It is Summer all right -- I'm complaining that we need more rain!

Sitemeter Sez: Someone from The Netherlands, searching for Josie Biereye; Madrid, Spain; Rollins, Montana (looking at Carol Buchanan's live-blog); Columbia Falls, Montana; Webster, New York; Singapore; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Grand Junction, Colorado; Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Oakland, California; Orange Beach, Alabama; Milwaukee, Wisconsin (One of the Cheney/Mills family); Portland, Oregon; Houston, Texas; Atlanta, Georgia; Chesterfield, Massachusetts; Slough, UK (between London and Heathrow Airport), and Warm Springs, Montana.

MORE New Mime Troupe History at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's FIRST illustrator of the 21st, for including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: The Plein-Aire Paint-Off is up at the Hockaday Museum of Art, fresh off the artists' brushes. Dan Fagre and Lisa McKeon's show is on the first level -- about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, it is a true labor of love by scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.
The Hockaday Museum of Art's Face Book Site (There's a link to the conventional website there.)

The other week, I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Media Watch: A videotape made from a film shot by the Royal Ballet in 1959 -- featuring Margot Fonteyn at the height of her powers, just before she started dancing with Rudolph Nureyev. The director was Paul Czinner, and it is pretty well filmed -- Gawd only knows how many takes they had to repeat for all those medium, long, and closeup shots. Michael Somes is Fonteyn's co-star, but the men's choreography was pretty dull in the first two pieces -- Swan Lake Act III, and fragments of The Firebird. (By the way, it is Igor Stravinsky's birthday today.) I liked the third section best -- quite a large segment of Ondine by Hans Werner Henz. There were more parts for men, and the guys all danced, rather than just postured and held the lovely ballerinas. The production was rather old-fashioned, even for the late 50's. The costuming tended to favor heavy fabrics, and the scenery was somewhat confining and overwrought. Fashions in both Modern Dance and Ballet would favor more lightness and sensuality onstage, even when this film was first released. Nureyev's career would soon literally take off, and male ballet dancers would leap at the chance to follow him into the air. Quick, strong, and charismatic Margot Fonteyn was by far the most inspiring aspect of the entire picture, and instead of retiring at the end of the decade, as was her plan, she became an even greater star.

What are the neighbors up to, lately?

I snapped this shot of a Whitetail Deer while walking near Woodland Drive last Monday evening about sunset.

Some cold nights with frost in some locations. The calendar SAYS it's Late Spring.

Sitemeter Sez: Gurgaon, India; Needham, Massachusetts; Renton, Washington; Albany, Oregon; Houston, Texas; Atlanta, Georgia, and Cerritos, California.

MORE New Mime Troupe History at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's FIRST illustrator of the 21st, for including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: The Plein-Aire Paint-Off is up at the Hockaday Museum of Art, fresh off the artists' brushes. Dan Fagre and Lisa Keown's show is on the first level -- about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, it is a true labor of love by scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.
The Hockaday Museum of Art's Face Book Site (There's a link to the conventional website there.)

The other week, I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Media Watch: Analog broadcast TV's supposed to go bye-bye after today. We'll still have it around here with low-power stations. There's only one network affiliate with a digital signal in this isolated area.

Congrats to NPR's Performance Today for their coverage of the Van Cliburn Piano Competition this year.

Montana Public Radio played Duke Ellington's important 1956 performance of Crescendo in Blue during drive-time today. It was from the restored live tapes which constitute Ellington at Newport (Complete). Paul Gonsalves' incredibly long and brilliant sax solo with Duke and a rhythm section is still unsurpassed. I heard an Afro-Beat International program not too long ago about Boston native Gonsalves' familial and musical roots in the Cape Verde Islands and New England whaling ships.

I finished the video of Toni Bentley at Harvard, and won her enthusiastic approval. Next, I'll add some new photos to Ida Rubinstein's Website, thanks to Toni's scholarship.

Ida Rubinstein (High Patroness of our Blog) as Spring, in the painting Femme avec des Fleurs by Romaine Brooks circa 1914. In her lecture, Bentley made a joke about a drawing showing Ida's legs nearly emerging from right below her bosom. This painting isn't quite as obsessive, but Rubinstein WAS lean and high-waisted, with very long limbs.

Perfect Spring weather -- warmth followed by rain on THIS side of the Rocky Mountains, but snow on the eastern side. Welcome to Montana.

Sitemeter Sez: Pico Rivera, California; Kaysville, Utah; El Cajon, California; Gttingen, Germany; Louth, Ireland (Hey There); Pittsboro, North Carolina; Edmonds, Washington; Perryville, Missouri; Zagreb, Croatia; Lausanne, Switzerland, and Los Angeles, California.

NEW Mime Troupe History at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's FIRST illustrator of the 21st, for including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: The Plein-Aire Paint-Off is up at the Hockaday Museum of Art, fresh off the artists' brushes. Linda Tippetts had to drive home through snow (see above). Dan Fagre and Lisa Keown's show is on the first level -- about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, it is a true labor of love by scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.
The Hockaday Museum of Art's Face Book Site

The other week, I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Media Watch: The Last Winter (2006) Directed by busy Larry Fessenden, who also co-wrote and co-produced it. Ubiquitous Ron (Hellboy) Perlman was an unpleasant crew chief in a doomed Arctic outpost, and I recognized journeyman actor Kevin Corrigan too. Fessenden did a cameo as a guy who was dead most of the time. The stunt-ravens from Britain got the best lines, and almost everybody croaked. I kind of like Fessenden's offbeat vampire flick Habit (1996), but thought this one was pretty derivative and uncompelling, despite being shot in Alaska and Iceland.

(Click for a larger image)
A multi-media re-creation of Katie Duck (L) and Debra Ryals (R) dancing under the theatrical lights at the Aspen Highlands Lodge just before New Year 1974-75. There are more of these painterly memory pics at http://theatrex.net/theatre/mt_pt5/index.htm

Oh no -- the streams and rivers are at full runoff, with local flood alerts, and they're talking drought because May was so dry towards the end.

Sitemeter Sez: Marion, Pennsylvania; Florence, Kentucky; Oakland, California; Arlington, Virginia; Stafford, Virginia; Alkmaar, Holland (nice little place in the tulip country); New York City, New York, Barcelona, Spain; Waroona, Australia; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Houston, Texas; The islands of Trinidad & Tobago, and Liege, Belgium.

NEW Mime Troupe History at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's FIRST illustrator of the 21st, for including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: Everything upstairs is making way for the Plein-Aire paint-off now that June has begun -- the new work will go up starting Saturday, fresh off the artists' brushes. Dan Fagre's show is on the first level -- about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, it is a true labor of love by scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.
The Hockaday Museum of Art's Face Book Site

Last week, I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Time Passages: The great Blues singer Koko Taylor passed away at the age of 80.
Montana Public radio devoted the whole evening to her music. As I said on Daily Kos: "The folks in the white-bread towns of NW Montana and the Native American reservations in between all love the Blues, and Ms. Taylor's being honored in her passing."

Media Watch: Some damn Bollywood flick with popular leading man Saif Ali Khan and ace comic actor Johnny Lever. I'm not even going to look up the title because it was so ridiculous. What little plot it had was concerned with mean fathers-in-law and a fake kidnapping. It was supposed to be a comedy, but was tedious to a fault instead. A lot of talent and money gone to waste. IMHO
Even the best players can strike out -- changing the subject, pitcher Randy Johnson just won his 300th game. I saw him play live in Seattle almost twenty years ago. He is six and a half feet tall, and throws really hard. Only about two dozen pitchers have won so many games in the last hundred and fifty years of Baseball history.
I've seen another one of that small circle play in front of me -- Nolan Ryan, but thanks to TV, I've also seen Warren Spahn, Steve Carlton, Tom Seaver, Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux, Don Sutton, the classy Phil Niekro, the cheating Gaylord Perry, and the whiney Roger Clemens. I was listening to the radio broadcast when Perry won his 300th around 1982 -- after that victory, American League umpires started throwing him out of the game at the first sign of his beloved, but illegal spitball, and he ended his career in the National League.

U.S. President Barack Obama visiting the Gizeh Plateau, across the Nile from Cairo University, Egypt, where he delivered a measured and moving speech earlier today. The Great Sphinx rises over him -- a possible image of definite pyramid-builder King Chephren from approximately 4000 years ago. Never forget that Humanity itself and Western Civilization arose out of Africa. It is good to acknowledge those facts, and give something back when we are able.

I've got to buy a new Rainbird sprinkler, my two others don't turn when they should, and the damn yard needs water. A variety of flowers are popping up one after another. The early bulbs are about done, and the poppies are beginning.

Sitemeter Sez: Paris, Ile-de-France; Venice, California; Louth, Ireland (Hi Mystery Pal!); Frankfurt Am Main, Germany; Herndon, Virginia; Las Vegas, Nevada, and Salt Lake City, Utah.

NEW Mime Troupe History at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's FIRST illustrator of the 21st, for including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: Seldom Seen II and Larry Johnson's photos of local characters are on display at the Hockaday Museum of Art, but everything's making way for the Plein-Aire paint-off at the start of June. Dan Fagre's show is up again -- about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, it is a true labor of love by scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.
The Hockaday Museum of Art's Face Book Site

Last week, I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Concerts: Danny Bedrosian, P-Funk keyboardist reports --
We had a blast in Argentina. I send all my love and respect to our friends and fans over in Buenos Aires for all their support.

We sold out three nights at La Trastienda. It was great. All three sets were slightly different and I cant remember all the songs, but it was a lot of what you would expect. Some rarities too though.

The entire crowd knew ALL the words, it was incredible. They were READY for the P for real!!!!!!

There is this one chant that the crowds specifically in Argentina do in between songs. On the third night, the crowd kept doing it (its a sign of respect from the crowd to a band they love) and we went into the chant that the crowd was doing, and turned it into a jam. It was DOPE. MANY MANY of my Argentine friends said that this has NEVER happened (that usually the band would just go into the next song, as this is a common thing that Argentine audiences do in between songs at concerts they like.) The chant was FONKY that they do too. REALLY FONKY.

I just want to send much love to all our fans in Argentina once again. It was a life changing experience and we all loved it

In Chile now, by the time this tour is over, including opening sets, it will have been 31 shows in 33 days for me.

BY THE WAY on the AMERICAN run on this tour, EVEN MORE amazing P-Funk rarities were played; If yall missed em, better ASK SOMEBODY!
Stinkfinger
Stillness in Motion
Black Beach
Back in Our Minds
Sir Nose D'VoidofFunk
Still Tight
Viagra
Handcuffs
Let's Take it to the People
Baby I Owe You Something Good
Stuffs and Thangs
I'll Stay

HOPE YOU DONT MISS IT NEXT TIME! MUCH LOVE TO THE BOARD! CHECK OUT MY NEW ALBUM MUZZLE MOOSICK!!
www.dannybedrosian.com

Digitized image from a YouTube video of George Clinton and the P-Funk All-Stars in Buenos Aires, Argentina last week.

Media Watch: THIS was an unlooked-for pleasure (see below). I got a number of Buck Rogers comic strips from 1958. I was in third grade when I read them fifty-two years ago. The Salt Lake City papers relegated this strip to the bottom of the "want ad" pages, along with the silly Etta Kett, Lank Leonard's archaic Mickey Finn, John Cullen Murphy's realistic Big Ben Bolt, and my favorite -- Walt Kelly's magnificent satire Pogo.
I was given a wonderfully noisy ray gun toy the previous year that had the letters Buck Rogers emblazoned on it, and the name was thrown about on television, where I had seen space operas for much of my young life, like Space Patrol, Commando Cody, and two versions of Flash Gordon. I liked Buster Crabbe's adventures, but was somewhat puzzled by Steve Holland's escapades. The former had much more attractive women, as well. It was very satisfying to finally learn who and what Buck Rogers actually WAS! I joined the Rocket Rangers too, by sending a torn-out scrap of the newspaper. I received a map of the Solar System and a membership card by return mail.

(Click for a larger image.)
Just one strip from Murphy Anderson's brief second run as artist of Buck Rogers 1958-59. I happen to remember these very panels -- It was the end of a storyline, and I learned the word "famished" when Buck asked the good Doctor Polaris out for a dinner date after a near-fatal space battle with furry Martian spacefarers. I guess I should have noticed Murphy Anderson's signature, because he worked on some of my favorite comics -- especially Adam Strange, but I missed those kinds of things in elementary school. Anderson's clean silhouettes and deft inking are still impressive to me -- I think aspects of this respected, but far-from famous commercial artist's aesthetics sank in to my conciousness over the years.

Spring is finally here, and I'm watering my newly-mown lawn. Killdeer (Plovers) are singing all over the college.

Sitemeter Sez: Venice, California; Louth, Ireland (My mystery pal, who's always welcome); Frankfurt Am Main, Germany; Herndon, Virginia; Las Vegas, Nevada, and Salt Lake City, Utah.

NEW Mime Troupe History at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's FIRST illustrator of the 21st, for including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: Seldom Seen II and Larry Johnson's photos of local characters are on display at the Hockaday Museum of Art, but everything's making way for the Plein-Aire paint-off at the start of June. Dan Fagre's show is up again -- about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, it is a true labor of love by scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.

Last week, I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Ch-Ch-Changes: A Los Angeles judge gave record producer Phil Spector nineteen years to life for killing B-movie actress Lana Clarkson. He bullied people for decades with his handguns, in and out of the workplace, and it says terrible things about our society that he eventually murdered a beautiful young woman while indulging his violent power trips. One day I'll write about the positive things Spector did, but they all happened a long time ago, and I don't feel like doing it now.

Media Watch: My OWN media -- I'm putting the finishing touches on a video made from Toni Bentley's power point slides and a sound recording of her lecture at Harvard about dancer Ida Rubinstein for the 100th Anniversary of the Ballet Russes debut in Paris. If it plays without any technical problems, it goes to Toni for her feedback and eventual approval.

Ida Rubinstein, High Patroness of this Blog, as she appeared before WWI, re-creating her onstage dancing for the camera.