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R.I.P. Astrud Gilberto (1940-2023)

Posted in Film, Music, R.I.P. with tags , , on June 7, 2023 by telescoper

I just read the sad news of the death, on Monday 5th June at the age of 83, of legendary Brazilian Bossa Nova and Samba singer Astrud Gilberto.

There was a time in the 1960s when the Bossa Nova seemed to be everywhere, and the reason for that was a collaboration between singer, guitarist and composer João Gilberto and tenor saxophonist Stan Getz that resulted in the award-winning album Getz/Gilberto that made the Bossa Nova go global, penetrating not only the world of jazz but the much wider cultural sphere including pop and film music. It also made a star of João Gilberto’s then wife, Astrud, who had never recorded before but sang on some of the tracks, the most famous example being The Girl From Ipanema. The popularity of this track resulted in a shorter version being released as a single which was a smash hit around the globe in 1964. Whether or not it’s true, the story goes that she was not under contract at the time the recording was made so never received any royalties for it, although the single made millions. It is said that it was Stan Getz – a wonderful musician but a notoriously horrible man – was responsible for swindling her.

Although an inexperienced singer at the time of this famous session, Astrud Gilberto had a direct, uncomplicated style and an aura of cool detachment that proved very appealing to audiences around the world, earning her a Grammy Award and turning her into a star almost overnight. Her relationship with her husband did not survive this transformation, however, and they divorced a few years later.

There was a lot more to Astrud Gilberto than that hit record, however. She started writing her own songs and her singing style matured. As a matter of fact I was lucky enough to see her perform live in London in the mid-1990s – at the Jazz Cafe in Camden, if I remember correctly – and she sang a very interesting mixture of music. I liked that later style more than the Getz/Gilberto recordings actually.

Anyway, here is a video of Astrud Gilberto singing The Girl From Ipanema in 1964 in what looks like it must be a clip from the film Get Yourself A College Girl – though I stand to be corrected if wrong! – and the music is exactly the same as the hit single so the band and the singer were obviously miming…

Rest in Peace, Astrud Gilberto (1940-2023).

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R.I.P. Jim Hartle (1939-2023)

Posted in R.I.P., The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , on May 27, 2023 by telescoper

It’s another one of the occasions on which I have to use this blog to pass on some sad news. Renowned physicist James B. Hartle has passed away.

Jim Hartle’s scientific work was concerned with the application of Einstein’s theory of general relativity to astrophysics, especially gravitational waves, relativistic stars, black holes, and cosmology, specifically the theory of the wave function of the universe. For much of his career he was interested in the earliest moments of the big bang where the subjects of quantum mechanics, gravity theory and cosmology overlap, leading among other things to the Hartle-Hawking conjecture.

Jim Hartle was one of the speakers at the very first scientific conference I attended in Cargèse, Corsica way back in 1986. I remember his lectures very well after all these years, not least because he was so witty. I remember his response when someone asked him about the existence of large dimensionless numbers in cosmology: “…it’s a property that numbers have that some of them are larger than others.”

Condolences to his family, friends and colleagues. Rest in peace, Jim Hartle (1939-2023).

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R.I.P. Ahmad Jamal (1930-2023)

Posted in Jazz, R.I.P. with tags , , , on April 17, 2023 by telescoper

With the passing, on Sunday, of Ahmad Jamal, at the age of 92, another legendary Jazz musician has left us. He was a consistently inventive pianist, of great elegance, and a wonderful knack of deconstructing a tune into its component parts before reassembling it into something fresh. His formative years were a time when many keyboard players emphasized virtuosic brilliance, but Jamal’s approach was relaxed and spare. He was great letting his story develop gradually but very enjoyably through a series of riffs over a compelling rhythmic foundation. A perfect example is this track, Poinciana, from a hugely popular album Live at the Pershing: But Not For Me, recorded in 1958 with Israel Crosby on bass and Vernel Fournier on drums. Ahmad Jamal is no longer with us, but this groove will last forever!

R.I.P. Ahmad Jamal (born Frederick Russell Jones, 1930-2023).

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R.I.P. Gordon Moore (1929-2023)

Posted in Open Access, R.I.P., The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , on March 25, 2023 by telescoper
Gordon Moore, photographed in 1981. Picture credit: Intel corporation.

I was saddened this morning to see news of the passing of scientist, inventor, entrepreneur and philanthropist Gordon Moore at the age of 94. Moore was a co-founder in 1968 of semiconductor company Intel, which has an enormous manufacturing facility at Leixlip, just a few miles from Maynooth, which employs almost 5000 people and contributes hugely to the local economy.

Gordon Moore also gave his name to Moore’s Law which relates to the rate of growth of transistors in integrated circuits and hence to the growth of computing power that gave rise to microprocessors, personal computers and supercomputers. I had reason to refer to Moore’s Law on this blog just a couple of days ago.

Moore made a huge personal fortune from business, and in 2000, he and his wife Betty established the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, with a gift worth about $5 billion. Through the Foundation, and as individuals, they have funded projects in science in fields as diverse as materials science and physics to genomics, data science and astronomy, in particular they have funded including the Thirty Metre Telescope project.

I have personal reasons for being grateful for the generosity of Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. When we were try to set up the Open Journal of Astrophysics some years ago we were awarded a small grant from them. It wasn’t a large amount of money but it was essential in allowing us to develop the idea into the working journal it is today. The Open Journal of Astrophysics is just one of many projects that would not have been possible without philanthropic giving of this sort.

I send my condolences to Betty (whom he married in 1950) and to the rest of his family, as well as all his friends and colleagues.

Rest in peace Gordon Moore (1929-2023)

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R.I.P. Tony Coe (1934-2023)

Posted in Jazz, R.I.P. with tags , , , on March 18, 2023 by telescoper

It’s a very sad coincidence that just the day after I had reason to blog about the death of Wally Fawkes, I have to mention the death of another superb jazz musician also associated with the clarinet, Tony Coe, who has passed away at the age of 88. In a prolific career and leader and sideman, Tony Coe also played with Humphrey Lyttelton’s band (from 1957-61) but he is best known for his work in more modern forms of jazz. He was known for the virtuosity and originality of his style, not only on clarinet but on tenor, alto and soprano saxophone. I read yesterday that he was also the first music teacher of Tim Garland who, on his Facebook page, mentions that he found Coe’s tenor playing rather reminiscent of that of the great Paul Gonsalves, which I’d never thought of before but is true.

My first encounter with Tony Coe was on an album I bought round about 1981 called The Crompton Suite by the Stan Tracey Sextet. It’s a rare find on vinyl these days but I still have my copy:

I haven’t heard this for ages because I no longer have a turntable and as far as I’m aware it hasn’t been re-released on any digital format, but I remember it very well and would have picked a track from this album as a tribute if it were on YouTube but instead here’s a lovely recording he made just a couple of years ago with John Horler on piano, the title track of the very nice album Dancing in the Dark:

R.I.P. Tony Coe (1934-2023)

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R.I.P. Wally Fawkes (1924-2023)

Posted in Art, Jazz, R.I.P. with tags , , , , on March 16, 2023 by telescoper

I just heard today – via the latest Private Eye – of the passing of Wally Fawkes on 1st March at the age of 98. His name won’t be familiar to many of the readers of this blog, but it is a name that I grew up with in a jazz-loving family. Wally Fawkes played clarinet with Humphrey Lyttelton’s band in its heyday in the late 40s and early 50s and was the last surviving member of that group. That band may have had a rhythm section that always sounded like its members were wearing diving boots, but the front line of Humphrey Lyttelton (trumpet), Wally Fawkes (clarinet) and Keith Christie (trombone) was truly outstanding.

Wally Fawkes wasn’t just a musician, though. He was also the acclaimed cartoonist known by the pseudonym Trog, and contributed a variety of cartoons to a variety of magazines and newspapers, including the long-running comic strip Flook. He was also an occasional contributor to Private Eye. He had to give up drawing in 2005 because of failing eyesight, after 62 years in the business.

I’ve already drawn attention to Wally Fawke’s excellence as a clarinet soloist with the Lyttelton band on The Onions at the famous 1954 Festival Hall Concert so it seems apt to pay tribute to his skills as both a cartoonist and a musician by returning to that concert for him playing his own composition Trog’s Blues. Wally Fawkes was a huge admirer of Sidney Bechet, and this tune clearly pays homage to Bechet’s monumental Blue Horizon (which I think is the finest instrumental blues ever recorded) but while Bechet’s blues performances were hewn from granite, Wally’s were wrought from finest porcelain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZloSiVrWmA

R.I.P. Wally Fawkes (1924-2023)

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R.I.P. Wayne Shorter (1933-2023)

Posted in Jazz, R.I.P. with tags , on March 2, 2023 by telescoper

I got home this evening to find the sad news that legendary saxophonist Wayne Shorter has passed away at the age of 89. I only got to hear him live once, many moons ago, when he was part of a band led by drummer Jack de Johnette (I think that was in the early 1990s) but I have a big collection of CDs of him in various settings, including with Miles Davis, The Jazz Messengers, and, of course, Weather Report. As a tribute I feel it’s appropriate to post a great record he made as leader.

Speak No Evil was recorded in 1964 and released as a Blue Note LP in 1966. It features a superb band, including Freddie Hubbard (tpt), Herbie Hancock (p), Ron Carter (b) and Elvin Jones (d) alongside Shorter himself on tenor saxophone. It’s one of the must-have jazz albums, and it demonstrates Shorter’s flair for composition as well as improvisation. In both respects his approach to this album is very different from that he took just a few years earlier with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. Standout tracks on this album include the suave yet unsettling Dance Cadaverous, the brooding Fee-fi-fo-fum, and the curiously agitated Witch Hunt.

Every piece on this album was composed by Shorter and as a player he revels in the ambiguous harmonies he created alongside the melodies. Although his style is clearly influenced by Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane, his tone is unlike either of these other giants, and Shorter expresses his individuality through varying emphasis producing asymmetric phrases. His playing is very quick-witted, full of abrupt changes of mood and dashes of fierce humour. A good example is Infant Eyes, a theme made up of three 9-bar phrases, played at a leisurely pace, on which Shorter’s lines impose a sense of determined exploration when many other soloists would have dawdled.

Anyway, don’t take my word for it. You can listen to the full album as a playlist on Youtube. The track order is: Witch Hunt, Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum, Dance Cadaverous, Speak No Evil, Infant Eyes and Wild Flower.

R.I.P. Wayne Shorter (1933-2023)

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R.I.P. David Duckham (1946-2023)

Posted in R.I.P., Rugby with tags , , , on January 11, 2023 by telescoper

I seem to be devoting a lot of this blog to R.I.P. posts these days but sadly I have to do it again because former England rugby union international David Duckham has passed away at the age of 76. With great poise and balance as well as a blistering turn of pace, Duckham was an oustanding player on the wing and his international career would have been even more memorable had he had better players around; the England team of the early 70s was rather weak, actually finishing bottom of the Five Nations in four of the seven years he played.

David Duckham was one of only three England players who made it into the Barbarians side that played New Zealand in Cardiff on 27th January 1973, a match many regard as the greatest game of rugby ever played. Can that really have been 50 years ago?

The Barbarians’ side on that day was packed with Welsh legends and the Welsh supporters after the game changed Duckham’s name from “David” to “Dai” because he was “good enough to be Welsh”. I regarded that great Welsh rugby team of the 70s in exactly the same light as the great Brazilian football team of the same period.

I remember commentator Cliff Morgan during that game describing Duckham as “a man who can really motor” and indeed he could. Here’s a short clip* of him in action:

http://www.youtube.com/clip/UgkxFupDdxcSqxaLxHJfSJ244OKl2hDV9y7k

I’m not sure why New Zealand scrum-half Sid Going decided to kick after controlling the scrum so well with all the Barbarians pack committed and knowing that the ball would probably end up in the hands of JPR Williams, a man who could very quickly turn defence into attack. On this occasion, however, Duckham was already coming in off his wing, so JPR just slipped him the ball and off he went in thrilling fashion. That amazing dummy even fooled the cameraman who nearly let Duckham go out of shot as he scythed through the All Blacks until stopped by Sid Going. Brilliant stuff.

R.I.P. David Duckham (1946-2023)

*Not sure why it won’t embed properly but you’ll just have to click on the link!

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R.I.P. Richard Bower

Posted in Biographical, R.I.P., The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , on January 10, 2023 by telescoper

I was shocked and saddened this weekend to hear of the death from cancer of Professor Richard Bower of Durham University. Richard was a leading light in the Institute for Computational Cosmology (ICC) at Durham, though his research interests spanned observational and theoretical studies of galaxy and cluster formation as well as numerical studies. 

I heard the sad news via social media and there have many tributes to and personal reminiscences of Richard have been circulated from friends, colleagues and former students, including this lovely one by Josh Borrow. I’m sure there will be official obituaries in due course that do justice to Richards personality and achievements in teaching and research; I’ll add links when I see them.

If I can add a personal note, I only worked on one project with Richard, about thirty years ago while I was still at Queen Mary & Westfield College in London. Doing the project was tremendous fun – so much so that the paper we ended up writing bears little relation to what we thought it would be like when we started. We were both young then – I think Richard was about a year younger than me – and both had a tendency to fly off at tangents, but fortunately we were working with two responsible adults (Carlos Frenk and Simon White) who kept us in order. I think the paper we wrote is a nice one, but the real point is that the whole experience was so enjoyable that it was not only formative experience for me from an intellectual point of view but also left me with very fond memories. Whenever we met subsequently, which happened fairly frequently and conferences and on panels and the like, we always talked about what a great time that was. It’s hard to accept we’ll never have that conversation again.

I send heartfelt condolences to Richard’s family, friends and colleagues, both past and present, and in Durham and elsewhere. was an irrepressible and irreplaceable character who will be greatly missed by the entire cosmological community.

Rest in peace, Richard Bower.

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R.I.P. Pelé

Posted in Football, R.I.P. with tags , on December 29, 2022 by telescoper

The sad news broke tonight that Edson Arantes do Nascimento, best known to the world as Pelé, has passed away at the age of 82. It’s never easy to come to terms with the loss of a sporting legend, especially one who was a boyhood hero, and news of his death brought back a flood of childhood memories. I am old enough to remember watching the great Brazilian team of the 1970 World Cup finals that included the likes of Jairzinho, Rivellino, and Carlos Alberto, to name but three, which I think was the finest collection of players ever to grace a football field. It says something for the stature of Pelé that he stood out even among that remarkable side. As well as being outrageously skilful, Pelé had a great footballing brain, which manifested itself as a wonderful positional sense and great tactical awareness. Although by no means a tall man – he was 5ft 8 – he was also superb in the air.

After Argentina’s win in the recent World Cup in Qatar many people were quick to dub Lionel Messi the greatest footballer of all time. With no disrespect to Messi, I think the greatest player of all time is unquestionably Pelé, not least because he had far less protection from referees at the time than modern players do. Pelé may have played his football in a very different era, but his influence on the game was, and remains, incalculable. He was a legend.

R.I.P. Pelé (1940-2022)

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