Issa's Sunday Service, #131: Ehson Rad & D. Kent Watson, via Guest DJ, Ed Baker

William Butler Yeats, attributed to John Butler Yeats

As most know who tread the creative path, the very best things are birthed in the moment of inspiration, the moment of un-thought, spontaneous, serendipitous, alive.  And so, the birthing of the guest DJ on Issa's Sunday Service, with this winning bit of musical adaptation by Ehson Rad and D. Kent Watson (I wanted to type by the awesome folk rock duo "Rad and Watson" but I don't want to be too spontaneous ...). The song is an adaptation of William Butler Yeats's pointed poem, Politics.

Oh, and who might this guest DJ/MC be?  Why the inestimable Ed Baker, of course, poet/artist/raconteur/lover and now Guest DJ.  First the poem, then the song ...



Politics
  `In our time the destiny of man presents its meanings in
   political terms' - Thomas Mann

     How can I, that girl standing there,
     My attention fix
     On Roman or on Russian
     Or on Spanish politics?
     Yet here's a travelled man that knows
     What he talks about,
     And there's a politician
     That has read and thought,
     And maybe what they say is true
     Of war and war's alarms,
     But O that I were young again
     And held her in my arms!

     W. B. Yeats

While he's at it, Ed is also recommending connecting with the avant band "Sun Rock Man", via Professor Martin Jack Rosenblum. Ed says:

these guys shades of Cage and Glass and Xenakis and Schoenberg and Antheil & etc I like the discordant way they progress back into the darkness(silence)

There is the Cid Corman connection and Carl Rakosi was mentioned, too.  Some of "Sun Rock Man's" debut videos can be found on YouTube and, so, I'm passing along those, too, for the experimentally minded.

Looking through some of Cid's volumes, a number of postcards and a letter fell out of one (Aegis), and on one of the cards, this:




Death explains
every
thing at once

Cid Corman

rainstorm--
monk-like on a rock, under a tree
a minor official

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

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Lillie poem archive

Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 131 song

 

Issa's Sunday Service, #52: "Cassidy"

It's week 52, a full year's worth of music with direct literary influences (LitRock) from Issa's Sunday Service. What better way to celebrate than with the Grateful Dead and their wonderful live cut, "Cassidy"?

The story behind "Cassidy" and it's odd spelling may be found here: Cassidy's Tale. Besides Neal Cassady, there is another Cassidy to which the song refers.

There you go.

It's hard to believe this is the first appearance by the Dead on the Sunday Service (though it isn't Neal Cassady's) - a few weeks back they did some backup up for the Reverend Gary Davis, but this is the first time as a headliner. The reason it seems appropriate to celebrate with a Dead song is their generosity over the years with their fans. Music as a shared, communal experience speaks volumes.

It's been an interesting year. Most of the 52 songs, with the exception of a few, can be heard on the Jukebox on the sidebar or at the Issa's Sunday Service homepage. The full list as they originally appeared may be found here. I had an interesting experience with one song; if you'd like to know the details, I'll be happy to supply them. Though you can hear it here, anytime. All I'll say is it's a good thing that the work of William Butler Yeats is out of copyright in the U.S. so this artist no longer will be accused of stealing and profiting, by violating copyright, as happened in the past (page down for details beginning with the 6th paragraph, especially the juicy bit about how said artist brags that his lyrics are better than Yeats).

I'm just saying.

To accompany the above tune, here's another live version of "Cassidy" from the Dead.

************************************

This week's feature poem comes from issue#78, March 1996 and is by Deloris Selinsky. Other poems from this issue were featured in two past posts.

make-up
heavily applied...
disguise on disguise

Deloris Selinsky

a face
like everyone else's...
the snail

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don