Stephan Bormann Band

Each year more jazz CD’s are released than can be reviewed. As a result, it is not a surprise that the Stephan Bormann Band's Songs From a Small Room received very little critical attention when it was released in 2005 on the Ozella label, an independent company in Germany. A professor of guitar at Dresden’s University of Music, Bormann is currently a member of the duo Hands on Strings, which has released three CD’s in Germany and which also features Thomas Fellow. Songs From a Small Room is Bormann’s third recording as a leader.

Composed of Stephan Bormann on electric and acoustic guitar, Volker Schlott on alto and soprano saxophone, Mohi Buschendorf on double and electric bass, and Jens Dohle on drums, the Stephan Bormann Band performs original material composed by Stephan Bormann.

Similar to a first book of contemporary poetry, where the poet often tries on various styles, seemingly moving through several wardrobes of clothes, there are a range of styles on this CD, such as chamber jazz and elements of mid-1970’s jazz fusion. Even so, the music remains unique because of its adoption of several different styles, none of which dominate the album as a whole. Some of the details to listen for are the short guitar solo at the close of “Signals,” the saxophone solo on “(song from a) Small Room,” the call and response between guitar and saxophone on “(song from a) Small Room,” the saxophone solo in “Come With Me,” the bass solo and the special effects in “Journey into the Past,” and the bass solo on “Two Old People in a Maize Field.”

Although short at nearly 50 minutes, when some CD's now contain 60 or 70 minutes of music, this CD serves as an excellent introduction to these musicians. It’s unfortunate that this debut effort has not been supplemented with a more recent recording.

I discovered this CD at CD Baby when I was looking for something else, and eventually downloaded the CD from Amazon. It's music that can provide a capstone to an evening or that can break the monotony of a lengthy crosscountry drive. Of late, it’s the music that makes it possible to start writing up my grading comments for student essays.

Track Listing: Nordic Sky, Signals, Taste of Summer, Come With Me, (song from a) Small Room, five 4 two, Journey into the Past, Beyond the Horizon, Two Old People in a Maize Field.

Fall Color in Northeastern Kansas

With each passing year, I am becoming more reluctant to give up the summer. Autumn in northeastern Kansas came much too soon this year. I was enjoying the warm late summer nights and the incessant singing of the frogs, katydids, and crickets, announcing how much they enjoyed living their lives at that moment,when our weather drastically changed.



When I was in Manhattan, Kansas in mid-October for the festival of high school marching bands, I ended up wearing five layers because of the cold and strong wind. It took as many layers to remain warm the next day when I was at the Renaissance Festival in Kansas City.



I may have mentioned before that the Kansas City area is particularly pretty in the fall because of the changing leaves and in the spring because of the colorful blossoms from the magnolias, redbuds, and pear trees. This part of Kansas (and Missouri), which can get up to 40 inches of rain in a year, has more trees than are found farther to the west.



The oaks have lost most of their leaves already; they were the first trees to change color this year. I am adding a few pictures that I have taken over the past few weeks. Clicking on each picture will enlarge it.

Caught in the Middle: A Review

Richard C. Longworth in Caught in the Middle examines the decline of the Midwest and what the region can do to counteract the effects of globalism. Beginning in the 19th century, the Midwest served as the country’s industrial heartland. Since the 1970’s, however, many of the factories in this region have either reduced their workforce or have closed down entirely and moved their production lines overseas. These closings have devastated the region, causing many towns to lose their only major employer. Some of these towns, Longworth says, won’t survive much longer except as bedroom communities for those people willing to commute long distances. Only a few cities and towns have managed to thrive. Kalamazoo, for example, has seen new growth since the city, thanks to private donations, has financed a college education for its local high school graduates. Warsaw, Indiana, has survived by becoming the home for orthopedic manufacturers, something Longworth refers to as “clustering.” These success stories are exceptions. In some cases, a city or town looking to replace its industrial base attracts a meatpacking plant, which, instead of hiring the local population for a living wage, brings in immigrants from Mexico who are willing to work long hours for very little money. This influx of immigrants creates a whole series of financial problems for communities forced to provide essential services.

Longworth believes that certain changes will allow the states that make up this region to survive. He foresees a great deal of potential in biotech, particularly the production of ethanol, and biosciences, both of which involve “turning plants and animals into products that go far beyond food.” “Already,” he says, “about one quarter of the Midwest’s corn crop goes for ethanol production.” More than likely, at least half of the corn crop will be turned into ethanol, he adds. Longworth also believes that the biosciences, which has lead to major centers of research in cities like Chicago, Ann Arbor, and St. Louis, will continue to grow and will lead to new lines of production by major corporations like Cargill, Monsanto, and Eli Lilly. For the region to renew itself, Longworth believes that the region needs an educated workforce. The research and manufacturing he foresees will require advanced degrees and if the young people in this region don’t pursue a higher education, the workforce will be imported into the region. Longworth also foresees major growth in the region’s cities if they can attract what Longworth refers to as the “creative class,” the highly educated people who can create the new ideas needed by the region. These cities will need to lose their provincialism and embrace diversity and open-mindedness, things that the region has not previously promoted. This shift to an educated workforce will create large pockets of poverty in the region, causing those who formally held minimum wage jobs to flounder. Ultimately, Longworth advocates more cooperation among the states, including the elimination of individual states in favor of smaller regions that cross existing state lines. Longworth also exhibits a strong bias toward the Big Ten schools, believing that those institutions hold more hope for the region. He also advocates the elimination of duplicate college programs, believing that specialization is the only hope for the major educational institutions.

Longworth’s examination of this region would have been more complete if he had considered the ecological problems that the region will face. Increasing the amount of corn harvested to fuel the demand for ethanol will be accompanied with a greater reliance on pesticides. What consequences will occur when the soil will no longer sustain the yields that corporations like Cargill require? What will happen when the water becomes more heavily polluted? Longworth’s attitude toward water as something to be sold is revealed when he says that “water is the resource of the future, and the Great Lakes states need to be ready to exploit it.” This attitude will only result in another period of bust and one of more serious consequences when the land will not sustain the population and when the water has been polluted beyond hope or sold to cities like Los Angeles and Phoenix.

Ultimately, Longworth’s book is an important one because of its relatively thorough examination of one particular region. The Great Plains states need a similar study because they offer less hope and will experience more widespread devastation in the coming years.

Puzzlement

That entry devoted to a reclining nude, not the Lucian Freud painting itself but the links to Giorgione, Titan, and Manet, has been generating a lot of traffic. When I did an image search on Google for Giorgione’s Sleeping Venus, my blog doesn’t appear anywhere on the first fifteen pages. When I created that post, I expressed surprise at the money that Lucian Freud’s painting went for at auction, examined briefly the meaning behind the image, and articulated the convention of the reclining nude female in painting. Perhaps I should be pleased at the traffic that I'm getting. In researching this post, I have now realized that Google places my blog second in an image search for "reclining supervisor" and the image that accompanies the post is, ironically, Giorgione's Sleeping Venus. That error explains this mystery.