Introduction

What is The New Yorker? I know it’s a great magazine and that it’s a tremendous source of pleasure in my life. But what exactly is it? This blog’s premise is that The New Yorker is a work of art, as worthy of comment and analysis as, say, Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” Each week I review one or more aspects of the magazine’s latest issue. I suppose it’s possible to describe and analyze an entire issue, but I prefer to keep my reviews brief, and so I usually focus on just one or two pieces, to explore in each the signature style of its author. A piece by Nick Paumgarten is not like a piece by Jill Lepore, and neither is like a piece by Ian Frazier. One could not mistake Collins for Seabrook, or Bilger for Galchen, or Mogelson for Kolbert. Each has found a style, and it is that style that I respond to as I read, and want to understand and describe.

Monday, November 28, 2022

Lynne Arriale Trio's Exquisite "Estaté"

The Lynne Arriale Trio’s “Estaté” haunts me. I can’t get it out of my head. I don’t want to. It’s an exquisite song – intensely romantic, deliciously blue. Composed in 1960 by Bruno Martino (lyrics by Bruno Brighetti), it became a jazz standard many years ago when João Gilberto recorded a catchy Bossa nova version of it in on his classic 1977 album Amoroso. There have been many renditions of it since. But, for me, the most compelling is the Lynne Arriale Trio’s version on their Live at Montreux (2000). The Trio consists of Lynne Arriale (piano), Jay Anderson (bass), and Steve Davis (drums). Arriale interprets it so ardently, so achingly. You can see the depth of her passion for it in a YouTube video of her Trio performing "Estaté," among other songs, at a 2005 concert in Stuttgart. Great as this Stuttgart variation is, I still prefer the earlier Montreux version. Oh to have been there in person to hear it. The album is the next best thing to being there. I love it.  

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2 comments:

  1. Guilherme MadeiraNovember 28, 2022 at 7:49 AM

    Hello John. Taking advantage of the reference to João Gilberto to recommend an excellent book by an excellent Brazilian writer: Ruy Castro´s “Bossa Nova: The Story of the Brazilian Music That Seduced the World”.

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    1. John MacDougallNovember 28, 2022 at 8:26 AM

      Hey Guilherme, how's it going? I wondered if that reference to Gilberto would catch your attention. Thanks for the book recommendation. Have a good day!

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