ClimbingSky

Why Baseball, Books, and the Grateful Dead matter

  • FOOD FOR THOUGHT FRIDAY: Sontag On Creating Your Own Space

    “You have to create your own space which has a lot of silence in it and a lot of books.”       — Susan Sontag Read more

  • THROWBACK THURSDAY: On Movies and Imagination

    Throwback Thursdays at ClimbingSky feature posts I wrote over a 15 year period for various blogs. This was first posted on March 25th, 2010 (so more than 16 years ago). I have always thought of movies as the laziest of arts. I do not mean their creation. I have seen movie sets. I know how many people it… Read more

  • MY JAZZ PROJECT: “Just the Beginning” by Armel Dupas Trio

    Album Just the Beginning Artist Armel Dupas Trio Year 2021 Personnel Armel Dupas (piano), Kenny Ruby (bass), with trio drummer Era / Style Contemporary Piano Trio Favorite Tracks Complete album experience First Listen Reaction An outstanding discovery that immediately became one of my favorite contemporary trio recordings. Atmosphere / Mood Tags intimate, spacious, warm, conversational,… Read more

  • FOOD FOR THOUGHT FRIDAY: Vonnegut on Saints

    You meet saints everywhere. They can be anywhere. They are people behaving decently in an indecent society.      – Kurt Vonnegut.  Read more

  • THROWBACK THURSDAY – “Names of Horses” by Donald Hall

    Throwback Thursdays at ClimbingSky feature posts I wrote over a 15 year period for various blogs. This was first posted on November 22, 2010 (so almost 16 years ago). Donald Hall is, unfortunately, an under-appreciated poet. While his prose works like LifeWork and Ancient Glittering Eyes represent his greatest strengths as a writer, he remains a marvelous poet. “Names of Horses” is… Read more

  • MY JAZZ PROJECT: “MIDNIGHT BLUE” BY KENNY BURRELL

    Album Midnight Blue Artist Kenny Burrell Year 1963 Personnel Kenny Burrell (guitar), Stanley Turrentine (tenor sax), Major Holley (bass), Bill English (drums), Ray Barretto (congas) Era / Style Soul Jazz / Blues Jazz / Guitar Jazz Favorite Tracks “Chitlins Con Carne,” “Midnight Blue,” “Soul Lament” First Listen Reaction LIVE RECORDINGImmediately welcoming; bluesy, relaxed, and deeply… Read more

  • FOOD FOR THOUGHT FRIDAY: Tolstoy on Respect

    “Respect was invented to cover the empty place where love should be.” — Leo Tolstoy Read more

  • THROWBACK THURSDAY – The Ruthless Range by Lewis Patten

    Throwback Thursdays at ClimbingSky feature posts I wrote over a 15 year period for various blogs. This was first posted on July 13th, 2010 (16 years ago). For the judging of contemporary literature the only test is one’s personal taste. If you much like a new book, you must call it literature even though you find no other soul… Read more

  • A Confession

    I am on Substack enough to know that there is a serious movement to discourage and ban any AI from creative work. But I need to confess this: I do use AI (in my case, Gemini) to proofread what I post here. The prompt I use is this: “Please edit the following for typos:” and… Read more

  • MY JAZZ PROJECT: One Track Analyzed (“Cigar Eddie” by Hadley Caliman)

    “Sometimes the songs that we hear are just songs of our own” ~cf. “Eyes of the World” by Robert Hunter & Jerry Garcia Just shy of 100 albums into my album-listening project—which I have come to call “My Jazz Project”—I find myself listening over and over this week to a single track: “Cigar Eddie” by… Read more