Does Your House Have Lions?

"One day in the late sixties, I was on the phone with Rahsaan and mentioned to him that just that day I bought a house.
He responded by asking, "Does your house have lions?"
I said, "What?"
He said, "Lions, you know like in front of a museum or the post office. You know, concrete lions. My house has lions. Get a house with lions."

--Joel Dorn

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

New Year, New Baby, New Blog Title....

Greetings everyone!  It's been a while since I've regularly updated this blog, so I thought I'd share why:

Each year, I commemorate Rahsaan's birthday in some way.  One year, I did a radio show.  Sometimes, I'll just listen to his music for most of the day.  A few summers ago I threw a birthday bash for Rah in honor of what would have been his 75th.  This year was quite different!  I gave birth to baby Johnny on the eve of Rah's birthday.  Johnny was born on August 6th, just four hours shy of the stroke of midnight.  And the crazy part is that I didn't plan it this way.  I didn't plan on having him to coincide with Rahsaan's birthday.  In fact, the due date was August 11th.  Sure, it would have been a nice twist for Johnny and Rahsaan to share August 7th, but it's better this way.  Johnny can have his own birthday party without his mama throwing a tribute to Rahsaan. 

Also, in anticipation of the new year, I decided to give the blog a facelift and a new title, which is the working title of the book.  The Man Who Cried Fire.  Whaddya think?

Cheers and happy holidays to everyone!

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Tonight

Rahsaan's last night on earth, and his last performance ever was 35 years ago tonight.

Though I haven't found any video clips from that night (if anybody has any footage, please let me know), here's one of my favorites:

Rahsaan Roland Kirk
August 7th, 1935-December 4th, 1977
R.I.P.

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

A Documentary about Rahsaan?

This is a no-brainer!  Donate, donate, donate, and fast!  The deadline is Dec. 3rd. 


Thursday, June 21, 2012

"Dorthaan's Place"

Here's a great interview with Dorthaan on JazzTimes.com.  Lots of cool stories about Rahsaan, Dorthaan's work at WBGO, and also some exciting news about Dorthaan's latest:  starting this fall, she will have her own room at NJPAC, called "Dorthaan's Place", where she will produce a monthly jazz brunch.

http://jazztimes.com/articles/30337-dorthaan-kirk-a-life-in-jazz

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Great footage but I especially love 14 minutes in when Rahsaan begins talking about Fats Waller

July 18, 1975 Montreux Jazz Fest

...I've seen excerpts of this video elsewhere, but it seems that the audio/video is usually off by a few seconds.  This one's in sync.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Astonishing footage of Rahsaan Roland Kirk

This is the first video I ever saw of Rahsaan--the footage that sent me down the rabbit hole fifteen years and began my journey of writing a book about him. If there's another musician, living or dead, who could do what he did, let me know because I haven't found them yet.