Will This Building Provide Affordable Housing In Harlem?

This building at the corner of Lenox Avenue and 116th Street in Harlem has been empty of tenants for years. Recently scaffolding has been erected around it. So maybe it will soon be turned into affordable housing. We'll see.

James Baldwin's Centennial Year

This year, in August, will mark what would have been the esteemed novelist/essayist James Baldwin's 100th birthday.

A Masked Giraffe On Manhattan's Upper West Side

This masked giraffe (not a real one, obviously) was seen outside a liquor store on Columbus Avenue in Manhattan during the COVID-19 pandemic. Was it a subtle reminder to patrons to wear a mask before entering the store?  Recently the giraffe was seen without the mask.

The Dave Brubeck Quartet's Classic "Time Out" LP

Time Out, recorded in 1959 by the Dave Brubeck Quartet, is one of my favorite jazz albums. ("Take Five," the hit jazz tune, is on the album.) I have both the long-play vinyl record and the CD. 

Brubeck in the CD's liner notes said that "[c]reating a 'hit' out of the odd-meter experiments of Time Out was the farthest from any of our minds...when [we] went into the studio to record."

I love the above photo. It appears in the reissued CD's booklet. Paul Desmond, the alto saxophone player as well as the composer of "Take Five," did his own thing by wearing a suit and tie and didn't try to copy what his bandmates wore. He was cool and confident.

Philip Payton, The Father Of Black Harlem

Philip Payton, The Father of Black Harlem is a book on my to-read list. It's a biography, by the scholar Kevin McGruder, of the African-American real estate mogul Philip Payton, who played an important role in establishing Harlem as the capital of Black America. Any study of Harlem history must include his name. As a native son of Harlem, I am interested in his story.

Community Gardens, A Solution To Urban Food Deserts?

Community garden, Harlem, 127th Street, near Lenox Avenue.

The Village Vanguard, A Jazz Mecca

The Village Vanguard, one of New York's storied jazz venues, located on Seventh Avenue South, at 11th Street, in the West Village. Among the musicians who've performed there are Miles Davis (trumpeter), Sonny Rollins (saxophonist), Thelonious Monk (pianist), Carmen McRae (vocalist), Bill Evans (pianist), and Gerry Mulligan (saxophonist).