Roger O Green

Music throwback: Strawman – Lou Reed

March 2, 2018 would have been Lou Reed’s 76th birthday

I was playing a compilation album from Sire Records’ Just Say Yes series and rediscovered Strawman by Lou Reed. The disc has a live version of a song that first appeared on his well-received 1989 album New York.

I was pained to note that the lyrics are as topical today as when they were first penned:

Does anyone need yet another politician
caught with his pants down and money sticking in his hole

Here’s a a rare Q&A from 1989, Lou Reed: A New York State of Mind.

Does anyone need another racist preacher
spittin’ in the wind can only do you harm

I don’t have easy access to my vinyl so I’m not positive I own the album. But there is another song from New York I must have on another compilation.

“‘Last Great American Whale’ is a ballad about a mythical creature who came to the rescue of an Indian chief, who was jailed for killing a racist youth. The whale saves the chief and stops the racism… But the great animal was then killed by a NRA member, who had been aiming for the chief. This is taken as a symbol of Americans lack of concern for the environment.”

From the Wikipedia: “Lewis Allan Reed… was an American musician, singer, songwriter and record producer. He was the lead guitarist, singer and principal songwriter for the rock band the Velvet Underground, with a solo career that spanned five decades. The Velvet Underground achieved little commercial success during their existence, but are now recognized as one of the most influential bands in rock, underground, and alternative music.”

The Velvet Underground was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 and Lou Reed was, as a solo artist, in 2015.

Unfortunately, he didn’t live to see the latter honor. On “October 27, 2013, he died from liver disease at his home in East Hampton, New York, at the age of 71.” March 2, 2018 would have been his 76th birthday.

He was survived by his third wife, multimedia and performance artist Laurie Anderson, with whom “he had collaborated on a number of recordings.” They were married on April 12, 2008, though they had been romantically involved since the late 1990s.

Listen to:

Strawman

Last Great American Whale

The New York album, in turn

May we e’er our praises sing, with loyal hearts and true

The one time in my whole life I intentionally entered a fight was in fifth grade.

“…IN A TROUBLED NEIGHBORHOOD” -Binghamton Press May 25, 1967

By fifth grade at Daniel Dickinson, my classmates and I had a routine after school. We walked Bill home on Mygatt Street. This was less than two blocks away, and right across the street from the store, Miss Ellis’, where I usually bought red licorice “shoelaces” from her big glass case. Then to Lois’ at Mygatt and Meadow, and to Karen’s at Mygatt and Spring Forest Avenue, across the street from the cemetery, where some of my ancestors are buried.

If I were going to my grandma’s, I’d split off and head to 13 Maple. But if I were heading home, I’d walk Carol to her house on Cypress Street, then go over to Ray’s house a few doors down, which was behind another house, cut through his yard, go via the Canny’s trucking lot back to Spring Forest, down Oak Street, and back to 5 Gaines.

We didn’t always all go together, but frequently enough for Christine, my sister’s best friend in those days, to acknowledge quite recently how much she admired our group. Christine, BTW, lived right next to my grandmother, so we got to swim in their family above-ground pool in the summer. There’s where I first saw color TV, in 1962 or 1963 – Disney and/or the western Bonanza.

Starting with 4th grade, we had gym with Mr. Lewis. EVERY semester, we had to do marching drills – “column left – MARCH” – before we could do anything fun, like volleyball. I always felt he was training us to be fodder for some war.

The first teacher we had for a full year since kindergarten was Miss Marie Oberlik, who lived on Meadow Street, less than three short blocks away. She taught us how to count to 19 in Russian, which I still remember. It was in her class where we learned about JFK’s assassination.

Neville Smith was the principal of the school, a well-dessed man, as I recall, and Pat Gritman was the secretary. For a number of years, starting when i was in fourth or fifth grade, both Leslie and I went to her home on Front Street for Friday night Bible club.

The girls in sister Leslie’s 4th-grade class. She’s to the left, partially behind Christine

My father, Les Green, would come and sing folk music at my class every semester from about 3rd to 6th grade. And he did the same for Leslie. He’d always sing Goodnight, Irene, which made some of the kids think I had a crush on the girl in the class by that name.

He DIDN’T do this for baby sister Marcia, and I remember that I went to her kindergarten class to sing. By that time, her teacher was Mrs. Burroughs.

The one time in my whole life I intentionally entered a fight was in fifth grade, when this kid Robert was pushing around David D, the one who was about a head shorter than most of the other kids. The fracas didn’t last long, though, because Mr. Frenchko, the assistant principal, and later my English teacher, yelled out of a school window and we scattered.

The drag about Robert was that he was the ONLY other black kid in my class. He was so academically challenged that he eventually failed three semesters in two or three years and ended up in the class of sister Leslie. (There’s a Stupid Crime Story I could tell you, if you want.)

Even then, I occasionally wondered if our school was getting all the resources it should. Specifically, the music book we used in Mrs. Joseph’s class, which I took for six or seven years, was ancient even then. I remember a time in fifth grade when she allowed us to pick songs, and someone called out the number for Old Black Joe, which we had never sung. We didn’t sing it that day either, as she said, plainly, “Let’s pick something else.” And a good thing too, because I was ready to walk out of the classroom.

More soon.

Broadway’s Bernadette Peters turns 70

Bernadette Peters replaced Tony winner Bette Midler in Hello, Dolly!

I was watching The Carol Burnett 50th anniversary special in December 2017. Carol noted that Bernadette Peters was on her very first episode on 11 September 1967. How could that be?

Because Ms. Peters was a member of the Actors Equity union the age of nine, with two television credits from 1958! Moreover, she was in two short-lived roles, and was an understudy for a third, on Broadway before she first made the Burnett show, uncredited. She made at least ten more appearances.

Bernadette Peters is a Broadway legend who has won Tony Awards for her performances in Song and Dance (1985) and in the 1999 revival of Annie Get Your Gun.

Her numerous other Broadway credits include starring roles in Into the Woods, Sunday in the Park with George, and Gypsy. She is considered by theater critics to be among the best interpreters of Stephen Sondheim’s work.

The actress, born Bernadette Lazzara, also made her mark in movies such as The Jerk and Pennies from Heaven, both with Steve Martin, whom she dated from 1977 to 1981. And she was in Annie (1982) with the aforementioned Carol Burnett.

Peters married investment adviser Michael Wittenberg on July 20, 1996. He “died at age 43 on September 26, 2005, in a helicopter crash in Montenegro while on a business trip.”

She has recorded six albums, performed in many concerts and serves on the Board of Trustees of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, among other works.

Starting on January 20, 2018, she has been starring in Hello, Dolly, an iconic role that been played by Barbra Streisand on screen, and Ginger Rogers, Ethel Merman, Pearl Bailey and, of course, Carol Channing on stage. She replaced Tony winner Bette Midler; Victor Garber follows David Hyde Pierce as Horace Vandergelder.

Charles, who directed me in Boys in the Band way back in 1975, saw the current production and declared it “spectacular.” He said, “Bernadette Peters has grown into a mature, comic actress who can also break your heart.”

Happy birthday to a performer who is still going strong, Bernadette Peters.

H is for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle

Yeah, I know the whole system is all rather archaic,

I’m not much of a monarchist, though I take passing notice of the activities of Prince Harry and Prince William of England, they being, roughly, my wife’s 20th cousin once removed, or something like that. Lady Diana Spencer, about whom a musical is planned (!), and my spouse had a common ancestor in the middle of the 14th century. Really.

The fact that Harry was going to marry an American actress named Meghan Markle who I, frankly, was not familiar with, really didn’t interest me that much. I have never seen or heard of the TV series Suits.

That is until the racial backlash began. Meghan’s mother, Doria Radlan, is African-American, and her father, Thomas Markle, is Dutch-Irish. She was raised by her mother when her parents were divorced when she was six, raised by her mother and often estranged from her father.

Meghan describes herself as “a strong, confident mixed-race woman.” after growing up enduring racial abuse because her mom’s skin tone wasn’t the same as hers. “While my mixed heritage may have created a grey area surrounding my self-identification, keeping me with a foot on both sides of the fence, I have come to embrace that.”

I wonder if such a match with Harry were possible if he were closer to the throne. With not only his father Charles and his brother William, but now nephew George, niece Charlotte and William and Kate’s new baby in line, Harry can be less restricted, I would think. Not that QEII would have cared, but would the United Kingdom accept a divorced, mixed race mother of the future king or queen?

Yeah, I know the whole system is all rather archaic. At the same time, it has allowed for a bit of measuring of societal change over time and that intrigues me.

Incidentally, despite the close relationship my wife has with Harry, we have NOT been invited to the wedding. I suspect the invitation got lost in the overseas mail, alas. We’ll have to watch it on the telly on May 19 like the rest of the commoners.

For ABC Wednesday

The Lydster: crime-scene tape

I suggested, jokingly – I THINK it as jokingly – that we should chuck our garbage in their Dumpster.

One of the things the Daughter knows about me is that I’m far less likely to get irritated by something I see if I’ve been given fair warning. So one consecutive days in November, she called me at the office after she got home from school.

The first time was to tell me that there was yellow, crime-scene tape running from our neighbor’s porch to ours, blocking the walkway between the two residences. And why was this? Because contractors, in the process of fixing their roof, had thrown down the old roofing material from that roof to said walkway.

And did the absentee landlord bother to let us know that this was going to happening? He did not. The only warning was the load of materials sitting on their lawn for about a week earlier.

The second time the Daughter called me was to tell me that the tape was gone, as was some of the debris, but that there was a Dumpster parked, partially on the neighbor’s lawn but mostly on ours, blocking, yet again, the walkway.

This meant, again, walking my bike through the house to the shed in the back yard.

By the time I had gotten home, my wife explained to the contractors where the property line was. (But did they REALLY think the neighbor’s property line extended to the porch railing of OUR house?)

In any case, the Dumpster left the next day, only to return the following day. At least it was entirely off our property. And there it stayed for weeks, as a cold snap scuttled their plans to work on the roof. It looked atrocious out there, this orange behemoth, but what is there to do? Get in contact with defense lawyers and fight for your rights with the best legal advice.

I suggested, jokingly – I THINK it as jokingly – that we should chuck our garbage in their Dumpster. Of course I didn’t.

Still, I’m glad The Daughter gave me the heads-up, twice, regarding our insensitive neighbor.