Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Sports Mentality

Hector Castro KILLED Stepdaughter For Crying During World Cup Game 06/28/10 10 McAllen, Texas

My friend Jeremy just emailed me the above news story along with the following appended observation:

"Funny, you never hear stories about people becoming murderous watching 'Classic Arts Showcase'".

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Thanks for all the "thanks." Please note that, to the best of my knowledge, not a single album that I have uploaded is in-print or has been in-print for a month of Sundays. Bit of a sad commentary on the current state of the record industry, doncha think?

Marian Bruce



Lucky To Be Me (Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden, Adolph Green)
Let Me Love You (Bart Howard)
It Never Entered My Mind (Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart)
Things Are Looking Up (George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin)
Something To Live For (Duke Ellington, Billy Strayhorn)
Looking For A Boy (George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin)
I Got It Bad (And That Ain't Good) (Duke Ellington, Paul Francis Webster)
My One And Only (George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin)
A Ship Without A Sail (Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart)
No One Ever Tells You (Hub Atwood, Carroll Coates)
The Gentleman Is A Dope (Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II)
Don't Like Goodbyes (Harold Arlen, Truman Capote)

Marian Bruce (ldr), Joe Wilder (t), Everett Barksdale (g), Jimmy Jones (p), Al Hall (b), Marian Bruce (v) rec. late 1958

Download available for the next 48 hours only

Marian Bruce Logan's NYT obit

Marian Logan, 73, A Civil Rights Aide And Cabaret Singer

By RICHARD D. LYONS
November 28, 1993

Marian Bruce Logan, a civil rights advocate, former New York City Commissioner of Human Rights and a cabaret singer in her youth, died on Thursday at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Medical Center. She was 73.

The cause was emphysema, her son, Warren Arthur Logan, said.

Mrs. Logan was an associate of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and a campaign aide for several political figures, including Nelson A. Rockefeller, Robert F. Kennedy and Robert F. Wagner.

Mayor Abraham D. Beame appointed Mrs. Logan to head the Commission on Human Rights in 1977. During her two-year tenure she worked to stop the practice of redlining, by which banks and savings and loan institutions refuse to make mortgage loans to residents of certain areas. Efforts on West Side

Along with her husband, Dr. Arthur C. Logan, a surgeon, she was involved in efforts to stabilize the West Side as an integrated community during urban-renewal efforts there.

Mrs. Logan was a socially prominent fund-raiser who generated financial backing for both national and local civil-rights issues and causes, particularly those of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

Mrs. Logan was at one time the only Northern board member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. She also raised money for the Congress of Racial Equality and the Urban League.

In 1971 the Citizens Union presented Dr. and Mrs. Logan with awards for outstanding public service for their prominence in campaigning for civil rights and better public health.

During her career in show business she sang using the stage name Marian Bruce. In the 1940's and 1950's she starred in the first all-black show to be presented in a Miami Beach nightclub. She also sang in Europe.

Mrs. Logan's husband died previously. She is survived by her son, who lives in Manhattan, and a sister, Esther Harris of Philadelphia.
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postscript
Dr. Arthur Logan was Duke Ellington's personal physician. Both he and his wife were also close personal friends of Ellington. Legendarily, "The Duke," reportedly as "great" a hypocondriac as he was an artist (!), spent much of his down time "on the road" on the phone with Dr. Logan.

Marian Bruce appeared on half the tracks on Luther Henderson's MGM album, Last Night When We Were Young, and also a track or two on Clark Terry's Duke With a Difference. A fine singer!

Thursday, June 24, 2010

London in Japan


Julie and Don

For those of you who read Japanese, my Q & A with Julie London music director, Don Bagley, has just gone up on the EMI (Japan) Records website. An edited, journalized version of the interview appears in this month's (and, alas, the final issue of) Swing Journal (Japan) magazine. These were done in conjuction with the label's mass release of all of London's recorded material for the Liberty label. Some 30 discs. In Japan, of course. Heaven forfend that any record outfit in this country would see fit to carry out such an auspicious undertaking.