The great British painter Howard Hodgkin passed on March 9 of this year, but I only found out about it last evening, which Tuffy P came across something on the internet. He was 84. Mr. Hodgkin made deceptively simple, powerful abstract paintings. In some of… Read More
Ridin’ along in my automobile My baby beside me at the wheel. The lyrics are all rock ‘n’roll, but you didn’t have to wait for the lyrics. By the start of the second bar you know it’s Chuck Berry. It’s like that with all his… Read More
Here at home we have a photo by the great Memphis photographer Ernest Withers of the Howlin Wolf Band pretending to pick cotton in Arkansas. There’s a young James Cotton in that photo sporting a big grin. RIP
At the end of 2015, I read many articles about all the music stars who passed in 2016. Today I’d like to salute one more performer who was very very well known within his own musical world, but his passing did not get a mention… Read More
Alan Jabbour was an extraordinary fiddler and ethno-musicologist. RIP
I was very sad to read that the amazing soul singer Sharon Jones passed away today, after being ill with pancreatic cancer for some time. She was just 60. I was just thinking about her and her music yesterday and posted one of her performances… Read More
Everybody who fly-fished the river knew him. His old pick-up with camper would be parked at the side of the road and John would be inside waiting for the evening hatch. He was always happy to have a visitor, to chat for a while before… Read More
This morning we attended funeral service for Nick Badyk. When we moved to Twenty Seventh Street, Nick was our neighbour to the south. You might call him an elder in the Long Branch community – he lived in that modest bungalow for 70 years. He… Read More
Back in the day there was always John Bentley Mays reviewing art in the Globe. I read his reviews regularly – it seems to me I disagreed with him on a regular basis – but I have to hand it to the guy, he was… Read More
Fred Hellerman, last of the folk group The Weavers, has passed. He was 89. RIP.
