I have some odd interests. Two are the Sun Ra Arkestra (the legendary jazz commune/band) and East Germany (the former country). I was reminded that these two interests once intersected by the Ra blog Adventure-Equation last weekend. In trying to sort out the band’s (often label-less) records and tapes that were sold at its shows, the blog mentioned a 1986 performance that was “also broadcast, unedited, on East German TV in 1988, as two 45-minute shows.” That merry band of space pranksters? Broadcast to the East Germans before the Berlin Wall opened? Hilarious! (This clip may be from the same East German concert, to judge from the banner at the back of the stage.)
I imagine a portly East Berlin bachelor getting home from his shift on the S-Bahn, turning on his Robotron Radeberg Combi-Vision RF3301 television set to the Sun Ra concert and saying, “What can this possibly portend?” I’m not implying that Sun Ra and the Arkestra were responsible for the fall of Communism and the opening of the Berlin Wall, but the timing is curious.
Harvey Dickson @'NY Times'
BIG congrats to Yotte (of this parish) for his truly wonderful Sun Ra blog making the NYT!!!
I imagine a portly East Berlin bachelor getting home from his shift on the S-Bahn, turning on his Robotron Radeberg Combi-Vision RF3301 television set to the Sun Ra concert and saying, “What can this possibly portend?” I’m not implying that Sun Ra and the Arkestra were responsible for the fall of Communism and the opening of the Berlin Wall, but the timing is curious.
Harvey Dickson @'NY Times'
BIG congrats to Yotte (of this parish) for his truly wonderful Sun Ra blog making the NYT!!!
Thanks Mona!
ReplyDeleteI had a dream about you last night (actually, only about 2 hours ago). True!
In it, you came by my house and met the family.
Then there was an earthquake.
You helped pick up a few things that had fallen over and we talked a minute while I put on my shoes to leave for work.
Weird and mundane, eh? - the story of my life!