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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

TT: A little traveling music, please

September 7, 2004 by Terry Teachout

I brought with me on my amazing journey a short stack of music for all occasions, some of which is as yet unavailable to civilians. Dave’s True Story, the kinky postmodern lounge act I profiled in the New York Times a few years ago, sent a rough mix of The World in Which We Live, their next album (which is terrific), while Mary Foster Conklin, another of my Times profilees, supplied me with a live recording of her recent Lieber-and-Stoller show (ditto), which I wasn’t able to hear in person.


I also packed a four-CD set burned by a kind reader of “About Last Night” which contains the sixty-odd recordings I chose back in 1999 for a series of three Commentary essays collectively entitled “Masterpieces of Jazz: A Critical Guide.” I’m hoping that some obliging publisher will invite me to turn the results into a fancy book-and-CD package (hint, hint!), but in the meantime, they made for classy drive-time listening.


In addition, I gobbled up ten commercially released CDs in the course of my voyage. It occurred to me as I returned to New York that they added up to a nicely eclectic list whose contents might be of interest to at least some of you, so here they are:


– Karrin Allyson, Wild for You (recently praised in this space)


– Ani DiFranco, Dilate (“Superhero” is now my theme song)

– Emmylou Harris, Stumble Into Grace (I still have a crush on her after all these years)


– Allison Moorer, Miss Fortune and The Duel (Our Girl and I are of like minds when it comes to Miss Moorer)


– Uncle Tupelo, 89/93: An Anthology (good when it’s good, dull when it isn’t)


– Caetano Veloso, The Best of Caetano Veloso (this one didn’t ring the bell for me, much to my surprise)


– Rhonda Vincent, One Step Ahead (hot retro-style bluegrass from a superior singer-mandolinist)


– Fats Waller, Honeysuckle Rose: 51 Original Mono Recordings 1927-1943 (I don’t think the world is quite ready to hear me yowling along with Fats on “I Wish I Were Twins”)


– Wilco, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (need I say more?)

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Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read More...]

The Long Goodbye

To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here. … [Read More...]

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