From Da List -- Santos: Skin to Skin

     . . . . Pardon my delay in getting this out, but I wanted y'all to know that tonight (Thursday. Nov. 17)-- at 8 pm eastern, from New Orleans!  Postmambo Movie Night proudly presents a special virtual screening of Santos: Skin to Skin, 

 a new feature-length documentary -- still making the festival rounds -- about our colleague, percussion master John Santos, followed by a conversation with filmmakers Kathryn Golden and Ashley James, as well as Mr. Santos himself.

You need to be on the parallel [seminar] list to attend.  If you aren't already on it and want to attend, just send me an e-mail with the word [seminar] in the subject line.

The Zoom link goes out at 6 pm eastern. Thanks! 

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Whew, it's cold!  But not anywhere near as cold as it is back up in NY.  Worse They Say Buffalo and Watertown are probably getting 4 feet of snow between today and Sunday.

Postmambo Colombia Music Seminar - Trailer. And HORSES!

      . . . .  I keep forgetting to put up the trailer for the Postmambo Colombia Music Seminar, which is coming right up.

People are so looking forward to this trip, for a multiple of reasons.  As activities are outdoors, the restaurants are open sites, travel within the area will be open to air, and the group is small enough that people can can move --masked -- in separate vehicles -- people feel secure.  The weather is terrific now too.

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     . . . . It's been non-stop busy here.  Even this weekend of splendid weather -- about to break for the more usual July of 90+ temperature and humidity -- it was a small, local arts community in New Jersey, with its own gorgeous theater, where the organization provided a showing of Tierra Sagrada to its community.  Trying to decide whether to go to Lisbon in the fall, for the annual WOMEX conference, where Tierra Sagrada will be part of the film festival.  Plus there was the 4th of July uptown in our friends courtyard garden, el V's bd at the Metropolitan Museum of Art where we got to view the just opened exhibit, Chroma: Ancient Sculpture in Color.  These were reconstructions of pieces that we've always seen a white and bare of any color at all.  On occasion, the original, as we have it, was shown next to the reconstructed color pieces.  I took this occasion to use the Android's camera for the first time.

Northern Bowman, Persian or Scythian

The city's exploding with music events, with musicians coming in from Latin America, particularly.  Last night it was Brasil, at Central Park's Summer Stage.  It was the most successful event the series has had so far this summer.

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     . . . . Non stop anxiety here due to the raging covid numbers, and the fool of a mayor who succeeded the previous fool of a mayor.  All the officials gravely intone -- finally forced to admit that the numbers in the hospitals alone has us in extreme high risk category for infection -- we should maybe consider wearing masks indoors.  We are surrounded by people having to deal with this, while their beloved relatives are in hospital with other conditions and then contract covid from the staff, and they are not allowed, then, to see their relatives.  Which means they can't keep monitoring how their relatives are being treated.  In one case, there is a doctor who insists on giving the patient an epilepsy med.  She doesn't have epilepsy, and it turns her into a zombie -- and thus incapable of protesting anything they do or don't do for her.  Why yes, we just received two new boxes of high quality masks from amazilla.

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      . . . . Non stop rage and despair on most other fronts.  What fools -- when not just outright evil, which there is no doubt most of them are  -- these jerkwaddies who have counted coup on the country, and what greater fools are us, who have allowed it and done nothing.

A map of Persia, indicating major settlements, regions, and mountain ranges, as well as the march of the Ten Thousand (dotted line).

     . . . . I take consolation from Xenophon's Anabasis -- the March of the 10,000 -- and Tom Holland's Persian Fire: The First World Empire and the Battle for the West (2005 -- so author's filled with 9/11 Clash of Empires interpretation of everything).

Additionally, I have become immersed in the splendid novel, Grand Hotel Europa, from Dutch author, Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer, originally published in Europe in 2018, and translated and published here this last month. The presiding genius of Grand Hotel Europa is Clio, as the lost lover, muse of European history, particularly Italy and Central Europe's. Though not exactly historical fiction, it's difficult to imagine someone who takes historical fiction seriously not being at the very least intrigued by the novel.  It's very long, so I fear its beguiling aspects may begin to pale at a certain point, but if this is the case, I have not yet reached that point.  Michele Hutchisson's translation fulfills the shimmering, yet transparent beauty of the prose, which wins as much admiration as the reader can provide.

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     . . . . Watching Indian historical epics, during long hot nights, which not only sends me constantly looking at my World Atlas -- such a huge book, it is fortunate the bed is near my screen -- while marveling at the integration of elephants as not only known and usual, but essential elements of the societies in such a variety of ways -- but teaching me about a whole new breed of horse, the curly-eared Marwari warhorse.

These horses appear to have been bred originally -- perhaps starting in the 13th-4th centuries, post the Mongolian-Turcic conquests of Central Eurasia -- in northwestern India, crossing some Arab stock with 'native' equines and the horses of the Mughuls and the  Khanates.  They became signature horses of the various northern kingdoms such as Jodhpur (Marwar) region of Rajasthan, and by the 17th century then, the horse of the kingdoms of Maratha Empire, which at its zenith covered all of Central India, most of the western seacoast, the Doab, that fertile land between the Ganges and its greatest tributary, the Yamuna.  I think it was the Brits who called it "Hindustan."

These horses, while large and powerful, thus warhorse, also need far less water and forage than most horses.  This is more than useful for an empire that encompasses extensive desert and rough infertile ground. The mares typically are larger than the stallions.  They have loyal and courageous natures, are said they would not leave their rider even when he was killed in battle.  It is also said that when engaging an army that used war elephants, fake elephant trunks would be fastened to their bridles, which confused the elephants into thinking the horses were baby elephants, allowing the riders to attack the elephant unexpectedly. The favorite coat for the cavalry warhorse is said to have been 'pinto', as we see in the painting above.

So it is again, when all else fails, horses still give me delight.

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     . . . . Listening via streaming to a Cali, Colombia radio station.  It is all over the music festival Postmambo will be attending, among other activities.  The things we can do these days ....

Postmambo Seminars Presents

June 16, 8 pm Eastern, Postmambo Movie Night presents:

Elder's Corner, directed by Adesiji Awoyinka, who will join us on Zoom for conversation afterward. From the press kit:

    From the colorful, celebratory sounds of Juju to the politicized urgency of Afrobeat, Nigerian musicians have spearheaded some of Africa's most prominent musical movements. Oftentimes, their work formed the backdrop against which the nation blossomed. So what happened to the pioneering artists who rose to prominence during the country's halcyon years - and continued to endure when it faltered?

If you haven't been to a Postmambo Movie Night before, here's how we do it. It's easier to do than it is to describe. 

    1) We assemble on Zoom, then migrate as a group to Vimeo to watch the movie.  (I'll give you the Vimeo link in the Zoom chat.)

    2) Once we're on Vimeo, I give the 5-4-3-2-1 countdown, and we all start watching in sync. When it's over, we migrate back to Zoom.

==>Please be on time. (It's hard to sync you in if you don't start with us.) Log in before 8 pm Eastern, please.

This is really easy, but occasionally people who don't have experience with these platforms encounter problems. We don't want anyone excluded! If you don't think you have the tech savvy, or want to do a tech check beforehand, e-mail me and we'll get together privately and talk you through it. 

**************** HOW TO DONATE ***************

You don't have to pay to attend. Don't feel bad if you can't. But we can only continue if we are supported, so we very much appreciate your donation of any size. We're self-funding, so your participation is crucial. I suggest a contribution of $15 for this one event, or $150 to express ongoing support for the series, but we'll happily accept whatever amount you can donate.  Payment options:

1) Zelle. This is our preferred way to receive money, if your bank offers it. Tell them to send it to postmambo@gmail.com.  (It will ask you to confirm by showing you the name PLEAS.)

2) Paypal (be sure to check "sending to a friend" or else they charge a commission): ned@qbadisc.com

3) cashapp $nedsublette

4) Venmo @Postmambo-Studies

4) Paper check via USPS.  E-mail me and I'll send the info. 

Thank you if you have donated, y'all know who you are, and once again -- thank y'all for making our sessions possible.

* * *
July 14: Postmambo Sessions presents a conversation with Dr. Gerald Horne, Moores Professor of History at the University of Houston and author of more than three dozen books, including Jazz and Justice: Racism and the Political Economy of the Music (Monthly Review Press, 2019). I might also have to ask him about his new one, The Counter Revolution of 1836: Texas slavery & Jim Crow and the roots of U.S. Fascism (International Publishers, 2022).

August 11: Postmambo Sessions presents a conversation with T.J. English, historian of organized crime and devoted music fan who co-led our beyond-splendid 2019 Havana Nocturne Postmambo Cuban Music Seminar based on his best-selling book of the same name. We'll talk about his brand-new title (pub date Aug. 2) Dangerous Rhythms: Jazz and the Underworld.

* * *

Come with us!  There's still time to join us, but it's coming up soon.  August 15-22: Postmambo is off to the Pacific region of Colombia for the Postmambo Colombian Music Seminar with co-host Dr. Michael Birenbaum Quintero. It's time to register and book that flight.  Trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-Xk-CQGtMA

Feb. 1-6, 2023: For the Funk Of It, live in New Orleans. Registration is open now. Write me . . .

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Long Time Gone: Emergence

      . . . . It's May 7th!  Nor has there been a post here since last month, on the 14th.  I guess . . . things just happen . . . or don't happen?

True, a great deal has happened, while it continues to feel as though nothing is happening -- which that latter is untrue, that nothing is happening, because a lot has gone down and is happening  and is going to happen, from dental appointments to planning the end-of-June trip to . . .  Miami . . . in fulfillment of the grant provided to perform discographic research in the Diaz-Ayala Collection.  Not one's preference for first plane trip in 16 months, etc., but one goes where the materials are, when creating a syllabus for a Discography Studies, a program that has never ever existed. 

Next week Postmambo and NOLA Reconnect host, in cooperation with The New Orleans Center for the Gulf South and University of California, Berkeley- American Studies, A Conversation With Gwendolyn Midlo Hall:

Haunted by Slavery: A Southern White Woman in the Freedom Struggle

Thursday, May 13, 2021 / via Zoom / 8 pm Central Daylight Time (9 pm Eastern)

Invite link: https://tulane.zoom.us/j/93931683186?pwd=bEcrMFhUYUMzajBTWnRJdVpkMklXdz09

Please join us in celebrating together with pathbreaking historian Dr. Gwendolyn Midlo Hall the publication of her long-awaited memoir, Haunted by Slavery: A Southern White Woman in the Freedom Struggle.

From the Haymarket press release:

The memoir of Gwendolyn Midlo Hall offers today's activists and readers an accessible and intimate examination of a crucial era in American radical history.  

 Born in 1929 New Orleans to left-wing Jewish parents, Gwendolyn Midlo Hall's life has spanned nearly a century of engagement in anti-racist, internationalist political activism. In this moving and instructive chronicle of her remarkable life, Midlo Hall recounts her experiences as an anti-racist activist, a Communist Party militant, and a scholar of slavery in the Americas, as well as the wife and collaborator of the renowned African-American author and Communist leader Harry Haywood.

    Telling the story of her life against the backdrop of the important political and social developments of the 20th century, Midlo Hall offers new insights about a critical period in the history of labor and civil rights movements in the United States.

    Detailing everything from Midlo Hall's co-founding of the only inter-racial youth organization in the South when she was 16-years-old, to her pioneering work establishing digital slave databases, to her own struggles against cruel and pervasive sexism, Haunted by Slavery is a gripping account of a life defined by profound dedication to a cause.

Produced by NOLA Reconnect, Postmambo Studies, and CubaNOLA Arts Collective, in association with the New Orleans Center for the Gulf South at Tulane University and the University of California at Berkeley American Studies. Admission is free.

Then there's always Postmambo Movie Night, which needs a lot of attention to set-up so the subscribers can have a smooth experience.

We're embarked upon planning and organizing a major move of books and music materials out of the apartment, which includes the use of professionals of all sorts. And the shredder.  I'm selling all the sf/f to a group who do very well with pop-up used bookshops in Brooklyn; they are desperate for stock.  Certain research groups will be kept, but more of them are going to be sold off, as how things are now we can't even access them, and it's highly unlikely we'll be writing any more books on these topics either.

Shopping / errands take a lot of time. My latest is shopping for a tablet, as the small computer is reaching the very end of its life.  It will be nice to have something that small, light and portable on which I can download books from the library and write and receive e-mail and have access to the internet.

We've also been very carefully initiating a slight approximation of social life, so far only with friends we know with absolute certainty are fully vaccinated, and who are doing the same. It has been very difficult to do this, which came as a shock. Thus this sense that nothing is happening.  Fortunately it seems just about everyone we know is going through this too, so we all understand each other, and there are no hurt feelings.  We'll get there certainly by the time it is warm enough to be comfortably outside at night.  None of us has any desire to meet in covid sheds or inside the restaurants.

It all feels just as weird now and hard to comprehend as it did a year ago at this time, but weird in a different way. Then we were closed down, really closed down, including a curfew. No covid sheds, no restaurant service at all except pick-up/take-out.  No library grab and go. No doctor appointments except emergencies, very emergency emergencies. Now we are very slowly attempting to come out of our cave-bubble, go shopping in real stores -- why yes, even with the tablet I've done research / comparison shopping places like Best Buy and in Apple (where one must have an appointment, as well as a mask in order to enter), buying jeans, since those from over a year ago fall off now, t-shirts and so on. 

Though the right dish drainer remains, evidently an impossibility. Moreover any place that has dish drainers has only a single variety, and it invariably is too small, is not wrongly designed for my space, which isn't, let me emphasize, is not a weird space for a dish drainer.  Cannot find one with a drainage tray that faces the right direction, fits the space, is not attached to the dish rack, large enough, no matter what.  I'm on the third one, which el V brought home the other day, and sure 'nuff, he didn't check, and the drain tray faces the wrong direction. 

But all around us, from Canada and Michigan to Mexico and Latin America, India and other places, the virus is burning down the house and a new variant seems to emerge every day -- while here the mayor and the governor race to be the one to open up the most the fastest and first w/o any restrictions of any kind -- and bring back All The Tourists, at least "36 million by the end of 2021."  One of the attractions?  Get a free vaccination injection, just walk in and probably get a Broadway ticket as swag.  This while pedestrian deaths from speeding cars, bicycles and scooters is already higher by this month than it has been in decades.

Now tell me this isn't weird.

New Orleans! Survived Again! See You On The Second Line!

  . . . .Announcing NOLA Reconnect, a virtual visit to New Orleans and Acadiana, Oct. 2-4, 9-11, 16-17, 2020 -- video trailer just uploaded.

NOLA RECONNECT

A VIRTUAL VISIT TO NEW ORLEANS

A POSTMAMBO MUSIC SEMINAR

OCTOBER 2-4, 9-11, 16-17, 2020

VIDEO TRAILER HERE

INTIMATE, INTERACTIVE VISITS

WITH LIVE SOCIALLY DISTANCED MUSIC BY

(confirmed so far / in alphabetical order)

SHAMARR ALLEN

JAMES ANDREWS

JOHN BOUTTÉ

DAVID GREELY

COREY LEDET

DELFEAYO MARSALIS

LEYLA McCALLA

SOUL CREOLE TRIO

STANTON MOORE TRIO

HERLIN RILEY

SPECIAL GUEST FROM DETROIT

JOHN SINCLAIR w/ MARK BINGHAM

and

JASON BERRY

RICHARD CAMPANELLA

LOLIS ERIC ELIE

INA J. FANDRICH

MICHELLE N. GIBSON, THE ARTIST

LILY KEBER

BLACK FEATHER CHIEF COREY RAYFORD

NED SUBLETTE

MIA X

MORE NAMES TO BE ANNOUNCED

WRITERS, SCHOLARS, CHEFS, CHOREOGRAPHERS, AND MORE

ZOOM Q + A CALLS WITH ALL PRESENTERS / YOU ASK THE QUESTIONS

Produced by Ned Sublette for Postmambo +

Ariana Hall for CubaNOLA Arts Collective

REGISTRATION IS OPEN NOW,

CLOSES SEPTEMBER 30

THERE IS NO WEBSITE.  WRITE FOR PRICES AND OTHER INFORMATION: postmambo@gmail.com

* * *

AN OPEN LETTER FROM POSTMAMBO FOUNDER

NED SUBLETTE

September 16, 2020

“We can do it virtual,” said Ariana.

Back in March, the you-know-what forced us to cancel For the Funk of It, our first Postmambo New Orleans Music Seminar. That was a blow to my small company. Fully subscribed with 50 or so travelers, this group trip to New Orleans was gonna be the big one. For five years Postmambo had specialized in immersive, educational musical experiences on the ground in Cuba. This was to be our debut in the great music city of New Orleans.

We reanimated in July, after the initial shock of the pandemic had passed, when our distinguished producer on the ground in New Orleans, Ariana Hall of CubaNOLA Arts Collective, proposed doing a virtual visit instead. When our travelers said they were interested, we raced to make it real. And now we’re offering it to the public.

It’s all taking place over the first three weekends of October -- Oct. 2-4, 9-11, and 16-17 – with sessions in the afternoons and on Friday and Saturday nights. (Since it’s still hurricane season, rain dates are Oct. 23-24.) If you want to come with us, now’s the time to register. Registration closes September 30, so hurry!

* * *

Things are bad for musicians right now in New Orleans, but there’s a lot going on during this lockdown.

This is a time to communicate. This is a time to support NOLA music and culture.

NOLA Reconnect. An interactive immersion in New Orleans, with a side trip to Acadiana. Intimate, shortish sets by major musical figures just for us, followed by Q & A, plus talks and gatherings with socially distanced writers, historians, cultural practitioners, food experts, and choreographers.

We’re still confirming participants, but as of right now we have confirmed (in alphabetical order):

*) performance by

SHAMARR ALLEN

JAMES ANDREWS

JOHN BOUTTÉ

DELFEAYO MARSALIS

LEYLA MCCALLA

STANTON MOORE TRIO

w/ JAMES SINGLETON + DAVID TORKANOWSKY

HERLIN RILEY

MORE NAMES TO BE ANNOUNCED!

*) Acadiana with

DAVID GREELY

COREY LEDET

SOUL CREOLE TRIO

*) special guest from Detroit JOHN SINCLAIR performing a new poem commissioned for the occasion, accompanied by MARK BINGHAM in Breaux Bridge.

*) interactions with artists, scholars, and practitioners, including

JASON BERRY

RICHARD CAMPANELLA

INA J. FANDRICH

LILY KEBER

BLACK FEATHER CHIEF COREY RAYFORD

NED SUBLETTE

*) cooking with

LOLIS ERIC ELIE

MIA X

*) dance with

MICHELLE N. GIBSON, THE ARTIST

MORE NAMES TO BE ANNOUNCED

info: postmambo@gmail.com

Even though we can’t wait to get back to physical travel, we’ve gotten excited about the new possibilities that virtual offers. These are not simply livestreams. It’s not TV. Every event is participatory, with live Q&A. And it’s not anonymous – we’re a group that talks to each other. New Orleans artists are exploring solutions for how to project their culture into the new social distance. Historians will help us frame our understanding of the city’s times and spaces. At night, there’ll be virtual cocktail parties -- we'll coach you on making a Sazerac -- so we can compare notes and hang.

Tired of long hours on the screen? So are we. We’re trying to improve the virtual experience. Concise and dense is our esthetic, and we’ll take long breaks to get the blood moving again.

Until we can travel freely again, Postmambo is a media company. In our first meeting with tech director Chris Butcher, he said (I’m paraphrasing): whatever happens with live music and whatever happens with the pandemic, virtual’s here to stay.

Chris is right. This is only the beginning. The tools are going to keep getting better. We have ideas. After we produce and evaluate this, we’ll announce our next offerings.

Programs are only available with full subscription to the entire eight days. No day passes, no à la cartes. But we’ll have a passworded archive up for three months afterwards so that registered travelers who miss a program can catch up.

Write for prices. I won’t lie, it’s not cheap. It can’t be. This is a live interactive experience custom-produced for our seminar group. We can’t keep giving music away and expect to pay the artists, producers, and support personnel. We’re at an “inflection point” not only in our terrifying present-day politics and social disintegration, but also in affirming that cultural work has value, and that artists deserve to be paid.

Reconnect with New Orleans together with us, virtually. It’s not a large group. We have room for you! Happy to answer any questions.

info: postmambo@gmail.com