Happy Birthday to Eva Zeisel!

There are lots of folks out in the world who have never heard of Eva Zeisel -- in fact, I hadn't, until only a few years ago. In the art world, the name is often everything. Today, Chihuly and Picasso and other successes have become practically household names, for their revolutionizing their media. But in the world of ceramics, the hand is all. Eva Zeisel has one heck of a hand.

There are plenty of sources for her biography, but too often they skip over the brief time, in the early 1950s, she spent here in Monmouth, IL (except when they're trying to buy or sell pieces she designed/crafted while here, at Western Stoneware).

There's a fellow who comes the the local auctions, now and again (he used to come every week, but his health is fragile... he's probably only about 10 years younger than Zeisel, after all), who worked pretty much all his adult life at the Monmouth Pottery, primarily making cups and mugs. One day, when the auction house had about a dozen locally-made Zeisel pieces up for sale, the gentleman commented that he had worked with her, and had never been impressed by her and never much liked her stuff -- it just didn't look strong enough, or words to that effect.

I have to admit, I look at them and think of fluids, of motion, of laughter and whimsy, and the gent at the auction didn't strike me as one who had a sense of humor about dishes. He likes the chunky, clunky, almost purely utilitarian stuff with the horrid green glazes, and the drip-glaze pieces.

If it weren't for Eva Zeisel's works, I suspect tableware would still be serious, stiff, and depressingly formal -- or worse, permanently 1970s-avocado-green-ugly. Certainly stoneware -- and Western Stoneware -- took on new light when she first cast clay.

I raise a glass in honor of her birth, one century and one year ago, today.

Happy 217th to the USCG

Today marks the 217th birthday of the United States Coast Guard. I raise my roll of Life Savers to them all -- even my retired coastie brugly other.

Both my brother and his wife served in the Coast Guard. In fact, they met in boot camp. They both served as radiomen (I think they may have changed the title to communications officer, since the 1980s, but don't quote me on it. I only know what I hear, and I'm a little deaf ... or, is it daft?), and eventually were both stationed in Alaska, where they became serious enough to marry, and where my brugly other's little bathtub, the cutter Woodrush, received the emergency signal from the cruise ship Prinsendam.

My brugly other told us all, once, that the Woodrush was so old and so pitifully underpowered that, although it was the first ship to receive the distress call, it was the last to arrive at the scene. Nonetheless, it was actively involved in rescuing its share of the hundreds of passengers stranded on a burning cruise liner.

My sister-in-law, too, was involved in her share of heroics, but after they had been transferred out of Alaska to about the farthest point away.

Only a couple of weeks after her first son was born, she sent her family north to stay with relatives (my mom and dad) while she stayed stationed in Key West to bear the brunt of hurricane Andrew, to keep comm lines open and to pitch in anywhere else they needed her.

I know from experience that Coasties are among the finest people this country has to offer, and I will be proud of my family's ties to them always.

Happy Birthday, ye shallow-water heroes!

A Great Day in Music History

Today is the anniversary of the birth of Cole Porter. It may come as a surprise to a few who know me, to hear that Porter is my favorite songwriter of all time. But then, I had the pleasure of performing some of his most fun material while I was still young enough to have not been completely caught up in what was "happening", and old enough to understand most of the words (our star sang the original version)...

The first time I was introduced to Cole Porter's music, I was just beginning high school, and was suckered into the school production of "Anything Goes." I was originally supposed to have been the assistant to the director (the ass't dir), but when three cast members quit over a three-way lovers' spat, I ended up learning to tap dance and getting stuck in the center of the chorus line. At sixteen, I was tall enough and strong enough, and had a fairly flexible contralto voice, so I became a sailor singing tenor parts. We had to use about a mile of elastic bandages to make my upper torso a little less feminine. There was nothing we could do about my curvy hips, though. I just had to learn to swagger as though those hips carried something other than the familiar internal equipment.

I've had a healthy respect for men and women in uniform ever since.

But more than that, those darned songs stayed stuck in my head. I still sing them often, for no apparent reason, and they give me great pleasure.

If you'd like a sample of his stuff as done by average pop stars, rent a copy of De-Lovely, starring Kevin Kline and Ashley Judd. The acting in that film is truly superior, and film is quite beautiful, touching, and smart... but the music is merely approachable. If you want real musical performances, look for such masters of his musical phrasing as Eartha Kitt and Peggy Lee, among others. (I know a lot of people tout Ella Fitzgerald as the-one-the-only, but to my mind, Porter wrote such magnificently concise works for a reason. Jazzy noodling about (aka scat) sort of misses the point -- or rather, dulls the brilliant edge.) Look, for example, to "Kiss Me Kate," and... ah, to heck with it, just get this dvd set for starters. Ignore the bulk of the story line and acting, just listen up!

Of course, if somebody wants to know what I'd like for Christmas...


At any rate, if you can, this evening, celebrate the genius of Cole Porter with a glass of fine wine and a whirl around the dance floor to his melodies, with whichever person you've got under your skin.