Friday’s Weekly Round-Up – 350

January 26, 2018Simon Pettet

Jerry Aronson‘s definitive documentary DVD,  The Life And Times of Allen Ginsberg, has been noted on this site several times before, but it’s a must-see, must-view, and, on the occasion of a refurbishing of Jerry’s web-site, bears repeating/revisiting.

Archivist, poet, Randy Roark, remembers Allen’s response – “He saw a working copy at one point and, after it was over, said, “So that’s who I am?”

Aronson himself recalls,  “I showed Allen the finished film in 1992 when it was really done, and he had not watched much of it, and I was anxious, waiting for his response. When … Read More

Nicanor Parra (1914-2018)

January 24, 2018Simon Pettet

[“Nicanor Parra Anti-Poet, professor of Newtonian physics, University of Santiago Chile, my host a month 1960. We couldn’t get a cab downtown from his daughter Catalina on 110 St. N.Y.C. so took Subway to N.Y.U.– here  stopped between stations, September 5, 1984 – Nicanor Para Anti-Poet on Subway from 110 Street Broadway downtown to N.Y.U. September 5, 1984”- Photo: Allen Ginsberg]

Nicanor Parra, the great Chilean “anti-poet”, one of Latin America’s greatest poets and one of Allen’s dear beloved old friends, died today, it was announced earlier by the President, Michelle Bachelet, who described him as “a singular voice in … Read More

Friday’ s Weekly Round-Up – 284

September 9, 2016admin

[Allen Ruppersberg – from The Singing Posters – Allen Ginsberg’s Howl (Part 1 & 2) (2003) (detail) — from the work included in the exhibition Beat Generation – New York, San Francisco, Paris at the Centre Pompidou, Paris, France, June 22-October 3, 2016]

Jeremy Harding in the London Review of Books:

“In the Beat constellation, Allen Ginsberg’s star now shines more brightly than the rest…There would have been no Beat phenomenon without Ginsberg, logorrhoeic poet and protester, illustrious, predatory queer, inventor and supporter of colleagues and hangers-on, impresario and self-appointed hero of a tradition that he put together from all kinds … Read More

Friday’s Weekly Round-Up – 160

January 10, 2014admin

“To Allen Ginsberg”, Living Music‘s, long out-of-print, free-form, “acid-folk” “avant-jazz”, 1971 album, recorded for Italy’s RCA’s experimental imprint, “Free Dimension” and featuring the voice of Gianfranca Montedoro, the keyboards of Umberto Santucci, and the saxophone and flute of Umberto’s brother, jazz legend, Cicci Santucci, was recently re-released by the intriguing, inquisitive, Australian label, Light In The Attic Records, and is now available again on vinyl.   Here’s Bob Baker Fish, reviewing it on Cyclic Defrost – “This is a total freak oddity, a concept album from 1972 Italy made by a musical social experiment with tunes that evolve … Read More