Here in Feb. 23-March 6, 2021, we are again in the midst of the Alamo's “13 Days to Glory.” I've "livetweeted" the Alamo siege twice, in 2011 and 2020. This year, I thought I would collect the text of my 2020 tweets in case I ever decide to revise them again! So here they are... Continue Reading →
Sinatra's life makes an interesting way to look at 20th-century America. Just this famous mugshot shows things have changed a bit since 1938: The charge is seducing a single female of good repute. He was born in 1915 and died in 1998. Crowds screamed for him two decades before the Beatles. The documentary "Sinatra: All or Nothing at All" grounds young Sinatra in an America where race... Continue Reading →
http://youtu.be/UCBEA4aI0eU Got a chance to crawl around inside the type of bomber my grandfather flew, a B-24 Liberator, today as several Collings Foundation aircraft visited our town. America's most-produced plane of World War II, these heavy bombers typically dropped 5,000-pound loads of explosives deep behind enemy lines across Europe and in every theater. B-24s were... Continue Reading →
Heard on the radio yesterday: An old norteño version of the old, old Hank Thompson hit "Wild Side of Life." "Mi Nueva Casa," I learn from musica.com, was a 1982 hit for Los Invasores de Nuevo León, boosting them to their first gold record. That is totally fitting in a number of ways, one being... Continue Reading →
This week was the first Shakespeare Week in the UK, a nationwide deal where they try to bring the big guy's works to life for elementary kids, a terrific idea and a tricky thing to do. Hell, it's hard to bring Shakespeare to life for grownups; that's when you get the faux-important approach, simply reading... Continue Reading →
Piano scholar and player James Goodwin has a number of videos up on YouTube. This, he says, "is an improvisation in the piano blues style that developed in the barrelhouses and whorehouses of Texas in the 1920s and 1930s. Characteristic is the use of slurred notes in the right hand and pumping chords or stride... Continue Reading →
If it is good enough for the Bird, it is good enough for me. This is also kind of a classic example of the mid-20th-century "open four cans of Campbell's" school of cooking. (Bonus: Queen Elizabeth II's recipe for scones.)
Here is U2 launching into the song they believed might actually spark violence if it were misunderstood: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYnnmQ9x5tQ And here is a John Wayne movie's anachronistic but stirring delivery of an actual rebel song: http://youtu.be/MGiDiMXLbWI Back in the heyday of MTV, when I was a budding little pre-teen U2 fan, I heard Bono say something... Continue Reading →
Had another wonderful evening at Gruene Hall last night. Stepped out on the street just to get the view my crazy talented friend Bill Harrison captured here. (Well I was a bit more vertical maybe.) The hall was built in 1878 and has a rich history. The original sign over the bar read "Den feinsten... Continue Reading →
Sometimes I really can't believe I was here. A couple thousand years ago, if you wanted to meet up with a friend in Ostia, you could say, "I'll meet you at that bar, you know, the one on Diana Street just off Main." They have bar food, too, and a beer garden out back --... Continue Reading →
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