Good Timing

Rolex watches don’t tempt me.  I’ve never even touched one of the expensive status symbols.  And while I haven’t been inside one of the luxury cars, I’m sure top-of-the-line Mercedes sedans merit their price tags.  I have the same sort of conflicted feelings about RoundAgain, the new album by the reunited quartet of saxophonist Joshua Redman, pianist Brad Mehldau, bassist Christian McBride and drummer Brian Blade.  I was initially floored by the shimmering summit of four of the world’s best musicians.  Yet I grew increasingly irritated by the quartet’s relentless perfection with each subsequent listen.  Is there such a thing as being too good?  Happening: Live at the Village Vanguard, the second most notable acoustic jazz album released July 10, is far from flawless.  The sound is surprisingly sketchy for a Blue Note Records release, and the quintet of pianist and bandleader Gerald Clayton, saxophonists Logan Richardson and Walter Smith III, bassist Joe Sanders and drummer Marcus Gilmore occasionally flirts with chaos.  While it’s clearly inferior, I find the slightly derelict Happening: Live at the Village Vanguard more interesting than the crystalline RoundAgain.  Then again, I wear a $50 watch and prefer Fords to Ferraris.


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The latest diary entry essay at Plastic Sax addresses the reevaluation of my priorities during the pandemic.

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Opera update: I eagerly devoured all four hours of last night’s free stream of Richard Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde.”  The tally currently stands at 113 operas in 113 days.

(Original image of the primary clock at Grand Central Station by There Stands the Glass.)

100 Operas in 100 Days

I visited the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville years before I attended my first opera production.  Raised on Waylon and Willie rather than on Puccini and Rossini, I didn’t hear opera as a child.  I’ve grown increasingly self-conscious about my ignorance of the form with each passing year.

When the Metropolitan Opera beneficently opened its archives to encourage patrons to remain quarantined during the pandemic, I reckoned it was time to get educated on the cheap.  (Tickets to the opera’s weekly live broadcasts are ordinarily $25.)  The free streams represent an attractive substitute for my compulsion to take in live music several nights a week.  Committing to a lengthy opera has a way of ordering an evening.  (The remarkable forbearance of my quarantine partner should also be noted.)

I enjoyed Gaetano Donizetti’s “La Fille du Régiment” on Monday, June 29.  It was the 100th opera I watched in 100 days.  The romantic comedy went down easily.  Having taken in plenty of Donizetti in the past three months, I was perfectly attuned to the opera’s cadence and flow.  And I knew from recent experience I’d delight in the performances of the young stars Pretty Yende and Javier Camarena.

The process wasn’t always painless.  I wondered what I’d gotten myself into back in March.  Even though I’ve attended seven or eight productions since seeing my first opera in 2010, the operatic rituals and format remained foreign.  As I suggested last month, opera’s high body count, unapologetic lustiness and preponderance of drinking songs kept me in the game. 

I’m not giving anything away by pointing out the moldy fustiness of too many productions.  Not only does the sight of a powdered wig sap my spirit, the inherent dorkiness of opera nerds- please slap me if I ever utter the exclamation “toi toi toi”- is insufferable.  But I like challenges.  Powering through all four hours and twenty minutes of Hector Berlioz’ “Les Troyens” and every bit of Richard Wagner’s  three-hour and 43-minute “Lohengrin” made me feel invincible. 

Moments of transcendence compensate for the frequent bouts of tedium.  “Salome” altered my consciousness.  I felt the heavens open during Philip Glass’ “Akhnaten.”  And I feel better about my time on earth having seen Leontyne Price in “Aida,” Luciano Pavarotti in “Tosca” and Joyce DiDonato in “Cendrillon.”  Becoming conversant in “Le Nozze di Figaro,” “Turandot” and “La Traviata” also made me a significantly more informed consumer of popular music.  With all due respect to Irving Berlin, Stevie Wonder and John Legend, Mozart, Puccinni and Verdi did it first.  But let me be clear: my newfound expertise elevates rather than diminishes my appreciation of less rarified forms of music.

What happens when the epidemic ends?  I can’t readily afford nice seats for productions at the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, let alone at the Metropolitan Opera and the San Francisco Opera.  And my closet doesn’t contain much in the way of formal wear.  Even so, I won’t be intimidated even if I wear jeans and a t-shirt while sitting in the uppermost balconies at opera houses.  I’ll almost certainly have taken in more (virtual) operas than any member of the audience. 

Until then- and as long as access to the operas continues- I’ll keep learning.  I’m alarmed by how much I loved all four hours of the ‘80s-tastic production of Wagner’s “Die Walküre” (opera #101) last night.  Valhalla!  Incest!  Predeterminism!  Valkyries!  I’m bracing myself for tonight’s showing of Dmitri Shostakovich’s insanely freaky “The Nose.”

(Screenshot of Pretty Yende and Maurizio Muraro in the Metropolitan Opera’s production of “La Fille du Régiment” by There Stands the Glass.)

What I Learned From Having Died

I’ve watched streams of entire operas for 61 consecutive days.  I finished a hideous three-hour-and-43-minute 1986 production of Richard Wagner’s “Lohengrin” this morning.  The strenuous process altered my ears.  Out for Stars, a challenging album by an Amsterdam based octet overseen by the Slovenian pianist Kaja Draksler, would have almost certainly have struck me as overly precious and exceedingly cacophonous just two months ago.  The scratchy recording sets the poems of Robert Frost to avant-garde chamber music.  While vocalists Björk Níelsdóttir and Laura Polence mimic operatic singing on “The Silken Tent,” their approach is more often in line with experimental folk ensembles.  Based on Robert Frost’s “A Passing Glimpse,” “Danas, Jučer, Sutra” reduces my opera-traumatized psyche to a puddle.  But don’t mind me- I’m so intoxicated by the European-steeped Kool Aid that even a woefully inept and horribly out of tune saxophone solo on “Away!” pleases me.


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Hearing Jah Wobble’s opening bass line on “Public Image” in 1978 was among the most transformative musical moments of my life.  I had a friend who sprung for Public Image Ltd.’s Metal Box a year later.  Corrosive songs like “Poptones” also modified the way I experience sound.  Almost every song by Sleaford Mods catapults me back to that era.  All That Glue, a 72-minute compilation of the group’s most popular songs and odds-and-sods, is a thrilling career summation and logical extension of PiL’s legacy.  Here’s the excellent video for “Second”.

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I lament the conservatism of the Folly Jazz Series’ forthcoming season at Plastic Sax.

(Original image of smoke near the entrance of Churchill Downs by There Stands the Glass.)