Thursday, June 30, 2011

Artistas en Cáceres

Saxamaphone quartet, with Vicente on tenor. The group was rehearsing for a gig accompanying a silent film, Chaplin, I think. They were sounding good. I wish I had been there to see it.

Delia studied ceramics at the fine arts school for four years, now she is studying sculpture. A friend from way back in the day!

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Friday, June 24, 2011

Bodas trianeras

Is it good luck or bad luck to run across a wedding?

The Guadalquiver, to the right.

Triana

Two Days in May

May 29, 2011. Nailing my pieces at the Spring recital, including Monk's "Pannonica."

May 30, 2011. This is the plane that dropped me off in Madrid. I took the picture after having a couple of drinks with a Russian woman who was off to Moscow.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Granada (2)

These guys were busking, playing Gypsy jazz, in the style of Django Reinhardt. The woman is just tuning up her violin. The bass, as you can see, is a modified plastic trash can. The guitarists (at least two of the three) and the violinist were serious musicians.

Un pincho de tortilla con mayonesa, unas aceitunas y una copa de vino fino de Montilla ... What I enjoyed while listening to the musicians play.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Granada (1)

That magnificent old pile, with the Sierra Nevada in the background. Taken from el mirador San Nicolás

Behind this wall, an enchanted garden, what granadinos call a "carmen."

Una casa granadina in the Albaicín

New Granada, from the Albaicín

The Cathedral

Marco and José Luis, on the terrace of José Luis's and Cati's house in the Albaicín. We used to play basketball together almost every day on the Paseo de los Tristes ... seventeen years ago!

José Luis and Cati

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Jamalandruki

Josetxo Goia-Arribe y la Orquesta Jamalandruki at Café Central in Madrid. The name of the band is taken from a magician, a character in Pamplona in the sixties. At first I thought the group's music sounded like kletzmer crossed with jazz, but Goia-Arribe said that it was based on the traditional sounds of his native Pamplona, and especially the sounds of San Fermin, like the paso dobles they play at bullfights. This laced with a generous dose of Thelonius Monk.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Pescados y mariscos: Avilés





Merluza, "hake."

Cigalas, still alive.

Sorolla Patio

In the patio of the Sorolla museum in Madrid.



Don Mario & the One-Man Band

Don Mario Izaguirre, with the one-man-band statue. La Cartuja, Sevilla.

Tascas madrileñas





Sevillian motif: Don Juan Tenorio, el "burlador" de Sevilla.

The greats of the Golden Age (early 17th C.), L to R: Calderón, Lope, Cervantes, and Quevedo.

L to R: Mariano José de Larra, Oscar Wilder, and a third guy.

The tapas board covers a ceramic reproduction of a Julio Romero de Torres painting. The girl on the cell phone stands in front of a Guardia Civil cut-out. Plaza del Ángel.





Near Plaza Santa Ana

There is no "Bodegas Calixto" across the street.