Second City Touring Group

The Second City Touring group visited us last Saturday night at the Simmons Center. The were lively and very funny. There were lots of skits, rehearsed and not, but the accent was on the improv. They used words and phrases from the audience to key a skit. I missed a few punch lines because of the audience noise and the piano background music but then, that's me. They are from left: Megan Hovde Wilkins Dana Quercioli Ross Bryant Edgar Blackmon

The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

Lost Gallery The rescue mission for battered and abused orphan photographs.

For more about Double Exposures see this page in Lost Gallery.

Music Monday - Seth Walker

Seth Walker. Friendly, personable, polite, musician, lyricist and composer. It was a privilege to attend the performance of a young man with such talent and blues heart. Another fine evening at the Simmons Center “Live and the Center” series. For something really special visit the Seth Walker Web Site and look around. It is excellent.

The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here. Who's taking care of the music? These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies

Chris Brubeck and Triple Play

Chris Brubeck and his group Triple Play perform perfection in Blue Rondo A La Turk. This was a fine show at the Simmons Center in our town Saturday night. Come again!

No Reason. I just thought it was clever. Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies

Live at the Center - Lander Ballard

Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

Live at the Center last night. Lander Ballard and George Graybill Lander Ballard presented an hour of music, last night, live at the Center. He sang and played original songs and familiar tunes from Clapton to the Beatles. He was assisted by George Graybill on bass. We enjoyed it very much. They were the opening act for No Justice, a rock band from Stillwater, Oklahoma. The rock band's set was loud and distorted, not geared for a small auditorium at all. The distortion blended the sounds into one strain. We couldn’t tell the drums from the bass and the three guitars were unidentifiable from the vocals. The words were almost completely obscured. We learned that the band preferred it that way at the sound check. Too bad.

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies

You shoulda been there! Janiva Magness

Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

She wore us out. What a voice. Janiva Magness served us the blues in style Saturday night at the Center. A natural. I am sure Ma Rainey and Big Mama Thorton are grinnin' ear to ear. If you aren't moved by that performance, you'd better check your pulse. Members of the Janiva Magness Band were: Benny Yee, keyboards, used to play with Coco Montoya's blues band and Elvin Bishop Rena (Pronounced "Rene") Beavers, drums, used to play bass guitar for Little Milton Gary Davenport, bass, a Beale Street veteran, several bands in Memphis Jacob W. Petersen, guitar, since 1999 long list of folks he's sat in with includes Taj Mahal, Steve Miller, Robert Cray, Pinetop Perkins, Lee Oskar

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies

Leon Russell

The Master of Space and Time plays. Rock Music is alive and doing quite well at the Simmons Center last night. From "Delta Lady" through "We're alone now and I'm singing this song for you." to "Great Balls of Fire!" Leon Russell plays with no break, almost no talk. It is steady music, hardly a pause even for applause. (And there was lots of that.) Thanks Leon. For the music and for the little story about Bob Dylan. And for digging "Hard Rain's Gonna Fall" out for a refreshing statement. And thanks for music so good it brought tears to my eyes, more than once. Thanks Leon. (Note: Here are some comments from my son-in-law Jeff who is Program Director for the "Live at the Center" program series.) Leon moves slowly because he was in two motorcycle accidents in the '80s in which both of his legs were severly injured. Plus, he is 65 and hasn't always treated his body like a temple! Something most people also don't know about him, which I noticed again when escorting him to and from the stage to his van - he was partially paralyzed on the right side at birth, which has left him with a right arm that just kind of hangs limp at his side when he walks. That affliction makes it even more amazing that he's a virtuoso on piano and guitar. The song the organist sang is "Rosie" by Jackson Browne. The organist and lead guitarist, by the by, have only been with Leon for 2 months, but I thought overall it was the best band he's had since the early '80s. Leon has always loved to cover Dylan songs and has done some of the most innovative remakes of Bob's songs. He's always done 1 or 2 in concerts but just hadn't done "Hard Rain" in public for a while. (He also did Dylan's "It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry" in Saturday's concert, which is one of his best Dylan covers.) Ironically, in the movie 'Remember the Titans," the soundtrack includes Leon's version of "Hard Rain" - it's played when the high school football players are taking an early-morning training run through the mist on the battlefield at Gettysburg. Our crowd was nearly 690, which meant about 60-70 empty seats, all of which belonged to season ticket holders. It's the second-largest crowd we've drawn for a concert since the CTAC took over the series in 2001. We knew some season ticket holders would have no interest in Leon and we also knew we were contending with Xmas parades in 4 area towns and OU playing football on TV. But the general admission ticket buyers turned out in force. We lost about 2 dozen people in the first half of the show because the music was too loud. And even the Leon Lifers who stayed on through the whole thing felt the music was right at the edge of being at an uncomfortable volume. What they don't know is that we spent extra money to bring in a technical experts from an OKC sound company who've worked Leon's concerts before, and they were able to control things enough that there wasn't any distortion. Leon has always loved to play loud, and after all, it is rock 'n' roll! Talk about reclusive: Leon had played in Fayetteville, Ark. on Friday night and they drove straight through to Duncan. They arrived about 8:30 a.m. and parked in back of the Simmons Center, and Leon didn't emerge from the van until 5 minutes before it was time to go on stage, then he immediately went back to the van after leaving the stage. He did, though, sign autographs at the van for people who ventured back - they just wouldn't let us announce that he was willing to do that. Fred, it was just like in Lawton: People handed their item to the bus driver, who took it in to Leon, who signed it and the bus driver returned it!! I still swear those autographs we got that night probably belonged to the bus driver!!!!! Aside from the 3 blues songs Leon sang, all of the other oldies were music by groups and artists with which he's been associated in the past as a touring partner, session musician, songwriter or producer. Leon has a long history of making social and political statements, especially on his first four albums. As reference, I'd suggest listening to the following: - 1969 album "Asylum Choir II" with Marc Benno. Cuts: "Sweet Home Chicago," "Down on the Base," "Tryin' to Stay Alive" and "Ballad for a Soldier," which is a truly biting shot at the war and military. - 1970 album "Leon Russell." The album introduced "A Song for You," but it also contained "Shootout On the Plantation," "Prince of Peace," "Give Peace a Chance" (Not the John Lennon song, but a Leon original that was popularized by Delaney and Bonnie) and "Roll Away the Stone." - 1971 album "Leon Russell & The Shelter People." Cuts: "Stranger in a Strange Land," "Of Thee I Sing," "Alcatraz" and a cover of George Harrison's "Beware of Darkness." Also has his versions of "Hard Rain" and "It Takes a Lot to Laugh." - 1972 album "Carney." Mainly a lot of fun and love songs, but the album did introduce "This Masquerade" and "Tightrope," his only top 10 solo song. It also includes "If The Shoe Fits," which is a terse bit of sarcasm directed at the music media and "Magic Mirror," one of the most introspective songs ever written. Ann, all of these cuts are still very relevant today, and if Fred doesn't have them, I do. OK, I guess I've revealed myself to be a total Leon Russell freak! But, hey, there are a lot worse things to be. My biggest thrill at the concert was that he was in good voice (at least, as good as can be expected), that he and the musicians said they had a good time and he was also more interactive with the audience than during any of the previous six concerts of his I've attended. Jeff Thanks Jeff. The "back" story is always a thrill.

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

Leon Russell!

Neener neener neener

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

Larry Gatlin and the Gatlin Brothers

Music Monday The Gatlin Brothers performed at our Simmons Center Auditorium October 31, 2007. They had just performed in Lawton in the Country/Jazz fusion concert. They decided to do a show in our town because we have such a nice theater. .. And well, because Larry Gatlin's wife is from here. It was a good show from some very professional showpeople. I enjoyed it very much. I used no flash and took lots of shots. There's plenty of light if I use a slow shutter speed and a fast ASA. I sometimes get blurry figures using available light but since I take all the photos from the same angle, (It's hard to change seats after the show has started.) it is easy to combine shots later to a final image. This is actually a composit of seven photographs. It is also important to note: Today in 1959, Ford motor company, on the advice of Abraham Lincoln, cancelled production of the Edsel. "You can fool some of the people..."

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.