tribute

 

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William Kennedy: Summer Tuxedo in February

Salmagundi magazine recounts a recent Havana-themed celebration of William Kennedy's new novel Chango's Beads and Two-Tone Shoes held at Skidmore. The event also featured musicologist Howard Fishman and his trio playing some of the period songs that appear in the novel, as well as period performances by other musicians.

"On the first of February, William Kennedy sported his white 'summer tux' for the first-ever Salmagundi Salon. He wasn’t committing an off-season fashion faux pas but dressing the part for a night at 'La Floridita North,' a club conjured out of the crush of mint for mojitos, hot jazz, and two-tone shoes."

"The weather cooperated (a practically tropical 52 degrees in the dead of an Upstate New York winter), making the conceit of a night in Old Havana c. 1958 feel like more than a species of wishful thinking. Dressed to kill, we gathered for a night of music, theatrical business at the bar, and top-shelf literature courtesy of William Kennedy’s most recent novel, Changó’s Beads and Two-Toned Shoes with its compelling frame of revolution and racial tension." More.

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John Sayles on Bill Kennedy's "Chango"

In case you missed it back in September, here's John Sayles's review of William Kennedy's latest novel, Chango's Beads and Two-Tone Shoes, which appeared on the front page of the New York Times Book Review.

Sayles visits Monday, February 27th.

"Changó’s Beads and Two-Tone Shoes, is his most musical work of fiction: a polyrhythmic contemplation of time and its effects on passion set in three different eras, a jazz piece unafraid to luxuriate in its roots as blues or popular ballad or to spin out into less melodic territory."

More.

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