Untitled: Hollywood Boulevard
Author: donald barnat
I’m With These People: NO on Bombing Syria
These images are from the rally yesterday in front of the Federal Building in Westwood, CA. The people of the United States have had enough. We don’t want to be that country anymore. We have so many problems here on our own soil. Let’s become the model for the rest of the world, not its police force.
And finally, just…
Bring Me the File on Posture Please…
Give it a minute. 😉
Red Shoe Diary
Looking Over His Shoulder
Friends, Accessorized
Atonement
This here is about atonement for my sin. I’m not religious but I grew up with the idea and can relate to the metaphor.
I don’t really know how to say this but… I think it’s really a sin (figure of speech) to make a bullshit effort that doesn’t at all reflect who you are or your abilities, as limited as mine are. But I sure as shit did that in recording in just a about an hour a ‘tribute’ to Marian McPartland and posting it online. I should be ashamed of myself and I am.
So I spent the better part of the last week trying to make up for it by doing something I sorely hadn’t planned on doing with my week and that is TRYING to do my best. I’m at a point in my life where I’ve never had the tools I do now to make music at home but I’m like at an age where I don’t half give a shit anymore.
I’ve got to work on that but in the meantime here is a version of Key Largo that at least reflects my best effort and considerable sweat. I’m stuck with certain things like my voice but I am capable of shaking the rust off whatever capabilities I do have and either doing my best or having the good sense to skip the whole thing entirely. That’s my September onward resolution.
Anyway.
A Mother’s Grace
Edited the title. I don’t know why I didn’t see it before. But I kind of did.
Friends in Sepia
I’m sure he just looks like he’s up to no good
I’m talking about the bronze panther! Why? What did you think I was referring to? 😉
Details: Sheri’s Apartment
When Sheri moved back from Maryland she had an apartment she didn’t like for a year. Then she got to work finding a place back up closer to where she used to live. Finally found the neatest little one bedroom in Beverly Hills. Built probably back in the 1930s, the owner was meticulous in keeping up the details of the place. Sheri was always finding things to perfectly accent her environment. When she first moved in she told me to bring a camera over to take some pictures.
All shots taken with a Nikon D3 and a 85mm 1.4 Nikkor D.
Sheri’s details…, a slideshow on Flickr.
Sheri’s Wedding
Remembering a great day in our lives…
Just remembering one of the happiest days of my adult life. The wedding of my best friend Sheri just five years ago. I’m not a wedding photographer but she didn’t trust the one she hired so she told me to be sure to bring my gear.
Good thing, he was a hack. She loved my shots and everybody was happy. All pictures were taken with a Nikon D3 and either a 70-200 2.8 Nikkor VR or the 24-70 2.8 Nikkor. Would give anything to go back to that day.
Sheri Wilson Dines 1958-2012
One year ago today.
We lost Sheri at 12:20 am, Tuesday, August 28th, 2012.
Bernadette and I were with her on Saturday, my birthday, and Sheri was comfortable and serene. She commented that I’d lost weight. I have and so I showed her; walking away from her bed and turning around. “Wow,” she said, almost just mouthing the word.
I came back to her side and trying to be as cheerful as I could told her that I was getting a lot of looks from the young ladies. She muttered something unintelligible.
So I got real close, put my ear just inches away from her lips, and bathed in her pretense of disgust with me; the reality check that was the basis of our friendship, one last time.
“You’re not getting any looks from young ladies.”
And that was the last thing she ever said to me. One last dose of reality.
Sheri knew…
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Soft Colors on Rodeo Drive
Remembering Sheri today with a picture she would have liked.
All Your Ducks, So Not in a Row
Pictures: Do you take them or make them?
In a period of reflection right now. So it’s fitting it seems to reblog some pieces from last year. Hope they are new to you!
THE REBLOGGING CONTINUES UNABATED! This from a few years ago.
Honestly, I’m not sure there’s two opposing camps out there. I think the way it usually goes is some poor unsuspecting chap says he likes to take pictures… and then, invariably, someone wearing a much more expensive watch says he doesn’t take pictures, he makes them.
Ah-HAH!
Then the first guy smiles and shrugs and says yes, of course, and then looks at his feet. The party’s over for him. He doesn’t even know what the other guy is talking about.
Make pictures? What does that even mean? What’s the difference between taking a picture and making one? Are they really two different things? How come I don’t know this?
The reason he might not know it is because there are so many instances in life where others hang onto information as if it’s a proprietary asset. Or, just as likely…
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Legs Crossed
It was bound to happen to me sooner or later. A dark haired beauty in her black uniform. And a crow. Oh sure. Just keep shooting, fellow street photogs. Your Elliott Erwitt moment will come someday, too. Whether you’re looking for it to or not. 😉
Focus, you say? That would have been too much to ask I suppose.
Love Green
Free WiFi
Marian McPartland, gone too soon at 95
You can hear Marian McPartland’s playing of “Key Largo’ by clicking the media player here and listen as you read.
Very sad to learn today of the passing of an all-time favorite and one of the most underrated musicians of the 20th century. The absolutely amazing Marian McPartland. I think the fame from being the host of her radio show, Piano Jazz, was something that actually drew attention away from her own singular greatness.
She was a magnificent jazz artist. She lived a long life, but along with the passing of Cedar Walton just a few days ago, this is a very sad day in the history of music. I listen to her all the time. In the last 15 years or so I’ve come to truly understand and accept how really great she was. Very sad.
From the LA Times obituary:
“One of the jazz world’s most visible female instrumentalists, McPartland’s highly personal style was rich with colorful harmonies and briskly swinging rhythms, enhanced by a love of bebop, while adapting smoothly to the many stylistic changes taking place in jazz over the course of a career spanning more than half a century.
“Marian McPartland is a harmonic genius,” pianist Bill Charlap said. “Her singular musical voice encompasses the past, present and the future of jazz.”
Critic John S. Wilson described McPartland’s playing in a New York Times review as a “series of paces that were, in effect, a thumbnail history of jazz styles. She took it from basic ragtime to very modern harmonies, throwing in some bebop and some stride piano, shaping the whole concept into an exhilarating performance.”
“One of my greatest influences was Duke Ellington,” she wrote in a 1999 article for Piano & Keyboard Magazine. “I listened to Fats Waller (though not as much as Duke), [but] I never really got into stride piano. Benny Goodman and Lionel Hampton, with whom I later worked, influenced me, as did Mel Powell, Teddy Wilson and Jess Stacy. Then other people came into the picture, like Art Tatum and Bud Powell. What has stayed with me is Bill Evans.”
Yes. Bill Evans. He oozes out of everything she did. As well as Duke. This great lady of jazz will be sorely missed.
The Counsel of Beauty
Life Imitates
Crush of Tourists
La Reina Blanca
Figure, Ground… Part Two
Figure, Ground… Part One
Wheels and Sneakers
Something About Men and Walls and Glass
Rocco’s Pizza, Wilshire Blvd
Waiting for the Bus
August 11, 1995
That was the day I met Sheri. I won’t go into the story. Just click on her name in this sentence or the category Sheri beside the title of this post and you can read all about it. 18 years. There’s a fortune cookie note I’ve stuck in the frame holding this picture. It says…
Loyal, true and kind, remember good friends like this are hard to find.
Lovely and Adorable
Untitled: Western Ave.
The Accessorized Male, Two Versions
Never saw a woman so alone
It’s only a lyric from the Doors’ classic LA Woman. Not saying the images don’t reflect my impressions based on the postures and expressions of the subjects of these photographs. But they’re only my creative projections. Don’t sue me, ladies!
Kind of Blue
Generations
The Scowl as a Fashion Accessory
She’s Just Not That Into You
Body Language
Still Fiercely a Man
It’s Chinatown, Jake…
Great article on LA’s Chinatown and the decline and changes that have occurred there in the last two decades. Read it here.
Ladrillo Rojo
Inked Up
Hollywood Jewels: Part 2
Hollywood Jewels: Part 1
Conspicuous Consumption
Fast glass in fading light…
Moments
Sunset Blvd
Dilapidated mansion on Sunset in Beverly Hills. Just like that one in the movie. Seemingly abandoned. But who knows? Maybe there’s a monkey playing the organ in there.
50'Lux 