I’m from a jazz household, and true to that tradition, my youngest is learning to sing scat. Here’s Ella Fitzgerald, singing in that style. Enjoy.

I caught this via The Atlantic Wire, and they’re right that it’s brilliant, but it’s confident and unabashed, too.  Hathaway’s  confidence in the trying of something is noteworthy and admirable.  We’re in danger of becoming an oh-so-serious, earnest, and proper people.  I don’t believe that the danger will come to pass– I’m a great optimist…

Armatrading on the uncertain practical consequences of kind words – especially, one would guess, in difficult times.

Two songs for a summer day more than half a century later — Enjoy —

Here’s a protest song, about boxer Rubin ‘Hurricane’ Carter’s conviction (later overturned), but I’ve not posted it for a particular message. (The case is controversial, with conflicting opinions about his guilt; I don’t know.) Instead, it’s here because Dylan’s a powerful storyteller. I was listening to one of his albums recently, and the song reminded…

Sommer’s music is always a treat, and here he insightfully describes the many and particular problems of Dr. K’s foreign policy. Go, Ben, go:

YouTube – “The Pan Piper” by Miles Davis & Gil Evans.

Wisconsin native Woody Herman — YouTube – Woody Herman and his Swingin’ Herd 1964 .

Enjoy.