Hilary Kole's new album is Haunted Heart (Justin Time Records)
It's Bastille Day 2009 and what do I recommend you do
to celebrate the 220th anniversary of the storming
of the prison and the beginning of the end
of the old regime one thing you can do is sing
the Marseillaise (Berlioz version) but you can also
ignore the whole croissant and read Donald Hall's new
baseball poem in The New Yorker it's called "Meatballs"
but is really about baseball in nine parts, nine lines
each part, nine syllables each line, and tonight's the All
Star Game with Obama throwing out the first pitch
but I think I'll listen to Fred Astaire sing with Oscar
Peterson on the piano thanks to Stacey or maybe
try this fine new singer Hilary Kole whose last name
means voice in Hebrew or Anita O'Day whose last name
is dough in Pig Latin she has a version of "You're the Top"
that's jazz specific i.e. You're Tatum's left hand, You're
the Goodman swing band, you're Lester Young! but
whatever you do I hope you have the time to read
a French poem or two I recommend Rimbaud (did
you know Ashbery is translating the Illuminations)
and listen to Charles Trenet sing "La Mer"
which Bobby Darren of Bronx Science
sang in English somewhere beyond the sea
-- DL
