News from the Mudd

This week's pile of new cds features LU's own Instructor in Music, Lee Tomboulian (jazz improvisation, jazz small group performance practice, and applied jazz piano.) Hear Lee on piano, organ, vocals and various other instruments in this mix of jazz, neo-Western swing and Brazilian rhythms.

The first ever Mayfest Revival (in April) takes place this Sunday, April 29, from 7-10 pm. The event starts at 7 pm in the Wriston amphitheater. Learn how to dance around a May pole and participate in hula hoop, limbo, and water balloon toss contests. Sweets and drinks will be provided.

At 8 the event moves into the Riverview Lounge in the Union where there will be chair massages, art therapy, and music and test anxiety relief. Homemade bread, fruit, and snacks will be provided.

Curious to learn how May Day was celebrated in past years at Lawrence? View the displays in Riverview Lounge, and the University Archivist will be on hand to answer any questions you may have.

This event is brought to you courtesy of the Times and Traditions Committee and the Student Wellness Committee.

The Mudd has picked up a brand-new online jazz journal, Jazz Perspectives, whose founding editors are affiliated with Rutgers University's Institute for Jazz Studies. This peer-reviewed journal is devoted to jazz scholarship but also includes Ethnomusicology, Music & Drama, Popular Culture, and Race & Ethnicity in Popular Music. Look for two issues a year, in April (volume 1, no. 1 is now available) and October. The library also has other jazz serials.

Check out the Mudd's latest CD acquisitions. Mouse over an image to get a description and click on "Check here" to see if it's available.

Charles Mingus would have been 85 years old today. As you might expect, the Mudd has many recordings of him and his compositions. Search... Music recordings in LUCIA. To find recordings of Mingus playing, try "mingus bass" and also "mingus double bass" as Keyword Anywhere searches, both in quotes, of course. For all things Mingus, just type "mingus."

It could be said that some poets and some jazz musicians are spacey. Now you can be spacey yourself with this marvelous free downloadable program, Stellarium. Enter your earthly coordinates and view the night (or daytime) sky as seen from your location. This "open source planetarium" allows you to be a sky pilot right in your own home, or out on the deck if you have wireless.

It's National Poetry Month. It's Jazz Appreciation month. How about combining the two and reading some jazz poetry on the web and in the Mudd?

April is National Poetry Month, and the Mudd is celebrating by inviting people to share their favorite poems. Bring your poem of choice to the library and put it on the Poetry bulletin board.

To learn more about National Poetry Month, visit

http://poets.org/ or the library's National Poetry Month page!

Is writing about jazz like dancing about architecture? Not in the case of Whitney Balliett, who would have been 81 today. Mr. Balliett died in February of this year. He was a jazz critic at The New Yorker for over 40 years and his entry in Grove calls his writings "eloquent and highly stylized."
The Mudd has seven of his books, mostly collections of his essays. A side note: his first wife, Elizabeth Hurley King, is a direct descendant of Rufus King, one of the two first United States senators from New York.

A mysterious one-named person, Dismuke, has created a web site of streaming RealAudio files from his (her? its?) personal collection of 78 rpm recordings. There's no searching capability, but browsing is fun. Of particular interest in this Jazz Appreciation Month is the Popular Music of the 1920's and 1930's section.

The most recent issue (vol. 25, no. 1) of the journal American Music contains a transcription of reminiscences recorded by Lil Hardin Armstrong about her life, and her courtship and marriage to Louis Armstrong. Since the Mudd subscribes to American Music, you can view Satchmo and Me online. A primary source at its best.

So you say, "Jazz is ok, but I'm really a fan of the Baroque, you know, Bach and all that." Never fear! Try some of Porter Heap's Swinging Bach (or Toccata and Fugue in d Minor) from the CD Orgel-Feuerwerk III, available from http://www.bonimusik.de. Or check out this version in the Mudd:


[CD] M385.B15 L6
Play Bach
Toccata et fugue en ré mineur (12:00)
Jacques Loussier, piano ; Christian Garros, percussion ; Pierre Michelot, double bass.

Ah, Denmark. Tivoli Gardens. The Little Mermaid. Vikings. Public domain mp3s of swing music. Oh, yes, Det Virtuelle Musikbibliotek brings you sound files to listen to and download. You can browse composers or search for someone in particular. Here's a little Count Basie One O'Clock Jump to get you started.

In keeping with Jazz Appreciation Month (see below) Herbie Hancock was conveniently born 67 years ago today. It may not surprise you to know the Mudd has 18 recordings of Mr. Hancock at the piano. But we also have quite a few recordings of his compositions interpreted by other artists.

To find CDs of Mr. Hancock the performer, try this Keyword anywhere phrase in quotation marks in LUCIA:

"herbie hancock piano"

To find everything,

herbie hancock

The Smithsonian sez: April is Jazz Appreciation Month. The next time you're walking past a practice room and you hear some Monk or Coltrane wafting from within, knock on the door and buy that tortured soul a hot meal. Or how about listening to some jazz? Mosey on over to the library and browse the M1366's. Here are a couple of CDs featuring our faculty:

A calling
M1366 .D36 C35
John Daniel, trumpet, flugelhorn, composer ; José Encarnación, soprano and tenor sax, clarinet, flute ; Matt Turner, cello, piano ; Steve Grismore, guitar ; Mark Urness, bass ; Dane Richeson, drums, percussion.

Smile: The Music of Marty Erickson.
M1366.E75 S65

If an internationally acclaimed performing artist plays a multi-million dollar instrument in a subway station and no one listens, is it any good? Read what happened when Joshua Bell participated in a stunt cooked up by the Washington Post. You can also watch the video and hear the audio.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html?hpid=topnews

If this link is no longer valid, search Newspapers from Proquest for the document title "Pearls before Breakfast."

Images for Academic Publishing (IAP)

ARTstor in collaboration with The Metropolitan Museum of Art recently announced a new service, Images for Academic Publishing (IAP). IAP allows scholars to download and use, free of charge, high-resolution digital images for scholarly publications. Initially, nearly 1,700 images representative of the broad range of the Metropolitan Museum's encyclopedic collection will be available through the ARTstor interface to users at all ARTstor participating institutions. With time, we hope to grow the IAP service to include images from multiple sources.

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