The Tatum FIles by S.G.Provizer

I'm sure this has been bruited about more than several times in the jazz blogs, but hell, the skies are dark and the wind is howling. So, the question is re-asked: To honor, worship and adore Art Tatum? My answer: I will honor and, in a limited sense worship, but not adore.  Yes; no one ever played "more" piano, but sometimes more says "too much." 

N.Y. Times Style Magazine: "...hardscrabble glamour." Steve Provizer

"Or maybe your granny (great-granny?) was a weathered-but-gorgeous sharecropper, a Dust Bowl refugee in frayed frock and battered boots, only-wait! what if those boots were splattered with glitter?"

Sunday New York Times Style Magazine, August 21, 2011

"Damn heels." Granny was trying to weed the beans when one of our gopher holes intervened. "Pa, I told you to flush out those varmints and fill up these holes!"

"Be right with you, sweetie. Just trying to see if these jeans are riding too high in the crotch. Too bad this mirror's got so many cracks in it. And you can hardly see anything in between the Prince Albert letters."

"Stop preening and get out here! God, my things are a mess. You'd think Gucci would find a way to keep the dust out of their purses."

"Stop frettin'. Next time I go to town I'll see what they have in the General Store."

"With that old nag laid up with the dropsy, it'll be a while before anyone gets in town."

"Damn, that means we wont be able to pick up this month's Harper's Bazaar."

"Oh, they've got nothing in there you haven't seen in Potato Grower's Weekly."

"Well, who's a little snippy? Just because that burlap frock of yours showed up in a J.C. Penney's ad."

"Like to know what Martha what's-her-name got for designing that."

"Honey, the day she can slop 3 pigs and do what you can do with a can of beans is the day I'll transfer my affection to that phony."

"You're sweet. Hand me that bucket of glitter, will you?

"Wait, you're not planning to...?"

"Yes I am, you old fuddy-duddy."

"But there's 12 coats of hand-applied lacquer on that vinyl. A dozen designers worked overtime to arrive at that shade of puce."

"I don't care, pa. It's mostly covered with cow manure anyway and I need a little brightening up."

"But glitter? It's so--louche!"

"Just because nobody else in the dust bowl has done it before doesn't make it a faux pas."

"Oh, honey, that's why I married you. (That and your pa's shotgun). You always were out in front of the rest of the pack."

"Like to see those rubes next door try to measure up to our standards."

"Too late now. They were taken away in chains by the sheriff after they missed their sharecrop payment."

"I know, I offered to lend her my Chanel suit for the trip to Leavenworth, but she just looked at me with a blank expression."

"Nothin' you can do about that. Most of these Okies couldn't tell the difference between Prada and Pravda."

"That's a good one, pa, but let's get going. If we move fast, we can patch that hole in the ceiling before the next tornado and still have time for that skin peel we promised each other."

"Honey, have I told you lately you're weathered but gorgeous?"

"Come on, lover. let's go have a closer look at the crotch on those jeans."

"Bad Jazz and Sports Art" By Steve Provizer

The recent announcement of a statue honoring Celtics great Bill Russell inspired a personal wave of public art paranoia and this expansion of an old post about Bad Jazz Art. Jazz has a special kinship with basketball and I wondered whether basketball heros, and the sport in general, have fared as badly in the world of statuary and art as has jazz. The Institute reports as follows:

Magic Johnson escapes from the clutches of an unidentifiable creature 
to direct traffic.

MJ sticks it just before the Mummy gets him

Rejected for the $20 Double Eagle goldpiece

Getting Ready to Jam

Maybe the 76'ers could use him.

Dali-Ball

And now, some of the jazz stuff...

And, public jazz statuary: Oscar Peterson, Louis Armstrong and Dizzy Gillespie.

I like this picture of Dr. J, who, although missing an arm, hasn't had the life sucked out of him.

Best of show: Doctah J.

Public art, on the other hand and almost by definition, is by committee. This is not a process that generally works in favor of art.

Maybe the best that can be hoped for is that the squadron of people tasked with the creation of the Bill Russell statue will lean toward user-friendliness. He was a guy noted for getting his hands dirty on the court and in the community. I hope the the statue that represents him is one that we appreciative citizens not only get to look at, but can touch. Maybe they can site it in a place where we'll be able to walk up, exchange a few words with #6 and hear his great cackling laugh.