Sometimes, disparate qualities converge and result in a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Culture, taste and sensibility expand and contract and we find ourselves mere leaves floating along their tempestuous currents. Then for one shining instant the most unlikely of elements collide to form a molecule of something distinctive and in its way the embodiment of that moment's perfections, flaws and incongruencies.
From one such happy accident came this gorgeous moment frozen in amber. Al Bowlly would have a rough time making it in the professional music circuit of today with its idiotically Hollywood standards. Monia Liter's brilliant technique on the old 88's might fare slightly better but only just. But they were here at the moment meant for them, and they did what they were born to do, and in so many ways, they are the very embodiment of one of the most brilliant epochs in the evolution of the music of our species.
Find your moment and be in it.
Dare to sing, even if it's not perfect, or correct or anyone else's ideal-- someone out there wants to hear you sing.
From Wikipedia:
Albert Allick 'Al' Bowlly (January 7, 1899 – April 17, 1941) was a popular British Jazz singer in the United Kingdom during the 1930s, making more than 1,000 recordings between 1927 and 1941. Bowlly was born in Mozambique to Greek and Lebanese parents who met en route to Australia and moved to South Africa. He was brought up in Johannesburg, South Africa. He was killed by the explosion of a parachute mine outside his apartment in Jermyn Street, London during the Blitz.
2 comments:
Very nice!
I wonder if this was a kinescope from an early British TV show.There were four camera angles; easy in video, hard in film.
The breadth and depth of your taste continues to amaze, Phlegmmy. And to amuse, in the best sense of the word, as well. Thanks!
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