James Huggins has clipped to his fridge door an article about 'Alfred' the man who has lived in the Charles DeGaulle Airport for over a decade, with no place to go. Alfred is the nickname he was given by airport staff, to whom he has become a normal part of the airport scene; his real name is Merhan Karimi Nasseri and he was born in a part if Iran that used to be under British control, to an Iranian father and British mother. He wants to go to Britain. Due to various misadventures including lost papers he's stuck.

You can read the full details of his predicament over at Geek Times . As you read, please whistle the tune of 'The Man on the MTA' (that old Kingston Trio song about Charley who was riding the Boston underground rail when the prices rose yet again; and, lacking the additional 25 cents, he was not allowed off. )

Stories like this boggle the mind a bit. Why can't the guy just phone up the British consulate, and why can't the British consul just pull a few strings and get the guy moving?? I would think he'd qualify as a British citizen, if his mother was British.

My friend in the second smallest independent state in the world writes to correct my description of him as a fan of jazz:

I am not a jazz-fan. Or Jazz Fan. I was brought up with it. It is the language that I speak and understand. I listen to it as little as possible. Why? Because nobody understands nor speaks that language any more.

I must own up: Among other Items, my Root Kulture is Victor Mature, Charlton Heston, Hemingway, Kerouac, Charlie Parker, Elizabeth Taylor, Nat King Cole, John Coltrane, Miles, Bill Evans and the Eagles. Plus Pynchon and a number of other folk, Chet Baker Sings (original version + second version). For example, I know who Davy Schildkraut is. Jackie McClean, of course. Wardell Gray. The fantastic Paul Gonzalves of the Ellington Band.

No. I am not a Fan. I know who Johnny Hodges is. Jimmy Noone. No. I am not a Fan. Bix Beiderbecke. Booker Ervin with Mingus. All of the above Folk speak in a language with which I am perfectly familiar. There are no cracks, seams or other. Lenny Bruce, Sammy Davis Jnr.

You know, when Europeans speak about Culture, they speak about History. We are here talking Museums. Kulture is when the protagionists are Dead. They then become exploitable by anyone and cannot answer back. It also becomes "Abstraction": like "Euro-Jazz" - a frightful noise that has no meaning, impetus, nor guts. Let alone theme or melody. A Shipwreck. Apart from the Readin' (I assume we all read, or have done so), to illustrate my point, I would invite You to flip onto Yr CD Player "Blues an' Roots" by Charlie Mingus. A record of the Early sixties. My personal opinion is that You will be hard put to it to find Any comparable Musical Statement coming out of Europe, or probably Anywhere - before or since. Yet Mingus lived, made a living, was very hip - the Canada Concert with Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie (Night in Tunisia, Salt Peanuts, etc.) He was on Bass. Plus, of course, other stuff with Monk, and so on.

Yeah. We hardly know what to say. As Cole Porter just said, "Okay. I quit" when the electric guitar folk came along, so John Coltrane no longer has a place. Fine. As has been previously stated, "Kind of Blue" whichever way You turn it - You can use it in a strippers' club, You can listen alone - do what You like, anyways. Anyways: You can never destroy it. (Coltrane, magisterial, serious, no extra words.

Cannonball Adderly a rumbustious player often, don't forget "Dancing in the Dark", is here a Butterfly, soaring into incredible poetry. Yeah, Big, Fat Cannonball knew what it was all about.)

American Kulture has allowed those guys to live, and to do what they thought best. They may have been poor at times, but perhaps "Kind of Blue" and "Blues and Roots" are quintessential documents of Our Kulture - an' I include Victor Mature in that; those guys also knew who Victor Mature was, or was Not. :-). Gosh !

Seriously, there has been so much Culture pouring out of America: wonderful writers, tough journalists, muscians, painters. Really ! U don't know how lucky You are !

Forgive us, here at voxnooz we have omitted thousands and thousands of Good Folk, for the sake of simplicity - Nathaniel West, for example, "Day of the Locust". Gregory Peck, " Captain Ahab". There are so many. Thank You for doing Your jobs.

The Big M.

I am frankly unfamiliar with whatever current jazz scene may exist in the U.S., Europe or elsewhere. I offer a quote, however, that relates jazz proliferation to capitalism:

As the wheels of capital grind remorselessly to the tune of impossible profit projections, jazz grows increasingly irrelevant to the dominant record labels. Atlantic vanished; Columbia recycled Miles; Concord Jazz did singers; BMG and Warners hardly mattered; and even Verve tightened the noose.

That was by Gary Giddins, writing on the best jazz of 2002 in the Village Voice.

Even so, there is a lot going on in America, all the time, even in the worst of times -- maybe more so in the worst of times. It's a big place that's fairly easy to move around in. However, let me just mention that Miles Davis died in 1991 and a lot of those other folks are dead, too. So, are we talking about your Kultur here? ' Kulture is when the protagonists are Dead.' 'Cultchah' means big money. Tourists pay for that stuff.

This in from a huge jazz fan at Voxnooz , in the second-smallest independent state in the world:

PamPam, I am at a loss to know why I should address these musical-stuff thoughts to You. I seem unable to voice them for myself or at my own places. Curious. However, this is the continuing Coltrane Story. Uh-huh. Perhaps I prefer to give this stuff to another person, whom I trust, to Edit.¹

Possibly, if it does not bother You unduly, I feel You have just the right distance from the subject to be a reasonably objective judge. :-)

Musicians have No Colour. More precisely, whatever Kolor they are is immaterial to their ability. Musicians commonly meet on a shared ability basis. "This, I can do. That is beyond me. For the moment. And You ?"

But musicians can develop. A mysterious process, nobody, even themselves, could say how. Yesterdays Wallflower is today's burning rocket in the sky. Sure, work and the miles is in it. But what is one's short-cut is another's long-haul. And Vice Versa. Ok. Fine. VoxNooz blabbermouths a lot. We have given our opinion on Coltrane. Uh-huh.

We invite You to consult RedHotJazz There You will find a number of piano solos that You can listen to, written but never recorded by Bix Beiderbecke. Prior to 1931. He died aged 28.

Those of You who swear by Art Tatum, Oscar Peterson, and the Heart-Breaker and Heart-Breaking Bill Evans ('member the Ray Charles number HeartBreaker :-) ? will find these numbers not only very interesting but also very revealing. As an aside, Y'all know that Bix was a star cornet player - not a pianist, as such. That was merely "Alone Together" stuff.

When You come back from Your brief trip around any selection of the above Folks, You will have realised - - You will have realised the richness and understanding that crosses the Time and Kolor Boundaries that may have locally affected those Folk. You kin round it off with a visit back to Lighnin Hopkins. Sonny Boy Williamson III, Little Walter, Big Howling Wolf, Muddy hisself. They are all just cousins, You know. Different tools available to hand, is all. :-)

1. This is not edited, except for typos, spacing and adding links. We have left untouched the author's quirky spelling and capitalization, since he believes his unconventional style relieves reader (or writer?) boredom .Back

I saw an example of writing around someone in the New York Times this morning. Times Magazine Entertainment editor (or entertaining editor, as a wag at the magazine puts it) William Norwich writes around a big hole in his life:

When love goes out the door, sometimes the furniture goes with it.
Or so it came to pass this spring. In a heaving rain, a moving van pulled up to the front door of the primary residence of our longtime companionship -- a one-bedroom cottage with tree-hugging skylights -- opened its mouth, was fed by strangers, then wended its way back across the lawn and was gone. The beautiful cottage was empty. If you telephoned, you heard an echo.

How terribly sad. Having lived with elegant, tasteful furnishings (brought by the partner) for a decade, the writer must find a way to refurninsh his place and his psyche when the partner de-parts, as it were. I do not recall ever seeing such personal writing in the Times before.

Norwich writes about his difficulty in decorating , partly beause he relied on the partner's taste and also because he is now on a limited budget, being able to afford only a dining table and several other 'unimportant' pieces. He takes a collection of photos to be framed, unsure if he can pay the bill. But luckily for him, his friends jumped in. One paid the bill at the picture framers, another came to help him hang the pictures and incidentally brought a collection of cast-offs with which to fill the place so he need not be embarassed in front of his friends, such as a 'card table made for her mother in Portugal with brass legs and a sable-colored Ultrasuede top.' A gardening friend helps with garden advice, as well.

The lack of tasteful furniture is not the sad part of this piece; that part is almost laughable. What is sad are the frequent references cropping up to imbalance and lack:

• "For several weeks the place felt wrong, like a ship on an uneven keel"
  
• "... something still feels adrift"
  
• " Something is missing..."
  
• " Life, or a reasonable facsimile, went on, whether I felt it was balanced or not."
  
• "with time, the moss can be encouraged to grow full circle around the house. If I let it, a beautiful green will fill the empty spots."

The column is about decorating. But it's really about the empy ache of a broken heart.

While we're on the subject of jazz (see previous entry) Louis Armstrong's house in NY City has been renovated and is opening to the public next Wednesday (10-15-03)

At work recently, I mentioned an interest in John Coltrane to my boss, and two days later he produced a CD case filled with an assortment of Jazz CDs and told me to take it home. So over the next few weeks, I have to listen and take notes.

Meanwhile, a good source on music is the BBC