1957 Monk/Coltrane concert released on CD

Someone needs to make a movie about this. Almost fifty years after Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane played a concert at Carnegie Hall, the tape of that concert has been uncovered and released as an album. Monk and Trane were both absolute geniuses, and they only played together for a short time. Previously, the only decent recording of the two giants together was the studio album Thelonious Monk With John Coltrane, which is well worth having but lacks some of the energy live jazz concerts tend to have. Only one Monk/Trane concert was known to have been recorded, and that was recorded from the audience by Coltrane's wife. The sound quality is very low.

But now, as Blue Note's website reports, tapes of their November 29, 1957 concert have been found:

The tapes from that evening at Carnegie Hall were inadequately labeled, filed away amongst the Voice of America's vast collection of recordings, and apparently forgotten until January 2005 when Larry Applebaum, a supervisor and jazz specialist at the Library of Congress, came upon them by accident during the routine process of digitally transferring the Library's collection for preservation purposes. Applebaum noticed a set of tapes simply labeled "sp. Event 11/29/57 carnegie jazz concert (#1)," with one of the tapes barring the sole marking "T. Monk."

This is wild. This remarkable music was released on Tuesday, almost half a century after the event. And word is, the sound quality is fantastic.

Not so fantastic: Blue Note's reprehensible decision to add protection to the CDs so they cannot be imported into iTunes. Yes, you can purchase the album through the iTunes Music Store, but then you don't get the extensive liner notes included with the CD, and given the historical significance and movie-plot story behind the discovery of the tapes, you have to have those liner notes. So anyone who wants to listen to this concert on an iPod but only wants to pay for it once can forget it. Or they can steal it using Kazaa or BitTorrent or something. Nice move, dummies. Way to bring classic jazz to a young audience.

In fact, the only thing that tempers my disappointment with this reality is the hilarious and telling discussion currently going on in the comment section of Blue Note's webpage for the album. (Click the link above to check it out.) The younger, hipper fans are all lamenting the copy protection, and the old fogey jazz snobs are berating them for wanting to steal the music "from" online and put it on their "I-Pod." I'm always fascinated when I stumble upon something that illustrates cultural or sociological differences.

Anyway, if anyone knows a way around this unfortunate set of circumstances, please let me know.

My new mouse

While we were in South Carolina, we did one of those multi-date birthday parties that families separated by great distances often do. So even though it was three weeks after my birthday, I got a present. That was pretty cool. My parents were nice enough to buy me the new mouse Apple is selling. (I refuse to mention its goofy name, just as I refuse to mention the goofy name of their hot new iPod. Both are great new products, but the names are lousy.)

This is the perfect sort of thing to get as a gift. It's a little overpriced, enough that you can't really justify buying it for yourself, but it's a special little thing that makes sense to buy for someone else. Or in my case, to have someone else buy for you:


Yes, this is my Elated Face.

What makes this mouse unique? Two big things. First, it's the only mouse Apple has ever made with multi-button capability. Apple has always used single-button mice, insisting that human interface studies have shown split-button and multi-button mice don't have a net benefit to users. There are in fact studies that demonstrate this, but the reality is that most experienced computer users still want to right-click and scroll and such. This mouse not only allows a right-click, but it also has buttons on the side that you can squeeze to get additional functionality. Second and more importantly, it has a scroll ball, not a wheel but a ball that allows you to scroll horizontally and diagonally as well as vertically.

I'll talk about these in reverse order. First the scroll ball, which I'm very excited about. I love it. If you ever work with large photos, you can imagine how nice it would be to be able to use your mouse scroll horizontally or diagonally to get from one part of the image to another. It's also great to use in applications that have timelines or other horizontal fields. I use it all the time this way in iPhoto, which in "Edit" mode arranges photo thumbnails horizontally above the enlarged image you're working with. The ball has a gentle traction and a soft buzzy-clicky sort of sound, making it pleasant to use and nicely responsive. It is quite small and is set into the body of the mouse, so you can use it by barely lifting a finger. If I had to guess, I would say you'll see a lot of scroll balls appearing on generic mice soon.

The multi-button functionality is not as much of a home run as the scroll ball, but it is still nice. What is most noticeable about it is the fact that the body of the mouse is not split in the middle like a traditional two-button mouse. It is one solid piece, but there are sensors under the mouse housing that detect if you're clicking with the right side or the left side. Like other Apple mice, the whole body of the mouse clicks down, not just a button.

This takes some getting used to, but I have come to appreciate it. It changes the way you hold and click the mouse. I end up holding it a little farther back, using my wrist a little more and my fingers a little less. It seems like a slightly calmer, gentler way to use the mouse. I know that sounds goofy, but it's true.

A great deal of complaining has followed the announcement of this mouse because of one apparent flaw: if you are holding both fingers on the mouse and press down on the right side, it won't right-click. The sensors don't work unless you lift your index finger off the left-click area when you press the mouse down. Indeed, this is annoying, especially at first, and especially if you expect this mouse to work exactly like a regular two-button mouse. As I just noted, however, it doesn't seem as if you're supposed to expect that out of a mouse that clicks the way Apple mice do.

It took all of five minutes to get my hand trained to make the slightly different action required to right-click. This might be a deal-breaker for some people, but it isn't for me. It's certainly far less annoying than some cheap two-button mice that are made so you accidentally click the right-click when you don't want to click at all.

As for the squeeze buttons, I think they're basically useless. It's difficult to press with the proper amount of pressure. What seems right isn't quite enough, and if you squeeze too hard, it responds as if you squeezed them twice. Since they're intended to work with Dashboard or Exposé, this is counterproductive. I wish they worked independently of each other and could be programmed to go Back and Forward in a browser.

All in all, I am very happy with the new mouse, except for one thing. I mostly use my PowerBook, and since we plugged the new mouse into the desktop Mac, Tracey gets to have most of the fun with my birthday present.

A bookish blog virus

My friend Tom "tagged" me as one of the people he wanted to answer the following questions. I don't know, I normally don't do this kind of thing, but for Tom's sake, I suppose I will. And not just because he's a good friend: he also whines incessantly in the comments when I don't post for a while. So this one's for Tom Hawkins. Here goes:

1. Total number of books you own?

Around 500-600 that I can see from here. There may be some boxes in the basement and/or attic, but I'm not sure.

2. What was the last book you bought?

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain. This was a gift for Tracey, but I enjoyed it too.

3. What was the last book you read?

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling. Yeah, I know, me and everyone else in the world. Sorry, geesh.

4. List five books that are particularly meaningful to you (in no particular order).

Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. No other book has had more impact on my practice of the Christian faith than this one.

Black Boy by Richard Wright. A classic of African-American literature, this book details the life of the author, and it offers some pretty depressing insight into what it meant to be a black man in the early 20th century American south. (By the way, I've just returned from the south, and we've still got some work to do.)

My Name Is Asher Lev by Chaim Potok. This is a wonderful novel about a Hasidic Jewish family trying to deal with the incredible artistic gift of the little boy Asher, who struggles to nurture and be true to his ability without denying his faith. Very moving.

John Wesley's Sermons: An Anthology edited by Albert C. Outler and Richard P. Heitzenrater. John Wesley is my theological hero, so it's handy to have this around.

With Burning Hearts by Henri Nouwen. This book is probably where I get some of my quasi-Roman Catholic Eucharistic theology. It's a thin little volume, and I recommend it to people who ask me for a book about Holy Communion. (You could also check out Book IV of The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis.)

5. Tag five people, any five people who read.

Gary (We'll probably find out something really remarkable about him if he does this.)
Lisa (Please limit your responses to works endorsed by major publishers. Just kidding.)
Amy (if she's still reading this...)
Lil Sis (Hope you like hearing about nursing books, everyone.)
Matt (Guaranteed to be some good history in there somewhere)

Artisan Church's "community canvas" at ARTWalk Alive!

After my frustrating morning replacing the tub faucet, it was on to a much more enjoyable project. This weekend, our church is volunteering at ARTWalk Alive!, a festival in the neighborhood where several of us live. We're doing two projects, one of which is a "community canvas," an interactive art piece that any of the several thousand passersby will be allowed to add to. The other art project we're facilitating involves Photoshopping square halos onto digital pictures of people who stop by. The images will then be printed out and matted in square mattes.

Since I will be in South Carolina for the event itself, I volunteered to construct the "community canvas."

First I built the frame. I got six pieces of 1" x 2" wood, each 8' long, from Mike, who just happened to have them lying around at his studio. I assembled four of these into a frame with legs, so the canvas itself would measure 8' wide by 6' high, with 2' legs.

Then I attached a 9' x 12' paper drop cloth to the frame using a staple gun. This was an interesting prospect. Never having been a painter, I don't really know the best process for stretching a canvas, and I suppose even if I did, it might not have worked with thin brown paper. But here's what I did: first, I cut it down considerably so it would be close to its final size and easier to work with. (The kids had fun pretending the long, thin remainders were tails.)Then I stood on a step ladder and stapled it at the middle of the top piece, wrapping it over the top and stapling on the back side. I pulled it tight and stapled it into the entire top piece bit by bit. After I repeated the process down each side, it was not tight enough, so I had to pull it out of one of the top corners, pull it tighter, and re-staple it. Then I stapled the paper into the bottom piece, which involved a little more readjustment. Finally, I cut away all the remaining overlap.

I needed to make the frame sturdier, though, so I cut the last two 1" x 2" pieces in half and gave them opposing 45-degree angles on each end. I screwed these four pieces into the back of the frame, one across each corner. That made it nice and stable.

In the end, I think it turned out pretty well. Here's a picture:



If you are in the area on Sunday, please attend the festival; it is always a great day. And stop by the Artisan booth to get square haloed and participate in the community canvas!

UPDATE: The festival was a huge success, drawing 7,500 people. The Democrat & Chronicle's online article included a great photo of the finished canvas, too! (Larger image here.)

It always takes longer than you plan.

That is the one lesson homeowners must learn. Any project you undertake will keep you busy longer than you expect. If you think it will be done in ten minutes, it will really take a half an hour. If you think it's a one hour job, it's at least two and a half. I'm not sure how long it takes the brain to adjust; all I know is that jobs still take longer than I think they will, even though I'm expecting them to drag out.

Today's job was fixing a leaky faucet in our old claw-foot tub. For months now, the cold water knob has refused to shut completely off, leading to a steady drip drip drip at all hours of the day and night. As is my way, I spontaneously decided that I had heard that sound plenty long enough and that it was time to fix it, now. I knew I had plenty of time to do it, because all that was required was a new set of faucet handles. (I had taken them off previously to scope it out, and the stems were pretty loaded with gunk, which I suspected was preventing the cold handle from closing the valve completely.) I figured ten minutes to get the old hardware off, and another hour to get the proper replacements at the hardware store, drive home, and install them. Replacing faucet handles is easy.

Ha.

Replacing faucet handles is easy. Removing and replacing the entire faucet, both handles, and the shower head rise is actually not very easy, especially when they're all extremely old and gunky. Turns out the type of faucet stems that were used in this type of fixture when it was installed are no longer available at major hardware chains. Fortunately, such chains do still sell the kit to replace the entire fixture. For about twenty times the cost of a couple faucet stems. So I went with that instead. And it took forever. What a hassle.

But I'm happy to report that the new faucet handles are fantastic. Supple response, perfect shut-off every time. No cranking required.

Update to the "Best Of" section

I added five new posts to the "Best of P.F." section on the left sidebar. If you're new to my blog or just want to revisit some of the posts I like best, take a look. I left the first set of links in the sidebar, below the new ones, separated by a line break.

Thanks for indulging this little bit of blog narcissism, and let me know if there's something you remember liking that didn't make the cut.

A child's enacted prayer for hurricane victims

I don't have anything to add to this beautiful post by Rachelle from Monkfish Abbey in Seattle. Just read it.

Last night I slept in San Pedro

I figure most of the other Apple-loving bloggers are going to be linking the crap out of the mind-boggling new iPod or the Motorola iTunes phone. Or to a lesser degree, the release of iTunes 5.0. So I won't bother with those.

No, the exciting news from Cupertino today is that I can finally buy a legal copy of the smash hit La Isla Bonita. That's right, friends, at long last Madonna has ended her holdout and granted Apple exclusive rights to sell her extensive catalog in digital format.

Now if only a few lame British rockers from the '60s would get over themselves, all would be right in the digital music world.

Slight tweaks to P.F.

I made a small change to my blog template this morning. I changed the code a bit so that the link to read and post comments is more obvious. The only reason I'm mentioning this is so I can give proper credit to Gary, from whose blog I stole the idea. He was nice enough to give me the html code for the change. Thanks, Gary. I guess now I'll forgive you for copying me in your choice of Blogger templates!

Coming soon: an update to the "Best Of" section, and an announcement about a new writing project I'll be participating in.