Dec
23
Happy Holidays
Filed Under Announcements |
Slow blogging through the holidays, sorry. But I hope you’re all having a great time with your family and/or loved ones. Some short notes: Congrats to Ed, a new father. If you need advice on strollers, etc., I’m your man. Also, Erasing has a great post on Shaun Tan’s The Arrival (which he describes as La Jetee + M. C. Escher + Chris Van Allsburg + Codex Seraphinianus).
Because of school, I didn’t get nearly enough time to read/listen/watch much of anything, or at least not as much as I would have liked to. But for what it’s worth, the following items gave me much pleasure in 2007.
MUSIC
Alkan, Concerto for Solo Piano, etc.: Marc-Andre Hamelin (If I ever have to demonstrate to the martians the expressive and technical range of an instrument commonly known as piano, I’d pop in this disc. My second favorite Hamelin CD, only after his Charles Ives Concord Sonata disc.)
Radiohead, In Rainbows (I’ll shut up.)
Stockhausen, Stimmung: Paul Hillier and Theater of Voices (see here.)
Herbie Hancock, River, The Joni Letters (I enjoyed this disc so much better than the other Joni Mitchell tribute album which was more hyped. Wayne Shorter hasn’t sounded this good in years, either. Tina Turner in “Edith and the Kingpin” is wicked, and Hancock’s solo in the same song is too good. My favorite of the album Luciana Souza’s cover of “Amelia.”)
No Age, Weirdo Rippers (Wesssssssiiiiiiiide!)
LCD Soundsystem, Sound of Silver (my daughter’s favorite album of 2007.)
Carla Bruni, No Promises. (Sexy, sexy…)
Motian/Frisell/Lovano, Time and Time Again. (I am kicking myself for having missed their concert last month.)
Burial, Untrue (The music I listened to the most while writing this year, alongside Tallis Scholars’ Requiem CD.)
Sally Shapiro, Disco Romance (Makes me feel old and young at the same fucking time.)
Beethoven, Sonatas Op. 101 & Op. 106: Mitsuko Uchida (The Hammerklavier that pounds the head and stirs the soul.)
Brahms, String Sextets: Nash Ensemble.
Schumann & Schubert, Cello Works: Antonio Meneses (Great Arpeggione sonata, but even better Schumann. Lyrical, searching and intimate. One of those records that gets better with each listen, starts living inside you. I know I will listen to it over & over again, for years, i.e. Radu Lupu’s late Brahms.)
Glenn Gould, The Complete Original Jacket Collection (80 CDs. Immaculate packaging, with each CD encased in its own sleeve, which is a reproduction of the original LP cover. This is for the completist in you, if you’re a Gould fan. I am in love.)
BOOKS
Fred Wander, The Seventh Well (A remarkable novel by a holocaust survivor, tautly written and elegantly translated by Michael Hofmann, whose recent literary criticism, by the way, makes me believe he is very very angry at life. But as for Wander, see my post here.)
Felisberto Hernandez, Lands of Memory (This book is actually a reissue that will come out Spring ‘08, but you can find used copies online, I think. Writing that is at once enigmatic and utterly natural. No wonder why writers like Calvino, Cortazar and Garcia Marquez worshipped the man.)
C. P. Cavafy, The Canon (Yes!)
Gerhard Richter, The Atlas (An update of the artist’s “idea book.” You know how Wittgenstein, in his Preface to Philosophical Investigations, called his propositions “a picture of a landscape… a thought criss-cross… an album” The Atlas is exactly that.)
Roberto Bolano, The Savage Detectives (But look out for Nazi Literature in the Americas, due out soon. Crazy little book. It’s a personal preference, I guess, but I much prefer Bolano in shorter works. But I’ll save the ultimate judgment until the release of 2666.)
Shaun Tan, The Arrival (See here.)
David Malouf, The Complete Stories (I just can’t believe I haven’t read his writing until this year.)
Alex Ross, The Rest Is Noise (Well worth the wait.)
David Peace, Tokyo Ground Zero (Thanks, Terry, for the recommendation.)
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