John Edwin Mason: Documentary, Motorsports, Photo History

Roy DeCarava's Harlem

I'm writing a conference paper about a triumph that turned into a tragedy. The triumph was "A Harlem Famly," one of the most powerful photo-essays that Gordon Parks ever produced. When Life published it in 1968, it moved many of the magazine's readers to reach out to the troubled and... Read more →

Funky Friday: Fontella Bass, 1940-2012

Fontella Bass, a singer who embraced styles as varied as gospel, pop, and experimental jazz, died yesterday. She's best known for having recorded "Rescue Me," one of the most iconic R&B songs of the 1960s. I still remember the giddy thrill that it gave me when I first heard it.... Read more →

Merry Christmas! From Bird, Ella, Miles, Pops, Duke, & Me

Merry Christmas, everyone! Enjoy the tunes, they're wonderful. And in Miles' case, brilliantly strange. Charlie "Bird" Parker, "White Christmas." Ella Fitzgerald, "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." Miles Davis (w/Marcus Miller and Dave Sanborn), "We Three Kings." Louis "Pops" Armstrong, "Christmas Night in Harlem." Duke Ellington Meets Tchaikovsky, "The Nutcracker... Read more →

A Christmas Eve Lagniappe: The Kait Dunton Trio

This doesn't need much of an introduction from me. It's 8 minutes and 32 seconds of bliss from the Kait Dunton Trio. Kait Dunton Trio, "The Way You Look Tonight," by Jerome Kern & Dorothy Fields. Kait Dunton, piano; Cooper Appelt, bass; Jake Reed, drums. * * * Kait is... Read more →

Funky Friday with Barbara Bruckmueller: Big Band Album of the Year, 2013

And the Big Band Album of the Year for 2013 is... The debut recording of the Barbara Bruckmueller Big Band. Yes, 2013, and I'm only half joking. I've been a fan of Barbara and her band for a couple of years. I love her sensibility as a composer. She's deeply... Read more →

John D'earth & the Dave Matthews Band Horns at Miller's

The Dave Matthews Band is in town for a couple of shows, and it was no surprise when the band's sax and trumpet players showed up at Miller's on Thursday night to jam with John D'earth's fine band. No surprise for a bunch of reasons... John's gig at Miller's is... Read more →

Convergences, 8: Mathew Brady, Yannis Behrakis, & the Scarred Black Body

This photograph will shock you, but it's not likely to surprise you. It's both disturbing and disturbingly familiar. Images of black bodies in distress are depressingly common elements of our increasingly global visual culture. Maimed, diseased, emaciated, incarcerated -- you and I see them every day. Often we pass them... Read more →