SOUNDTRACK: JLCO SEPTET WITH WYNTON MARSALIS-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #163 (February 2, 2021).
I was looking for some era-appropriate music for this post, then I saw this Tiny desk from Wynton Marsalis which hearkens back to big band but is very contemporary (just like this story).
Marsalis has been writing music about democracy and the call for justice for decades. “I hope that the social and political corruption and turmoil of these times cast a light on the individual investment required to maintain a libertarian democracy,” he wrote on his blog in January. “May the events of these times inspire us all to engage even more deeply in the rights and responsibilities we have as citizens.” Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra Septet recorded their Tiny Desk (home) concert at Dizzy’s Club, or what they call “the house of swing.”
The first of the three pieces is called “Sloganize, Patronize, Realize, Revolutionize (Black Lives Matters),” a six and a half minute instrumental that features tasty solos from just about everyone.
“Sloganize, Patronize, Realize, Revolutionize (Black Lives Matters),” [is] a bold statement about humanity and the consequences of racism. Marsalis says this piece — as well as the rest of the music on his new album, The Democracy! Suite — deals with the timeless human issues we see exacerbated during the times of the pandemic, like social challenges and matters of the heart.
It’s got a big swinging intro and then things settle down for individual moments. First Walter Blanding plays a grooving tenor saxophone solo. Wynton takes a bright trumpet solo. Carlos Henriquez gets a little upright bass solo action and has a little back and forth with Obed Calvaire on drums. I often wonder if these solos are written out, or if they follow a general guideline or if they are all improvised.
After a return to the main melody, Ted Nash gets a very different sounding alto saxophone solo after which Elliot Mason plays a ripping trombone solo. Dan Nimmer plays a slightly dissonant piano solo before the band returns to the main theme and brings it all home.
The next two pieces of the suite run uninterrupted into each other.
“Deeper than Dreams” is a reverential piece Marsalis wrote for those who have lost loved ones during the pandemic. Marsalis … lost his father, the legendary pianist and jazz patriarch, Ellis Marsalis, to complications from COVID-19 last spring, and [he] speaks affectionately of “the times when our old folks come and sit with us in the spirit realm when we are sleeping.”
This piece starts slow and swoony. This time the solos are more duos. With Marsalis and Nash playing together, then Blanding and Mason going back and forth and finally a piano and bass moment for Nimmer and Henriquez.
To close, “That Dance We Do (That You Love Too)” is playful and funky and inspires a hopeful message, one that Marsalis says is “for everybody who got out and got down during this time on behalf of freedom.”
This final piece opens up with a funky introduction. Nimmer mutes the piano strings as he plays a sound that sounds like a guitar. The bass brings in a funky rhythm and then the horns all go to town. The biggest surprise comes when Blanding brings out a tiny saxophone that looks almost like a toy and yet he plays a wicked and wild solo on it.
Then Marsalis plays a muted raw trumpet solo–he gets some wild and crazy sounds.
Obed Calvaire never gets a drum solo per se, but his work throughout the songs is always interesting and complex with all kind of nice percussion and rhythm.
This was a really fun set.
[READ: March 15, 2021] Matthew Henson and the Ice Temple of Harlem
I saw this book at work and thought it might be a reprinted Blaxploitation novel. But in fact, this is an entirely new book.
I also didn’t realize that Matthew Henson was a real person. I’m embarrassed not to know that but I see that it was almost by design that I didn’t know who he was.
Henson was an American explorer who was one of the first people to reach the geographic North Pole. He was essentially partners with Robert Peary on several voyages to the Arctic over a period of 23 years. [I’d never heard of Peary either, so I didn’t feel too bad about not having heard of Henson]. But unsparingly, upon the success of reaching the North Pole, it was Peary who received the accolades and Henson was dismissed as his helper or even his servant. Henson received nothing for his work and wound up languishing until many years later when his work was finally recognized:
In 1937 he became the first African American to be made a life member of The Explorers Club; in 1948 he was elevated to the club’s highest level of membership. In 1944 Henson was awarded the Peary Polar Expedition Medal, and he was received at the White House by Presidents Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower. [He died in 1955]. In 1988 he and his wife were re-interred at Arlington National Cemetery. In 2000 Henson was posthumously awarded the Hubbard Medal by the National Geographic Society.
So that’s the background.
In this story, Henson has come back from his expedition and has been making a name for himself as a kind of hero for hire. It’s a wonderful conceit and a great way to get attention for a man who deserves more name recognition. Also very cool is that the book includes Bessie Coleman, (the first African American and Native American woman to earn a pilot’s license–although she had to go to France to earn it since America wouldn’t give her one).
I also don’t know enough about the Harlem Renaissance and the roaring 20s to know how accurately the city is depicted. But it seems pretty accurate and Phillips conveys the tone and mood of the time pretty convincingly. The gangster quality shines through–with quintessential gangster names like Daddy Paradise, Dutch Schultz and Queenie St. Clair.
Unfortunately, the book is riddled with typos and grammatical errors. If it had been edited by anything other than SpellCheck most of these would have been caught. But even with those really bad lines (some lines were so clunky I had to read them aloud), and some rather confusing elements, I still enjoyed the story.
Harlem has a spiritual leader who has been making waves. His name is Daddy Paradise. As the book opens, Henson has been hired by Daddy Paradise to rescue his daughter who has been kidnapped. The kidnapper was the notorious Dutch Schultz (I think). Schultz is looking to muscle out numbers racket boss Queenie St. Clair.
The scenes where Henson does his work are the best. The way he sneaks around, climbs walls, silently disposes of bad guys. That’s the real heart of the story. Henson does such a good job rescuing Daddy Paradise’s daughter, that he hires Henson as security for his upcoming speech (which will be outside with a large audience expected).
With that as a background job, the main plot comes about with Dr Henrik Ellsmere. He is working in his home lab when a man in a tiger mask comes in to take him away. Ellsmere is able to dose the man with a sleeping potion of his own creation and escapes to find Henson.
Ellsmere and Henson share some secret information. In a flashback we learn that Henson and one of his Inuit guides discovered a meteorite in Tunguska that no one else believed exists. He showed a piece of it to Ellsmere who determines it has some powerful qualities. And now the bad guys want to know where it is.
I enjoyed the flashback to the trip where Henson and Peary came across the meteorites. Children’s author Sarah Albee has a post about Peary’s discovery and transportation of these meteorites. She gives a nice summary of how things went down. And for the Inuit perception of these events, check out this amazing article from INSH.
I’m unclear if the events with the “extra” meteorite are based on anything, but they make for an exciting tale and the death of an obnoxious racist sailor.
Back in New York, there’s some great battle scenes, with racist jackasses getting serious comeuppances. In addition to carrying a pickaxe, Henson also has throwing stars on some kind of contraption in his sleeves so he can carry them unseen. Later someone electrifies them so that when he throws them they give off a burst of electric shock, which makes no sense to me, but whatever. The book maintains that Henson travelled in the far East and learn martial arts–no idea if that is true.
There’s some racist policemen [shocker!] who beat up Henson and lots of talk of elevating Black men and women and businesses, both of these aspects lend the story some gravitas.
But there’s also plenty of pulp action. Bessie Coleman’s plan is shot at, but Bessie kicks ass and doesn’t let foolish white men stand in her way. There’s also Lacy DeHavilin, a wealthy white woman who has lots of useful connections for Henson. The price for this information is a night of unbridled sex, of course. Henson knows it’s just part of the job. Henson also has a couple of places that he hangs out, including the radio station where he was a weekly show telling of his adventures.
There were definitely many confusing moments in the story. It was hard keeping the white people straight, honestly. There’s one guys who seems like he was okay, but he winds up getting in a fight to the death with Henson. Or was he lying about being an okay guy? I’m not really sure what’s going on with the whole Queenie/Dutch subplot either.
And then just for fun, Nikola Tesla becomes mixed up in the story. Tesla is using his electrical acumen to surveil plutocrats. He is also trying to make an electric ray that he hopes will end wars.
After having just finished Goliath in which Nikola Tesla is portrayed as a crazy dangerous man, it was interesting to see him here portrayed as a crazy, slightly less dangerous man. Tesla hopes to tap into the power of the meteorite, too. I also enjoyed that the bad guys are able to almost copy Tesla’s death ray in a portable version.
I’m also not sure if there was actually ever an Ice Palace in Harlem. I recall it being mentioned, but I’m, sure we don’t see it. There’s a great climactic scene in which Henson Coleman and Daddy Paradise’s daughter work together to keep some racist ass.
And then something happens and the book ends.
Regardless of the flaws of the book I enjoyed the energy and tone and I loved the whole concept of Matt Henson being a super bad ass. And yup I’ll definitely read another one.
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