Matthew Barney’s ‘Secondary’ at His Long Island City Studio

Matthew Barney’s Secondary, a five-channel video installation, is now showing at his studio in Long Island City through June 25.

Secondary comes four years after Matthew Barney’s last large-scale exhibition, 2019’s Redoubt. Like its predecessor, Secondary features movement-based narrative in addition to materials- and aural-based elements. It’s also short (for Barney): one hour, though it does benefit from multiple viewings. Here Barney again collaborates with composer Jonathan Bepler. Also, notably, top creative billing is shared with movement director David Thomson, indicating the enhanced importance of dance and movement to Secondary compared to Barney’s earlier pieces.

A synopsis, excerpted from the exhibition’s website, is as follows:

Secondary maps two different narratives onto each other, using movement as the formal through-line. The first describes the complex overlay of violence and spectacle inherent in American football, and more broadly within American culture. Barney’s personal involvement in the sport served as a starting point for the development of this project. The extreme physical and psychological conditions of the game have been abstracted in Barney’s art practice since his earliest work, and now provide a context for this subject that is both retrospective and a new, direct engagement.

The significant risk of the game became clear, and made a lasting impression on Barney as a young player, through an incident that took place in a professional football game on August 12, 1978 where Jack Tatum, a defensive back for the Oakland Raiders, delivered an open field hit on Darryl Stingley, a wide receiver for the New England Patriots. Stingley was left paralyzed. The impact, and Stingley’s resulting catastrophic injury, became mythic in scale through its relentless replay in sports media. It was also a watershed case for the reform of rules protecting the bodies of athletes, which remains a polemic in football today, now gathering critical mass in the media. Secondary’s underlying plotline examines these charged aspects of football—and, specifically, Barney’s memory of that play in 1978—through a movement vocabulary that focuses on each element of the game, from drills to pre-game rituals to the moments of impact. It seeks to explore the complicated overlay of actual violence and its currency as image within the sport and the culture at large.

The parallel narrative in Secondary is a material-based choreography where the substances Barney uses to make sculpture—lead, aluminum, terracotta, and plastic, all in various states of liquidity—are generated, formed, and manipulated by the performers in real time. These materials speak to qualities of strength, elasticity, fragility, and memory, and each, in its own way, embodies a character. The athletes cast in Secondary are played by professional dancers and by Barney, and they range broadly in age, but with an emphasis on older bodies.

Matthew Barney

Secondary was filmed in and around Barney’s warehouse studio, which also serves as the exhibition space. Between producing the work and opening the space for public exhibition, the studio has been cleared of tools, materials, and associated ephemera, leaving an open expanse that more resembles an athletic facility than an atelier. While viewing the film, one sees an earlier version of the same site put to different use. Mr. Barney has demurred in the past when repeatedly presented with the prospect of River of Fundament (and other works) being examples of gesamtkunstwerk (“total work of art”), principally because Barney also associates that term with the artist building the “container” in which the work is presented—his primary example being Richard Wagner’s Bayreuther Festspielhaus, which was built to the composer’s specifications and exclusively stages his works to this day. That said, while Barney didn’t build the warehouse in which Secondary was filmed and presented, he is responsible for manipulating said container to meet his purposes. Per his stated usage of the term, Secondary comes much closer to realizing a gesamtkunstwerk than his earlier pieces. (Whether or not he would agree with that is another matter. Probably not.)

Amid the vast gray setting of steel, concrete, and support columns is a large, strikingly colorful field of artificial turf, in the center of which is the Field Emblem, an idée fixe from throughout Barney’s oeuvre that in the past he has specifically related to football. Hanging above the field is a three-sided jumbotron, similar to that which one would see at a professional sporting event. Additional screens are also placed near each of the field’s corners, much like the screens placed throughout an arena or stadium. Floodlights are mounted to establish the field as the central focal point. To one side is a makeshift press box of sorts and to the other is a row of benches. Viewers are welcome to watch the screens from the field, the benches, or to walk around and change perspective throughout the 60-minute duration (the length of a football game, without breaks or stoppages).

The film plays across five screens simultaneously: the jumbotron shows the same feed on each of its three sides, and the other four screens vary throughout—sometimes showing different perspectives of the same scene, sometimes showing different scenes entirely, and other times synchronizing either in pairs or across four or all five screens. Hence the film promoting repeated viewings. I was present for multiple screenings and saw several new things each time. Additionally, each screen has its own sound feed, adding another layer that phases in and out of sync.

matthew barney secondary
Viewers watch in the arena / exhibition space

Though abstracted, familiar rituals play out. First we see the various participants prepare: athletes train and warm up; the owner facilitates the site; fans excitedly await the game; referees consult one another; everyone gets in place (the teams and referees take the field; the owner goes to the press box; fans gather around); the national anthem is given focused attention; the game is played; the fans leave; the site resets for the next contest. The assorted preparations constitute a majority of the film, but they gradually build narrative tension, as the viewer knows that the game and injury will eventually occur, but not when or how. Also, it’s not unlike a real athletic regimen: most of the time is spent in preparation and maintenance—training, running drills, practicing maneuvers—and is punctuated by the occasional game (or race or event, etc.), particularly in professional American football which follows a roughly weekly game schedule during its regular season.

Throughout approximately the first half of the film, bodies work solo, in concert with one another, and in dialogue with materials. Various actions, from routine movements such as throwing a ball and assorted calisthenics to repetitive head trauma, are deconstructed by performers David Thomson, Shamar Watt, Raphael Xavier, Wally Cardona, Ted Johnson, and Matthew Barney. Similarly, numerous materials are physically engaged: tubing, garbage bins, polycaprolactone (PCL), clay, a muddy trench. Just as a game showcases, at least in part, much of the preparation that has gone into it, the game in Secondary—including the national anthem as the opening act— is where all of the pieces come together. It features movement (solo and in concert), music (solo and in concert), and materials (in various stages of rigidity). The game is also the first time we see all performers (athletes, officials, fans, etc.) in the same space and interacting to some degree as a group. Tension is heightened by finally bringing the two teams into direct confrontation, as they’ve been presented as training separately up until this point (though all within the studio and sometimes near one another).

One noteworthy fact about the the six performers who portray the athletes is that most of them don’t have backgrounds playing football. (Barney, who played football while at Yale, has woven athleticism generally and football specifIcally through much of his output.) I highlight this because Barney generally prefers practitioners over actors—in this case, one would assume a football player. That said, by selecting movement artists, the performers were able to home in on specific movements and actions divorced from the context of a specific game or sport. A film ostensibly about football, at least in one regard, does not show a literal sequence one would see in an actual game of football, yet it powerfully conveys a message about such all the same. (I’m reminded of Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, an opera about a song contest yet lacking a single unbroken aria.) However because the game is so ubiquitous in America, most people have at least a passive familiarity with the sport, its presentation, and its actions. Secondary does include one actor: Thomas Kopache as Raiders owner Al Davis. His expressive gaze haunts the film, particularly during the national anthem.

Because the subject is so familiar, it can be approached indirectly and still be legible to a wider audience. Consequently, Secondary is the most accessible of Barney’s major works, at least in recent years. While not mainstream by any means, the subject matter, length, and overall presentation (playing in a loop in an open gallery) are likely to be more welcoming than scheduled screenings of feature-length (or longer) works about the cosmic hunt or bespoke Egyptian mythology or the like. While it does lack explicit imagery, a foreboding sense of violence—immediate, psychological, cultural—permeates much of the running time.

Composer Jonathan Bepler shapes a compelling sonic experience. Like Redoubt, the music and sound here are more complementary and decorative as opposed to a shared centerpiece, as with the operatic River of Fundament. However, a noteworthy change in Secondary is that, I believe, a vast majority of the music and sound has a diegetic source. (It may be occasionally treated after the fact, but “external” sounds are rare.) While there may be seemingly non-diegetic instances—e.g., hearing sounds from one screen while looking at another, or seeing vocalizations begin with one character while the camera cuts to another character—there is little-to-no semblance of an external score. As with the film and the site, the music is contained within the film’s universe itself. Save some percussive elements made corporeally or with found objects, much of the rest of the score is vocal, particularly in the vein of the free vocalizations found in River of Fundament and Redoubt. Several of the recurring vocal techniques mimic those found at a sporting event. Examples include:
– Vocalizations to mimic the sound of a referee’s whistle, occasionally made by the performers portraying referees
– Screaming and rasping reminiscent of a crowd’s cheers, often made by those portraying fans
– Quick staccato utterances of “hut” and other syllables, often done by the referees when consulting one another
– Groans and croaks redolent of an injured player

A pivotal scene dramatizes Barney’s dissection of the national anthem ritual. After the players and referees take the field, the owner ascends to the press box, and the fans gather around, soprano Jacquelyn Deshchidn, a Chiricahua Apache, adorned in gold and wearing wings, takes center stage (on or near the Field Emblem). Instead of singing “The Star-Spangled Banner,” Deshchidn performs an aggressive and mournful improvisatory piece lasting several minutes. Deceptively, their piece begins on “O,” but the similarities quickly end. Here Deshchidn is accompanied by the chorus of referees portrayed by Isabel Crespo Pardo, Jeffrey Gavett, and Kyoko Kitamura. Notably, this passage includes the only instance (lasting a couple of seconds at most) of consonant harmony throughout the whole film, occurring at approximately the 46-minute mark, and its rarity and unexpectedness yields a great impact. Deschchidn’s anthem also includes the lone clear word uttered in all of Secondary, “bombs,” which is repeated in quick succession at varying intervals and dynamics by both soloist and chorus. Throughout much of their performance, Deshchidn locks eyes with Kopache’s Al Davis as he glares down from the press box.

matthew barney secondary deshchidn
Deschidn during the anthem (Jerry Saltz watches, sans coffee)

It should be noted that this is the third successive major work that situates an Indigenous American character in a central role: Jacquelyn Deshchidn’s national anthem in Secondary, Sandra Lamouche’s hoop dance in Redoubt, and, among others, Chief David Beautiful Bald Eagle as Norman III (i.e., the version of Norman closest to being divine) as well as pow wow ensemble Mystic River in River of Fundament. Though representing different tribes and traditions, it’s no coincidence that Barney has centered the generally shared Indigenous American experience when exploring violence, mythology, nature, and industrialization in American contexts.

Signature Barney elements appear throughout the film. Plastics and metals are engaged in various states: viscous PCL handled by Watt and Cardona; dumbbells molded from clay and plastic; a triptych of sculptures resulting from the impacts between Thomas and Xavier recreating the Stingley-Tatum trauma. There are also references and allusions to earlier work. In one sequence, a pair of athletes engage a large salt block, such as those seen in River of Fundament. The trench itself, as well as Watt’s physical dialogue with the mud and the filth also have obvious parallels to River of Fundament. In addition to further exploring the boundaries of dance and movement highlighted in Redoubt, a sculpture from the same film is seen in the studio during an early sequence of Secondary. Of course, the concept of creating via movement and resistance is at the heart of Barney’s long-running Drawing Restraint series. The Field Emblem has permeated Barney’s work for decades, including being highlighted in Cremaster Cycle and Drawing Restraint 9, among others. And football has been a recurring subject and influence in his work going back to some of his earliest output such as Facility of DECLINE.

The current exhibition includes more than just the film. The site itself is, as Barney notes, a “central character” in Secondary, so one may move around the studio, including onto the field (and sit or lay if preferred). The trench remains and may be viewed up close. The press box, though closed off, still stands. Within it are a storyboard and a sculpture, possibly a water casting. A work on canvas, a take on the field of play featuring the Field Emblem, hangs on one wall of the studio. Bringing the show full circle, an Otto jersey is also displayed.

Trench, press box

I highly recommend Secondary if you have the opportunity. Although it may possibly screen elsewhere in future months or years, seeing the film where it was created—in the space adapted for that purpose—is a singular experience, one I’ll always treasure.

The Fencemen’s ‘More More More More Monuments’ EP & A Remembrance

The Fencemen’s More More More More Monuments EP is now available to stream on the usual outlets and is also available for purchase via iTunes. Recorded in 2013, it’s not new music per se, but this is the first time it’s been made public.

Regular readers may recall that I contributed some sounds to “Rented Rooms” on The Fencemen’s debut album Times Are Alright. I joined the band shortly after the album’s completion, playing on all songs during live shows. I remain thankful that they allowed and welcomed me into the circle, both musically and personally. The band eventually ended but the friendships remained.

While very little of that live material was captured, I did participate in the writing and recording process for what ultimately became More More More More Monuments, a mostly hard-driving collection of songs that built upon the gritty, catchy aesthetic of Times Are Alright. The EP’s songs, title, and recording were set in 2013 but it was never released. An unmastered copy of the 2013 mix has been in my library under the title The Lost EP ever since. I’ve regularly listened to it, wishing others would one day get a chance to hear it. The time has finally come.

I’m proud of both what we created as well as having played a small role in it. On a specific and personal musical note, I was glad that it captured, on some level, a bit of my preferred approach to the “rock sax” conundrum—to be more of a second guitarist than an alternate melodic voice that just occasionally solos (in an often stylistically jarring way). (More on that here and here.) I’m also glad that my wife could contribute some added sonic texture, playing viola on “O Golden Spike.”

Curiously, regarding the saxophone itself, despite the songs being nearly a decade old, the EP is out at an interesting time, as the saxophone has gradually been seeping back into indie, pop, and dance music in recent years. Monuments is a fitting complement to such a trend, even if it was recorded well before it.

All that said, the circumstances surrounding the EP’s completion and release are unfortunate. Tyler Blakslee, The Fencemen’s lead singer, lyricist, and general creative force, tragically and unexpectedly passed away a couple of weeks ago. (A touching tribute by Sean Hoen is here.) Getting this mastered and released is a tribute to him. He and Dan Jaquint (drums, engineering) continued working on the EP over the years, including very recently, and Dan moved mountains to quickly push it over the finish line amidst the grief.

Not only did Dan just “get it done,” but this final mastered mix sounds wholly different—in the best way—from the old mix I’ve been listening to for ~9 years. It’s aggressive and alive. I love it.

This past spring marked a decade since I officially met and befriended Tyler. (We met once socially a couple years prior, but the 2012 (re-)introduction sealed the deal.) We were fast friends and, although our interests weren’t always aligned, we shared an intense passion for what we liked and could appreciate such when hearing one another rave about this or that cultural artifact. I knew that any time I saw Tyler I would need to bring my conversational A-game and be ready to volley myriad niche references back and forth. We had many great times and made some wonderful memories over the years.

Regarding the Monuments EP specifically, I vividly remember one writing and brainstorming session Tyler and I had at my house—just the two of us in my office sketching out ideas for what would become the song “Rackets.” That evening was emblematic of much of our relationship. We started out by discussing his ideas and working to establish a direction to realize what he heard in his mind’s ear. When I sketched out some skeletal sounds on my horn and (quite old) keyboard, he was clearly displeased with the lack of effects and varied sounds at my immediate disposal. (His attention to detail was always 110%, part of what kept Monuments in the dark for so long.) I kept telling him it’d work on guitar or bass or whatever, but he was skeptical. (He was eventually satisfied when he heard the others playing off those same ideas at a rehearsal.) Ultimately we made progress creatively and he felt like we accomplished something. Afterward we spent some time just listening to music and talking and laughing about this or that movie, show, or book.

More More More More Monuments may have sentimental value for me, but I think it’s a powerful creative statement in and of itself. It’s also a monument to our friend.

‘Just Answer the Question’ – a Thinking Podcast with Alice Dreger

I’ve been working on a project since the beginning of the year and it’s finally ready to see the light of day, so I’d like to share a bit about it should you be interested. It’s different from the usual ground I’ve covered here and elsewhere over the years.

Just Answer the Question is a thinking podcast created and hosted by Alice Dreger, the esteemed writer, historian, and speaker. (She also happens to be a friend, former neighbor, and now colleague.) I’m the producer*, and I also provide original music for the show. For a little more background on how this came to be, see Alice’s newsletter on the topic.

Just Answer the Question logo

Yes, I know, seemingly everyone has a podcast these days. (Oddly enough, my previous post was about my guesting on another show.) There’s a lot of content out there, maybe even too much, and we hope to create a thoughtful space separate from the news cycle and whatever the controversy du jour may be. From the show’s website:

For each episode of Just Answer the Question, we take one question and use it like a corkscrew to open a bottle of intellectual wine that we then share with three helpers. Some podcasts call their visitors “guests,” but we consider ours “helpers,” because they help us think through our questions by sharing their experiences, research, and insights.

After we’ve recorded conversations with our episode-specific helpers, our creator Alice Dreger and producer Mike Teager then use the recordings as primary sources to compose episodes that take you through a guided tour of the exploration of our central question. Alice contributes short essays and narrative glue, while Mike contributes original musical framing. Our goal is to give you somewhere around an hour of time to think, feel, remember, laugh, listen, and examine the threads that weave through our lives. Our hope is that we help you enjoy this big collaboration as much as we do.

JATQ website

You can also watch our promo video on our website and Twitter.

The podcast is free and the first three episodes are available now on all main directories with more in the pipeline. New episodes should appear about every ~3 weeks.

We’ve recorded conversations with many compelling, thoughtful folks already—some you may have heard of and others who may be new to you. But regardless of name recognition, the discussions have been consistently rich and engaging.

We also offer additional content via a paid subscription. This is known as the Tangent Tier. For $5 per month, you can access the long-form interviews from which we pull excerpts for the main (free) podcast episodes. We may ultimately only use ~15 minutes or so of a given interview for an episode, but we often talk with our helpers for ~40-60 minutes each, and much is left on the cutting-room floor. For those interested in more of the “two people talking” format, this is that (compared to the more produced format of Just Answer the Question).

If you’re interested in the Tangent Tier, more info is here and you can subscribe here. And since the first three main episodes are now available, the accompanying Tangent Tier installments are too. (Nine of them, to be exact: three for each episode.)

The first three episodes are as follows:
“What’s have I done?” — An examination of how we take stock of our lives: as a continuous narrative or as a series of episodes. Featuring discussions with bioethicist Dr. Tod Chambers and psychologists Dr. Dan McAdams and Dr. Jonathan Adler.
“What’s it like to play me?” — A look at role-playing, including as oneself in different contexts. Featuring discussions with radio personality and playwright Peter Sagal, actress Jennifer Riker, and narrator and audio artist Tavia Gilbert.
“Can a father be a mother?” — Reflections on being a primary caregiver. Featuring discussions with journalist and The Company of Dads founder Paul Sullivan, psychologist Dr. Jonathan Adler, and yours truly.

Do give a listen to the podcast if it sounds like something you’d like to explore.

Relevant links:
Just Answer the Question website
Subscribe to the podcast via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, Google Podcasts, and more…
Subscribe to the Tangent Tier here

*As for my being the producer, I’m reminded of a line from one of my favorite movies, Get Shorty, delivered by a confident Chili Palmer: “I don’t think the producer has to know much.”

In all seriousness, when Alice first asked me about collaborating on this, I was (and am) beyond flattered, and I admitted that I knew very little (i.e., nothing) about producing generally and podcast production specifically. That said, in addition to being friends, we knew that we liked working together when I used to report for East Lansing Info. So we used that and our shared penchant for organization as a starting point, and here we are. The learning curve has been and remains steep but rewarding.

Talking Parenting on ‘The Company of Dads’ Podcast

A bit of a different post here. In addition to the wide net of artistic-related concerns this (neglected) blog is concerned with, I have occasionally delved into personal matters such as priorities, family, and work. However, considering there are ~250 posts on this site, “personal” writing is in the extreme minority.

In October of 2021, my good friend Alice Dreger virtually introduced me to the then-outgoing New York Times columnist Paul Sullivan. He had just published his final “Wealth Matters” column, one that outed his other job: that of being the primary caregiver to his three daughters. Or, as he calls it, being a Lead Dad. He announced that he was leaving the NYT to focus on building a community of other Lead Dads in order to both raise awareness of and normalize the role. His column deeply resonated with me, and Paul and I lightly kept in touch as I followed his launching The Company of Dads.

(I should note that Alice, in addition to being my friend and former neighbor, was also the primary caregiver to her son, a role that we’ve continually bonded over through the years, which is why she thought to introduce me to Paul.)

In February he asked to interview me for his podcast, and we got along swimmingly. The episode (#11) is out today. I was very surprised to be asked, considering the guests he’s already featured, but I’m happy to discuss my parenting experience, especially with those in a similar role. We continue to stay in touch, and I’m grateful that we’ve been able to connect.

I don’t know how much of our original talk will be included—we spoke for a while and covered a lot of ground. There’s was a little music talk, but the focus was really on the role of primary parent and Lead Dad*. We discussed parenting and how that’s juggled with family generally, work, music, volunteering, and more. And, I don’t know if this made the cut, but we did touch on our shared childhood love of professional wrestling as well as my renewed interest in it over the last couple years. (Speaking of which, the 30th anniversary of my first live event was just a couple weeks ago, and I’m going to my first live event in decades next week.)

If you’re at all interested in the discussion or the topic generally, give it a listen. I really value what Paul is doing with the Company of Dads, and I look forward to seeing where it goes.

The episode is available via Apple Podcasts, YouTube (where you can sneak my River of Fundament poster in the mirror, and you can also see me hunched over because of awkward mic and camera positioning), and wherever else you may get your podcasts.

I’ve been repping the Company of Dads both from my home office as well as at gigs:

Working on a forthcoming project, with a hint of Redoubt poster in the background.
Staying hydrated in a pit.

*Admittedly, I do have a little hesitancy around the term because I’ve always just seen myself as “the parent” instead of “the dad,” likely because I was raised by a single mom who essentially fulfilled both roles. But that’s just me and my own experience, and it’s another tale for another time..

Ethan Iverson & Tom Harrell at Buffalo’s Kleinhans Music Hall

After a two-year postponement, pianist Ethan Iverson and trumpeter Tom Harrell came to Buffalo for their duo concert at Kleinhans Music Hall’s Mary Seaton Room. Originally scheduled for March 2020, this was the first concert on my calendar to be pushed back or canceled outright due to COVID-19 restrictions. (With Chicago’s Ring Cycle being the second…) Now, more than two years later, it was the first acoustic jazz concert I’ve seen as an audience member since then. This was my first time seeing either musician perform live and hopefully not the last.

(For additional context, a pre-concert interview is here.)

The concert was a compelling 80-minute journey through the The Tradition via The American Songbook and a couple of Harrell originals. An “evening of standards” can go in many directions (good and bad), and the duo deftly navigated the musical waters in a way that was consistently refreshing. On the one hand, their approach was traditional: recognizable tunes, clear melodic lines, alternating solos within the prescribed forms. However, within that rubric there was much variety: harmonic and rhythmic exploration, stylistic wandering (with Iverson occasionally drawing on European classical influences), a wide textural range—notable considering the duo format.

The 11-song set was pretty evenly divided. Each piece was several minutes in length, and I don’t think there was one instance of someone soloing for more than two consecutive choruses. The set ran The Tradition’s gamut, from medium-tempo numbers (“Sentimental Journey,” “I’m Getting Sentimental Over You,” “I Remember You”), to blues (“Philadelphia Creamer,” an Iverson original), to up-tempo swing (“All The Things You Are,” Harrell’s “Improv”), rhythm changes (“Wee”), ballads (“I Can’t Get Started,” “The Man I Love”), and modern fare (Harrell’s “Journey To The Stars”). (Full disclosure: I am missing one title, as there was one tune I couldn’t name.) Many of the tunes are featured on 2019’s Common Practice (ECM), a fun album that showcases Iverson and Harrell in a quartet setting. But the duo format put those same pieces in a new relief, and it nicely highlighted Harrell’s more intimate, understated approach.

Harrell spent most of the evening on flugelhorn, which was a real treat. His full, warm sound complemented the piano nicely. He did play trumpet on two or three occasions in the latter half of the set, but not for a full tune. I appreciated his approach to melodies—straightforward but not plain, providing a nice contrast to his more searching improvisations. His two originals were nice additions. “Improv” was a post bop romp that fit right in with the evening’s standards theme. And “Journey to the Stars” went perhaps the farthest astray from that same theme, with Iverson’s arpeggiated harmonies* and Harrell’s haunting lines.

Given the duo setting, especially when paired with a monodic instrument, Iverson had his work cut out for him and more than rose to the occasion. He was often a one-man rhythm section and sometimes even a one-man horn section. And his melodic approach was diverse, from his borderline shout chorus on “I Remember You” (which sounded like a horn soli) to his crystalline single-note lines and everything in between. His bouncy, bluesy clusters on “Sentimental Journey” filled the hall, and his sparse melodic lines on “I Can’t Get Started” showcased Iverson’s expansive textural range. (And for those familiar with Iverson’s writing, particularly on jazz standards, he practices what he preaches: his playing evinces a keen interplay between the bass and melody, with more emphasis on counterpoint than “chord scales.”)

My only complaint is that the performance didn’t last longer, but it’s better than the alternative. The concert was more than worth the wait. My only hope is that it won’t be another two years until I can see either artist again.

Ethan Iverson and Tom Harrell on April 8, 2022
(photograph by me)

Also, it was nice to briefly meet Ethan Iverson after the concert. He’s just as friendly in person as online (where I occasionally tweet at him, usually about Keith Jarrett).

*I should admit, with apologies to the artists, that Iverson’s arpeggiating briefly reminded me of Collective Soul’s “December,” which proved distracting for a few seconds. Not that Collective Soul invented such arpeggiation—far from it—but that’s where my mind took me. Ah well…