3.1

3.1 books read.

1st up, "Usurpation" by Sue Burke, 2024, 314 pages, 97k words. Book 3 of the Semiosis series. I enjoyed the other 2 OK, with some reservations. This 1 was a bit slow starting, then once it got moving, a 15 year jump to the future. The author says the pacing is odd due to the main narrator being a very long-lived, immobile, intelligent plant.

Next, our 0.1 book: "The Wood at Midwinter" by Susanna Clarke, 2024, 64 pages, 3k words, illustrated. A tiny, cute little story about a saintly girl whose best friends are dogs, a pig, and a woods. A very simple story, I completely forgot how it ended. So i took 10 minutes & read it again. At $10.99 for the eBook, not much of an entertainment value.

3rdly, "The Mercy of Gods" by James S. A. Corey, 2024, 385 pages, 119k words. Book 1 of The Captive's War series. Incredibly powerful aliens with various client races show up and overrun a human world, taking prisoners to see if a use can be found for humanity.

These guys write well, but I must take exception with some of the chapter endings early on.

Chapter 1:

Later, when he stood in the eye of a storm that burned a thousand worlds, he’d remember how it all started with Else Yannin’s hand on his arm and his need to give her a reason to keep it there.

Chapter 4:

Later, it would seem like a premonition.

I would characterize this as cheesy, heavy-handed foreshadowing. These guys are better writers than this. This is an editing failure. Both those sentences could be deleted & everyone would be better off for it.

Lastly, a novella set in the world of the previous story: "Livesuits" by James S. A. Corey, 2024, 70 pages, 21k words. A different take than the novel, with humans fighting back. It has a very "Starship Troopers" kind of feel. Kind of an "Oh no!" ending. I liked how these authors used these shorter works to flesh out their universe in The Expanse, I think this is a good technique.

Well as short as that last 1 was, the post title probably should have been "2.4" instead of "3.1".

IslandWalk Birds, 2023-2024 Season

The wood stork flew in, landed ~15' from the great egret, &
started walking toward it.
The great egret didn't want to hang & flew off.

My overall birdwatching strategy for IslandWalk is posted here. I have made that post kind of the home page for my Birdwatching in IslandWalk project, and will update it whenever I do a new post on IW Birding.

This is my 4th report, here are the 1st 3:

1. 2020-2021;
2. 2021-2022 - the 1st post chronologically, it contains discussions of things I found interesting about a lot of the species - 10 seasons worth;
3. 2022-2023.

For the 2023-2024 season, I was in IslandWalk October thru April, less 1 week in Martinique in February, & 2 weeks in KY in March.

I manually entered this season's data, 32 bird lists, in this spreadsheet. It doesn't take that long, and it gives me a good review of the data.

I will be reporting for all observed species the following 4 datapoints:

1. % of days seen;
2. total birds counted;
3. average;
4. max.

Here's the link to the IslandWalk hotspot at eBird.org.

Each bird name listed below is linked to its IslandWalk activity page in eBird.org. So click on the name, you will get a picture & all the data eBird has on that bird in IslandWalk.

Swimmers

I guess all are dabbling "ducks"? "Dabbling" === "stick your bill down in the water & swish it around & eat what you get from that" - as opposed to diving ducks.

• mottled duck: % days 100; tot 1334; avg 41.7; max 85.
• muscovy duck: % days 100; tot 169; avg 5.3; max 10.
• common gallinule: % days 100; tot 622; avg 19.4; max 31. After 1st being counted in IW by me 2020-04-02, their #s continue to grow. In the 32 bird lists, there were 5 where the gallinules outnumbered the mottled ducks. The gallinule seem to like the more numerous reeds we have now.
• american coot: % days 75; tot 146; avg 6.1; max 15. From a total count of 3 the prior season to 146 this season.

Divers

• pie-billed grebe: % days 88; tot 148; avg 5.3; max 14.
• hooded merganser: % days 31; tot 147; avg 14.7; max 36. They were here from late November to early February.
• lesser scaup: % days 31; tot 547; avg 54.7; max 94. We had quite a flock of these. They were on Lake #22 for quite a while, then spread to Lakes 24-29 for their last couple of weeks. They were here from the new year to early March.
• ring-necked duck: % days 6; tot 14; avg 7.0; max 10. 10 in early December, 4 in late January???
• double-crested cormorant: % days 91; tot 140; avg 4.8; max 12. No sign of a Cormorant Menace, yay!
• anhinga: % days 81; tot 93; avg 3.6; max 10.
• brown pelican: % days 41; tot 28; avg 2.2; max 4.
• belted kingfisher: % days 31; tot 10; avg 1.0; max 1. Their distinctive chitter is easy to recognize.

Waders

Wader numbers seem to be down in general. 1 theory I have is that the lakes have been so full. I think the waders prefer things more marshy.

• great egret: % days 97; tot 77; avg 2.5; max 4. No longer our most numerous wader.
• great blue heron: % days 41; tot 19; avg 1.5; max 2. Down from last season.
• snowy egret: % days 59; tot 54; avg 2.5; max 7. Down from last season. I last counted a snowy egret on 3/12.
• cattle egret: % days 0.
• tricolored heron: % days 91; tot 82; avg 2.8; max 7. Down from last season, but our most numerous wader this season.
• little blue heron: % days 88; tot 79; avg 2.8; max 11. Down slightly from last season.
• green heron: % days 16; tot 5; avg 1.0; max 1.
• wood stork: % days 6; tot 2; avg 1.0; max 1.
• white ibis: % days 97; tot 423; avg 13.6; max 41.
• glossy ibis: % days 72; tot 210; avg 9.1; max 44.
• limpkin: % days 22; tot 8; avg 1.1; max 2. Considerably fewer than last season.

Beach Birds

• killdeer: % days 0.
• black skimmer: % days 0.

Raptors

• osprey: % days 47; tot 16; avg 1.1; max 2.
• bald eagle: % days 3; tot 1; avg 1.0; max 1.
• cooper's hawk: % days 3; tot 1; avg 1.0; max 1.
• red-shouldered hawk: % days 3; tot 1; avg 1.0; max 1.
• broad-winged hawk: % days 0.
• swallow-tailed kite: % days 0.
• loggerhead shrike: % days 88; tot 69; avg 2.5; max 7. 1 of my fav birds. Down a bit from last season.
• black vulture: % days 6; tot 2; avg 1.0; max 1.
• turkey vulture: % days 50; tot 31; avg 1.9; max 6.

Corvids

• fish crow: % days 81; tot 632; avg 24.3; max 76. I am increasingly thinking it is pointless to count crows. The proper caw goes out, 100 crows can gather in 30 seconds or so. Similarly, the vultures will show up in large numbers depending on the size of the fish kill. I created a formula column in the spreadsheet, = # birds - fish crows - black vultures - turkey vultures, I may play with that some.
• blue jay: % days 94; tot 376; avg 12.5; max 30.

Perching Birds (Passerines)

• mourning dove: % days 94; tot 198; avg 6.6; max 21.
• eurasian collared dove: % days 75; tot 75; avg 3.1; max 9.
• common ground dove: % days 0.
• rock pigeon: % days 0.
• common grackle: % days 96; tot 968; avg 38.7; max 70. Once again our most common passerine.
• boat-tailed grackle: % days 78; tot 86; avg 3.4; max 8.
• red-winged blackbird: % days 9; tot 7; avg 2.3; max 3.
• european starling: % days 9; tot 37; avg 12.3; max 32.
• northern mockingbird: % days 100; tot 744; avg 23.3; max 52.
• brown thrasher: % days 13; tot 5; avg 1.3; max 2. Quite a bit fewer than last season, but not a lot regardless.
• northern cardinal: % days 25; tot 10; avg 1.3; max 2.
• red-bellied woodpecker: % days 100, tot 303, avg 9.5, max 23. Up a little from last season.
• pileated woodpecker: % days 3; tot 1; avg 1.0; max 1.
• downy woodpecker: % days 3; tot 1; avg 1.0; max 1.
• northern flicker: % days 0.
• palm warbler: % days 81; tot 289; avg 11.1; max 35.
• black-and-white warbler: % days 0.
• yellow-throated warbler: % days 0.
• prairie warbler: % days 0.
• blue-gray gnatcatcher: % days 3; tot 2; avg 2.0; max 2.
• gray catbird: % days 0.
• american redstart: % days 0. NEW! I saw 2 of these 1 morning walking to town center. The orange patches made the ID easy.

Or Not

I really was intending to starting blogging books on a onesy basis. But, I'm in a period of serious baby-sitting, and after I finished novel #1, it was inconvenient to blog it. Versus, it was very easy to start another book. So, 3 novels and a novella, all very good.

1. "Polostan", by Neal Stephenson, 2024, 320 pages, 111k words. This is Volume 1 of "Bomb Light". I think we're going to get Stephenson's version of "Oppenheimer". This is totally a setup book - the origin story is 1st, rather than get us sucked in & then tell it as a flashback. The heroine of the story mostly grew up in Big Sky Country, working on a ranch that bred polo ponies - that was her mom's side of the family. Her dad meanwhile is a dedicated commie. Nothing says "dedicated commie" like

   For Papa was busy translating the Twenty-One Theses of the Second Congress of the Third International into English, to inform the proceedings of the Red International of Labor Unions, which was preparing an ideological offensive to cleanse its ranks of naïve anarcho-syndicalism.

   The family moves to Russia when she is ~5YO, when grown she speaks fluent, accentless English & Russian. Heading into the race to the A-bomb, & the following cold war, which side will she be on? We'll find out, I guess.

   We get Neils Bohr early on in the story, & our heroine's 1st lover in 1933 is a young New York Jew named Dick - Feynman maybe?

2. "Alien Clay", by Adrian Tchaikovsky, 2024, 375 pages, 116k words. Tchaikovsky likes prison novels - this is his 2nd or 3rd. Interesting interstellar travel technique, some very, very novel biology on the target prison planet - totally different system of "evolution". As always, a great read.

3. "Spill", by Cory Doctorow, 2024, 103 pages, 31k words. The Bard of the Revolution delivers, as always. This is at least the 4th Doctorow story featuring Marcus Yallow, gifted hacker. These stories are all about civil resistance to the powers that be, & are somewhat reference manuals on how to fight back against police brutality crowd suppression methods.

   Our heroes of the revolution in this story are Water Protectors, trying to stop the latest zombie revival of the Keystone Pipeline. A lot of them are Native Americans. I did not know this:

   Native people serve in the armed forces at five times the rate of the general population.

   Lots of false flag operations, lots of subversion of local law enforcement by corporate $$$, Capitalism FTL!

   The emotional content of this story is outstanding, I gave it 5 stars.

4. "The Naming Song", by Jedediah Berry, 2024, 501 pages, 155k words. This is only Berry's 2nd novel. I enjoyed the 1st, which came out in 2014. He also did a deck of cards telling a story of generations of a weird family living in a weird house, with associated audio with 52 different people reading each card's excerpt - it's surprisingly enjoyable.
   

   This latest I really enjoyed. Post-apocalyptic, but the apocalypse has done some strange things. Very much a story about words. A most excellent read! Interesting characters, cards come into it, lots of action, great conclusion. I actually gave this story 5 stars, 2 in a row!

Still babysitting, ready to forge ahead ...

Ain't Misbehavin'

"Ain't Misbehavin'", subtitled "The Story of Fats Waller", by Ed Kirkeby in collaboration with Duncan P. Schiedt and Sinclair Traill, 1966, 248 pages. Trade paperback.

• 17 chapters. I think the 1st 13 chapters were mostly written by the collaborators in 3rd person. Then Ed Kirkeby takes over (when he becomes Fats' manager in 1938) and the last 4 chapters are written with him in 1st person;
• 16 pages of photos - nice! A large % of the people mentioned have a pic;
• 16 page listing of "The Music of Thomas "Fats" Waller; A Selective Discography by the "Storyville Team""; very comprehensive, & includes all personnel.

My review/precis of "Fats Waller" by his son Maurice listed the date of this book - the Kirkeby book - as 1975, gotten from ??? Meanwhile, the copyright in this soft cover trade paperback is 1966 - 11 years before Maurice Waller's 1977 book. Overall, I think Maurice's is the better piece of work. This 1 seems to get bogged down a couple of times~2x.

Ed Kirkeby (1891-1978) was Fats Waller's manager from 1938 until Fats' death in 1943. He 1st met Fats in 1935 as an A&R man for RCA Victor. Kirkeby was also a musician, band-leader, lyricist, and record producer. Fats' career had been greatly aided by Phil Ponce, his prior manager, but by 1937 or so Phil was getting old & was having health issues, so a new manager was needed, and Kirkeby got the gig.

Like the 1st Fats bio I posted about, I'm just gonna make a bulleted list of new things I found interesting.

• In London in 1938, Fats hung out & performed with Adelaide Hall, who had brought Art Tatum to New York. He also hung out with his old friend Spencer Williams, and ... Django Reinhart! No mention if Fats & Django played together.

• In Chapter 16, it's mentioned that Fats insisted on accompanying Maxine Sullivan at the Famous Door on 52nd St. in New York. I discovered Maxine's music working up "keepin' out of mischief now" - she had a nice intro for the song. I got 24 tracks of her music, & she does several other Fats' songs as well.

• Cab Calloway (1907-1994) was a buddy of Fats.

• Kirkeby's story of Fats' run-in with Una Mae Carlisle when he was supposed to be delivering tickets says that she was in the hospital. I wanted to review this, but I couldn't find it skimming [missing an eBook] :-(

• Kirkeby tells a completely different story of Fats' Jan 14, 1942 Carnegie Hall concert:

  This was the very first time a solo jazz artist had played Carnegie Hall, and Fats really came into his own. The reviews were terrific, and Fats got a tremendous ovation from the capacity crowd of 2,800 enthisiasts who jammed the hall.

  ??? Quite a different tale than the other bio. Saving face, maybe? I skimmed the 3rd bio I have looking for a tie-breaker, couldn't find mention of the Carnegie Hall concert. [Gawdammit, I miss my eBooks! I love books, but, it is much harder to create these reviews/precis from hardcopy books.]

• Kirkeby was white, & he numerous times expresses his outrage at Jim Crow and segregation problems Fats' band had on the road, not just in the South, but in the North & the mid-West as well.

• Finally, the most important new factiod! A FFTKAT!

  During prohibition, like most folks Fats drank bathtub gin. Post-Volstead, Fats drank Old Grand-Dad bourbon. Being from KY, my primary liquor is necessarily bourbon. I stock Maker's Mark, a top-shelf wheated bourbon. My dad was a (cheap) bourbon drinker, I remember Old Crow, which I tried recently. Maybe Old Grand-Dad too?

  Somewhere in Kirkeby's narrative, he mentions Fats drinking 100 proof Old Grand-Dad. I'm thinking, that's not right.

  Meanwhile, my bourbon-drinking mind wants to try the Old Granddad. &, if it's good, & cheaper than Maker's, maybe I'll stock it? To channel Fats? [LOL]

  So I look for it in Total Wine (which has incredible pricing on Maker's Mark, buy 2 1.75l bottles for $37.99/each. Incredible! Liquor Barn in Lexington is at $47.99). They have 1.75l of 86 proof Old Grand-Dad for maybe $30? I don't remember, because what caught my eye was a 1/5 of 100 proof for $32.99. Here's a pic on my liquor shelf.

  

  It's actually been moved to my freezer. Very good on the rocks.

  Note the spelling too. I had it as Granddad, the label is clearly GRAND-DAD !

  Channeling Fats ...

Well, 2 down 1 to go. The newer bio by an English author appears to be organized rather differently than these 1st 2. I think it will be a while before I get to it.

Oops! I Forgot

Back in April, I titled a book review post "Before I Forget" and said I was going to make that my new catchphrase.

Well, I waited too long, & I did forget 1 of the books I had read since the last book review post. Oops.

I think I will start doing 1 post/book, even if it is just science fiction, after I get caught up here.

1. "The Best Science Fiction of the Year Volume 3", edited by Neil Clarke, 2018, 816 pages, 252k words, 26 stories. I like that in his intro Clarke gives us the source of the stories (10 from online magazines, 6 from print magazines, and 10 from anthologies), and the size breakdown (2 novellas, 11 novelettes, 13 short stories). The stories are high quality. There was 1 standout story, by Rich Larson. It definitely smacks you upside the head, very violent, kind of John Wick-ish.

2. "Binti: The Complete Trilogy", by Nnedi Okorafor, 2019, 368 pages, 113k words. Actually a 2015 novella & 2017 & 2018 novels. I believe these won numerous awards. A young woman of a small tribe gets a chance to attend the best college in the galaxy offworld. The plotting is good, it went fast. The main character is engaging, and teaches us about the traditional Himba culture, including otjize: a butterfat & ochre clay mix that the Himba (increasingly mostly women) cover themselves with, including their hair. It protects against UV, IR, & insects, & acts as a cleansing agent, bringing dead skin with it as it dries & flakes off.

3. "The Best Science Fiction of the Year", Volume 4, edited by Neil Clarke, 2019, 818 pages, 253k words, 29 stories.
   Source breakdown: 11 from online magazines, 6 from print magazines, 11 from anthologies, 1 from collections;
   Size breakdown: 3 novellas, 8 novelettes, 18 short stories.

   I really went quite a way before any story jumped out at me. I think this may be short story fatigue setting in. There was a good Hannu Rajaniemi story I had read before. Then 3rd from last, an excellent story by Ken Liu. A cautionary tale re cryptocurrencies. Next, Rich Larson, a really nicely odd story whose protagonist is the only uplifted chimpanzee in existence, who of course works as a police detective. And finally, a Carolyn Ives Gilman story, very hard sci-fi, featuring life forms who only wake up & live when there are copious quanties of x- & gamma-rays present.

So I think no more short stories for a while. I started a 2nd Fats Waller biography, plus my friend David has already started reading the new Neal Stephenson novel, so I want to get to that.

"DeFi today is a circular speculative economy"

[Note, DeFi === Decentralized Finance: cryptocurrencies, NFTs, coins, etc.]

I think I did a pretty good rant analysis of "AI" BS, the newest unnecessary waste of energy, in my post "Bullshit All The Way Down".

I need to vent & do the same for crypto.

!!!!!SPOILER ALERT!!!!!

F#cking losers. Making $$$, so what, destroying the planet. Seriously, making $$$, providing 0 real value, wasting petajoules, either make it illegal or tax it out of existence.

What are my feelings about the immediately previous & ongoing bubble/grift, cryptocurrency?

Blockchain is an interesting technology. Bitcoin as a v0.5 POC (Proof Of Concept) for blockchain, maybe. But, we're 15 years in, this whole marketplace has not really found any useful applications. Bitcoin-based transactions are slow & expensive, & always will be. Ransoms, blackmail, criminal activities are currently their main use?

And NEVER FORGET, "proof of work"-based crypto systems are an environmental disaster. Sadly, McSweeney's had a parody PSA from the Department of Energy, thanking people for turning things off & down & savimg energy - to be squandered by AI & crypto.

I threatened promised this late July in a comment when I shared a Doctorow post on "The largest campaign finance violation in US history". This is Must-Read. Seriously, read the Doctorow article, give it a week to sink in, then come back & read my meager effort.

Welcome to the wild & woolie world of cryptocurrency! Spoiler alert! Largest campaign finance violator was Coinbase, a crypto exchange.

Vitalik Buterin, Mr. Ethereum, might be the only person in the crypto world that I kinda respect. The title of this post is a quote from Buterin. I think I read early summer where he said something similar. I am interpreting this to mean,

This whole BS DeFi is just us buying each others speculative virtual tokens & trying to figure out how to suck the general public into our scam.

He looks like a Dostoyevsky character, how can I not trust him?!?!? LOL!

[Note. I think my name may be on a patent, via Exstream Software, from ~2007, for Intelligent Documents, which I think is pretty much what the Smart Contracts (?) of Ethereum are. That patent would have passed from HP to OpenText.
I've thought about that since then, always concluded, smart => code => how confident are you in your testing of that code? You are sending it out into the cold, harsh world to represent your interests. I think the concept is fraught with peril.
LOL, I used that phrase, "fraught with peril", on some presentation on VAX/VMS system services I gave somewhere/early 80s, the attendees greatly liked the term ;->]

1 of my main sources of info is via my RSS Reader, NewsBlur - very reasonably priced. I am currently subscribed to 230 RSS feeds/blogs.

2-3 years agp, I subscribed to the feed of Coindesk. It is 1 of the biggest info hubs for crypto. It posts prolificly: I'd estimate 1-3 dozen stories/day. I seldom read stories, but, I scan headlines, every day, w/o fail. I will leave a random sample below in an appendix.

You kind of learn the cast of criminals. 1 or 2 women only. You recognize several recurring themes:

• Bitcoin or other cryptocurrency may or may not be correlated to outside economic factors.
• Whale investors must be carefully analyzed. Whaleomancy is a discipline fraught with peril!
• Fraudsters steal billions from gullible crypto investors.
• Cryptocurrency thought leaders love The Orange Turd, because he endorses them, because, grifters gonna grift.
• It is all pretty much completely speculative investing. Pump & dump, all that good stuff.
• Cryptocurrencies are going up & going down, hitting & missing targets, absolute & relative to each other. Bull & bear markets - so they have completely achieved a viable market - as long as they can keep pulling new suckers in.
  This type of finance is always to some extent a Ponzi scheme. I had a period when I was younger & ignorant when I invested in a lot of dividend stocks - which tended to be VCs. Every year or so, you would get hit up for an additional investment, to "keep the liquidity optimal".
• Sector leaders & founders are charged with fraud; go to jail; & get out of jail. I joked on twitter:

  The crypto industry is showing signs of maturity. The founders are starting to get out of prison.

One theme you don't see very often: somebody actually using this stuff to accomplish something useful! But, in the Appendix below, the CoinDesk headlines of Friday, Oct 11, there is actually such a post: "DePIN Promises Small Business Innovation in Emerging Markets"!

I think the whole thing is similar to derivative investiments. Ah, I found it - this post of mine references a study that states that the value of derivative investments is 5-10x all other forms of money put together. Man, all this stuff needs to be taxed at a 90% rate. No, 99%. It should be taxed out of existence. But, start at 50%, over 5-10 years raise to 99%. Let the grifters get some of their profits out, because ... ... ???

The tax rate should be determined by, how much did this transaction benefit the common wealth, versus being rent-seeking or some such other economic parasite. If I'm buying groceries, tax rate low or 0%. If I'm paying a "convenience fee" on my phone or whatever, tax rate 90% on the rentier.

As with all bubbles, it will pop. The question then is, as Doctorow examined in depth, what survives after the bubble pops? In the various web bubbles, lots of great web infrastructure & platforms were left behind. And bitcoin mining has created huge server farms, hopefully some of which were designed to minimize environmental impact. Already, as bitcoin mining becomes more expensive, miners are shifting their server farms to "AI" support. So "compute-intensive-grift-1" readily transforms into "compute-intensive-grift-2". Really sad. But, people are making money & growing the economy, so, it's all OK! Capitalism, FTL!

In David Graeber's "Debt: the 1st 5000 Years", Graeber posits that this eternal boom/bust cycle makes capitalism overall apocalyptic - the bubble will burst; Rome will fall. & with that, comes cynicism? nihilism?

No, it creates Moneyism: the only thing that matters is making money. Aka Financialization: the late stage capitalism insanity currently causing so many problems in the world, like the 'vacuum up, cash out, load w debt, sell off' VC-backed operations that are decimating so many small, medium, & large service industries. Doctorow has been all over this. This blog previously discussed financialization here, "Postcapitalism", by Paul Mason, a Brit.

Today, 2024-10-12, Doctorow teed off on crypto again. I should hurry up & get done here.

Meanwhile, f#cking crypto-bros are going all in for the Orange Turd for president, because, grifters hang together, &, grifters gonna grift. Great, yeah, there should be a federal cryptocurrency reserve. Holy f#ck, that is a Orange Turd level grift, you've conned the US of A into keeping a Scrooge McDuck treasure trove of your worthless Beanie Babies cryptocurrencies!

So, what happens next? Orange Turd reelection would greatly hearten the crypto-bros, including the sons, Beavis Fredo & Butt-Head Fredo, who now have their own crypto bank! Oooh, I smell a grift! How many months until it's bankrupt?

LOL, my wife just sent me this excellent article on Drumpft Crime Family crypto plans. Their visionary will be the youngest Drumpft brother, who, I am sadly really afraid, may be the grifter anti-christ. His dad is the greatest grifter in history - he grifted the POTUS job, FFS! & his mother is an incredible grifter, look at all the crap she has for sale!

Oof, I'm as bad as the xtians! I'm getting the youngest Drumpft bro as Mordred, & his mom Melanoma as Morgana, in "Excalibur". ?!?!?

Crap, he speaks fluent Slovenian w his mom & her parents. Orange Turd is only capable of grunting in Slovenian. Baby bro also speaks french. Je parle le francais aussi. :(

Phew! Gawd! Thinking about the Drumpfts wears me out! Enuf for now!

Meanwhile, (BLUE WAVE!!!), on the other hand, if rule-of-law prevails (BLUE WAVE!!!), I think the right thing to do would be to outlaw anything that exceeds an energy/transaction limit. Prolly won't happen, next up, tax the hell out of it. Start at 50%, work up to 99%.

I think the tax rate should be based on, how useful to everyone is this energy use? We all have to live with the externalities - pollution & climate change - we should all have a say in how the planets sustainable energy budget is allocated.

Is this a new concept? Voting weighted by how much each person is affected by an externality? In voting based on externalities, poor folk should get at least 10x the votes of rich folk. Rich folk can insulate themselves from the easy climate problems. Ecological "sacrifice zones" are almost always in "black & tan" neighborhoods. I certainly will vote 0% for crypto, & maybe 5% for "AI" (LLMs).

Appendix

Here are the headlines from the Coindesk RSS feed for yesterday, Friday, 2024-10-11. I highlighted 2 headlines.

1. 12:43am Trump-Themed PoliFi Tokens Buck Bitcoin Downtrend as China Stimulus Hopes Return
2. 05:24am Former FTX Customer Sues Hedge Fund, Says It Reneged on Bankruptcy Payout Deal
3. 05:54am Binance Executive Tigran Gambaryan Denied Bail in Nigeria
4. 06:41am Bitnomial Exchange Sues U.S. SEC, Alleging Regulatory Overreach
5. 07:13am Bitcoin on Track for Record Sideways Action, With Eyes on November Elections as Bullish Catalyst
6. 08:01am First Mover Americas: Bitcoin Trims Thursday's Inflation-Led Losses
7. 09:28am CoinDesk 20 Performance Update: RENDER jumps 6.5%, With All Index Constituents Rising
8. 10:27am DePIN Promises Small Business Innovation in Emerging Markets
9. 10:58am FTX's Salame Hoped Dog Bite Would Delay Prison, But Tucker Carlson Derailed Effort [LOL!}
10. 11:04am Mt. Gox Postpones Repayment Deadline to 2025, Allaying Concerns of Bitcoin Selling Pressure
11. 11:26am [Opinion] Has Ethereum Lost Its Way?
12. 12:13pm Scroll Airdrop Allocation Met With Dismay From Farmers
13. 01:12pm Arkham's Token Soars 16% on Report Sam Altman-Backed Crypto Firm Plans Derivatives Exchange
14. 02:48pm Trump-Supported World Liberty Financial Will Start Public Token Sale Next Week
15. 05:27pm Bitcoin Bounces 7% Above $63K as Crypto Traders Eye China Stimulus Statement

The 2 highlights:

1. #8, bolded - a claim to an sctual real world use!!! There are SO few of these.
2. #13, italicized - "Derivatives Exchange". They've got themselves a market ecosystem here, hell yeah, derivatives!!! Is the derivative of "worthless" "worthless"?

p.s. Beanie Babies! Beanie Babies! Beanie Babies! None of the crypto-bros look old enough to remember Beanie Babies! Better jump in, don't be left behind, fortunes are being made!

Well, at least you got cute little stuffed doggies, vs a # in a wallet on your phone, which hopefully won't get hacked & taken. Or maybe you got a fabulous NFT of a bored chimp! Kudos! [Sarcasm]

I'm definitely getting too old for such aggregious BS!

Fats Waller

"Fats Waller", by Maurice Waller and Anthony Calabrese, Foreword by Michael Lipskin, 1977, 235 pages. Trade paperback.

• Foreword by Michael Lipskin (9 pages);
• 12 chapters;
• 22 page listing of Recording Dates and Personnel;
• 4 page listing of Fats Waller's Published Songs;
• 4 page listing of Fats Waller's Unpublished Songs;
• 1 page listing of Fats Waller's Piano Rolls (22 tracks);
• 12 pages of Song Arrangements: sheet music for 3 songs:
  1. ain't misbehavin'
  2. anita - Fats' 2nd wife, mother of 2 of his 3 kids. Beautiful tune, in my list.
  3. got religion in my soul - apparently unpublished? Antitheist hackles raised?!?!? Never before with Fats ?!?!? But. Fats dad was a deacon, Fats was religious in principle, but statisically, not so much so. Still, Don't gimme dat ol time religion, it ain't NOWAY good enough for me.
• 4 pages of 2 column Index.

I have been a Fats Waller fan for over 50 years. I was turned on to Fats in 1970 by Del Hilgartner, founder, leader, keyboard player, lead vocalist, blues harpist for Blue-Eyed Boy, Mr. Death, 5 piece rock band. I was lead guitarist, 1st harmony vocalist.

I 1st posted about My Fats Waller Project 2021-03-09. I have used that post as a status page that is updated every time I add a Fats song. Started with 14, up to 42 now, woo-hoo!

Here is my Fats Waller playlist on YouTube, the 42 Fats songs I have recorded (as of 2024-10-08).

I started a post "A Tale of Two Guitarists" (Al Casey & James Smith) over on my Jaz Dumoz Music Blog. Conventional wisdom is that Al Casey was the guitarist for Fats Waller & His Rhythm for its whole lifetime, 1934-1942. But, in my project, I went through the track listing for the 3 RCA Victor Vintage Fats albums I bought in 1970, and in ~1/3, 1935-08-02 thru 1936-02-01 the guitarist is James Smith. Horribly unsearchable name, no web page, no pix for James Smith?

Anyway, while trying to figure out the chronology of these 2 guitarists, I thought, "I should read a bio of Fats." So, I did, yay!

This book is an easy read, & very informative. This review/precis will be a list of the things I enjoyed the most, in no particular, I think, vaguely chronological order.

• Fats was born 1905-05-21, in NYC, and grew up in Harlem.

• Fats got his start professionally playing organ or piano in theaters for silent movies. He would learn how to play songs by playing them on a player piano slow and moving his fingers to match the depressed keys. Between 1923 & 1927 Fats recorded 22 piano rolls. I've had an album with 13 of these for years.

  Fats had formal piano lessons as a child, and as an adult had lessons from a classical pianist. [Couldn't find the name scanning the index - I miss my eBook!]

  Rent parties were also an early source of income. These typically had several pianists who would put on a "cutting contest", trying to outplay each other. George Gershwin (1898-1937) liked to go to rent parties. He and Fats became lifelong friends.

• Fats 1st met & played with Louis Armstrong (1901-1971) in 1923. Fats 19 YO, Louis 22. They became fast friends, and were always looking for chances to play together. It seemed like a lot of these happened in Chicago where Louis was based at the time.

• In Chicago, in 1926, Fats was kidnapped by minions of Al Capone & taken to play at Capone's birthday party.

  Frightened, Dad began to pound the keyboard with somewhat less than his usual gusto, but when he saw the enthusiastic response from Scarface and his buddies, he really began to swing it. In fact he swung it so hard, Capone kept him there several days, shoving hundred dollar bills into his pocket whenever he played a request, and filling his glass with vintage champagne whenever Dad (frequently) emptied it. After the birthday party was over, three days later, the thugs returned him to Chicago several thousand dollars richer.

• Also in Chicago, in 1930, outside the theater where Fats was playing, his wife Anita was almost kidnapped by thugs mistaking her for a showgirl. A doorman told them who she was & ran them off, but, gawdam, that was total PTSD shit for poor Anita. :(
  Fats wrote this song for her, the mother of 2 of his children: Anita.

• Fats also had a son by his 1st wife Edith, who divorced him after 2 years over his musician's lifestyle. Per Maurice, Fats frequently got "amnesia" with regard to his alimony payments when he was on the road. Fats was jailed a couple of times for getting behind on alimony payments, once being fetched back to New York from Chicago.

• Over the last decade or so, I had created a "genealogy" of jazz pianists:

  Jelly Roll Morton (1890–1941) ⇒
  Fats Waller (1904-1943) ⇒
  Art Tatum (1909-1956) ⇒
  Oscar Peterson (1925-2007)

  OK, 1st, Jelly Roll ⇒ Fats:

  Fats was mostly NYC, Morton was mostly New Orleans. Per the book they never met. They were supposed to play on a bill together in 1930, to display contrasting styles, but Morton was a no-show. So, no.

  Fats' predecessor, his mentor, was James P. Johnson, (1894-1955), generally considered the father of Harlem stride piano, which was perfected by his greatest student, Fats Waller.

  
  Johnson also acted as a father figure to Fats, whose father, a trucker & a church deacon, was initially dismissive of Fats' music. & Johnson's wife Lil was a mother figure to Fats, whose mother died when he was 15 YO.
  [I bought 11 tracks, 1921-1926, of Johnson's music on Amazon, for $10.39! Nice!]

  Other early influences:

  • Willie "The Lion" Smith, 1893-1973. Another early stride giant - Del also pointed me at him, but I just recently bought some tracks, &, I far prefer Fats. After being originally unimpressed with Fats, The Lion helped him find some of his first gigs and was a lifelong friend;

  • Clarence Williams (1893/1898-1965) - "an American jazz pianist, composer, promoter, vocalist, theatrical producer, and publisher." He encouraged Fats to start recording & publishing his music, and in the summer of 1923, his band recorded several songs written by Fats, so Fats' 1st composing credits. 19 YO.

    Wow, from the Wikipedia article:

    Two of his 1924 recording bands, "The Red Onion Jazz Babies" and "Clarence Williams' Blue Five" featured cornetist Armstrong and soprano saxophonist Bechet, two of the most important early jazz soloists, in their only recordings together before the 1940s.

    What a lineup! Armstrong & Bechet! !!! ??? !!!

  • Andy Razaf (1895-1973). Fats' most well-known & prolific collaborator. He composed the lyrics to some of Fats' biggest hits. From Wikipedia:

    Razaf was born in Washington, D.C., United States. His birth name was Andriamanantena Paul Razafinkarefo. He was the son of Henri Razafinkarefo, nephew of Queen Ranavalona III of the Imerina kingdom in Madagascar, and Jennie Razafinkarefo (née Waller), the daughter of John L. Waller, the first African American consul to Imerina. The French invasion of Madagascar (1894-95) left his father dead, and forced his pregnant 15-year-old mother to escape to the United States, where he was born in 1895.

    Man, was european colonialism some of the worst shit in all of history, or what? I am a francophile, but WTF could make them think they had the right to invade Madagascar?!?!?

    Gawd, I love that name! 7 syllables, 1, 6 syllables! It just rolls off of the tongue! Seriously, speak it out loud.

    Andy was a poet, his name is a poem, & I believe that poetry works much better when spoken aloud.

    Andy saw Fats win a piano contest in 1923. He approached Fats, they hit it off, and a great songwriting duo was created!

  • Spencer Williams (1889-1965) "was an American jazz and popular music composer, pianist, and singer." It's interesting to me that with the popularity of "cutting contests", multiple pianists would frequently work together.

  • J.C. Johnson (1896-1981) was a pianist & songwriter who collaborated with Andy Razaf as well as Fats.

  Back to my genealogy, Jelly Roll ⇒ Fats: No way.

  But the next, Fats ⇒ Art Tatum, largely correct!

  Art arrived in NYC in 1932 from Toledo OH, as the accompanist of singer Adelaide Hall (1901-1993). [Note, just ordered on Amazon "Centenary Celebration" by Adelaide Hall, 52 tracks, $12.12, FTW!] People told Fats he had to check out the new kid. Fats did & was greatly impressed. So he recruited James P. Johnson & Willie "The Lion" Smith to join him in a cutting party with the new kid. In 1932, Art is 23 YO, Fats is 28, James P. 38, Willie 39. [The book says Art is 18???]

  James P. and Dad were eager to do battle with Tatum at the piano, so they searched for a club with a suitable instrument, eventually chosing Morgan's, a small Harlem bar. ...

  Pop urged Art to take the stool and show off his stuff. Art played the main theme of Vincent Youmans' big hit, 'Tea for Two', and introduced his inventive harmonies, slightly altering the melodic line. Good, but not very impressive. Then it happened. Tatum's left hand worked a strong, regular beat while his right hand played dazzling arpeggios in chords loaded with flatted fifths and ninths. Both his hands then raced toward each other in skips and runs that seemed impossible to master. They crossed each other. Tatum played the main theme again and soared to an exciting climax.

  [Art Tatum is the king of the arpeggio! Make sure and follow the links to the 2 songs he did. Unbelievable virtuosity.]

  Reuben Harris looked around at the open-mouthed faces of Harlem's Waller, Willie "The Lion", and James P. Jimmy took the stool and played "Carolina Shout" as if his hands were possessed by a demon. But it wasn't good enough. Next Dad toook over and played his own specialty, "Handful of Keys." The crowd cheered when their hometown boy finished, but it appeared as Tatum still had a slight lead. Tatum followed Dad and had the place jumping with "Tiger Rag". James P. had one last trick up his sleeve, his brilliant version of Chopin's "Revolutionary Etude". Dad told me he never heard Jimmy play so remarkably, but the performance fell short. Tatum was the undisputed king. In comradeship the four threw their arms affectionately around each other and Tatum was duly toasted.

  James P. remembered the occasion and commented, "When Tatum played 'Tea for Two' that night I guess that was the first time I ever heard it really played."

  [Note, I added the links to the videos of the songs mentioned. Kind of fun, to reproduce the songs as they were played that night. Sadly, I could find no recording of James P. Johnaon playing Chopin's "Revolutionary Etude", so I included some rando's version. Imagining this song being played by the father of Harlem stride piano is left as exercise to the reader!]

  Art was quoted saying that the biggest influence on his style was Fats. He learned as Fats did, from piano rolls of James P. Johnson - and Fats.

  There are several stories of the times Fats paid respects to The King, Art Tatum.

  Back to my genealogy, Art => Oscar : Peterson was a Canadian, born in Montreal, which is a jazz city. [Here I am sitting with Oscar Peterson at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, ON, Canada, 2021-08-19.]

  
  Plus he was a later generation, born 16 years after Art. Reading through his Wikipedia article, I was thinking this would be a dead end, but, starting the section titled "Musical styles & influnces":

  Peterson was influenced by Teddy Wilson [(1912-1986)], Nat King Cole [(1919-1965)], James P. Johnson, and Art Tatum, to whom many compared Peterson in later years. After his father played a record of Tatum's "Tiger Rag", he was intimidated and disillusioned, quitting the piano for several weeks. "Tatum scared me to death," said Peterson, adding that he was "never cocky again" about his ability at the piano. Tatum was a model for Peterson's musicianship during the 1940s and 1950s. Tatum and Peterson became good friends, although Peterson was always shy about being compared to Tatum and rarely played the piano in Tatum's presence.

  Wow! So in addition to blowing away Fats, The Lion, and James P., Art Tatum also blew away the next generation, Oscar Peterson.

• Fats really didn't like boogie woogie. I am defining that as playing dominant 7th or 9th chords & adding 6s over the 5s, & maybe also adding 3's over the 1, or maybe playing scales - a staple of rock-n-roll & blues shuffles. Here's a random sample from YouTube! Not bad!

  Here's Fats' words from a New York Times interview shortly before his death:

  "That's music," he said after he had finished [playing "Tea for Two"]. "Subdued and not blantant. None of this boogie woogie stuff that's just monotonous. Boogie woogie is all right if you want to beat your brains out for 5 minutes. But for more than that you got to have melody. Jimmy Johnson taught me that. You got to hang onto the melody and never let it get boresome."

  Interesting, "Up Jumped You With Love", the last song Fats sang on a recording with His Rhythm, 1942-07-13, has an instrumental break & last verse that are very boogie woogie. I worked up the song a few months ago & noted how odd that was. I cannot immediately recall any other song where Fats plays boogie woogie licks like in this song.

  So the choice is between playing boogie woogie I IV Vdom7 or playing 'Rhythm' (I got rhythm) - I vi ii Vdom7. Also, boogie woogie is the flat tire beat, which is triplets. You go to a blues festival, 1/3 of the songs will be flat tire beat shuffles.

• Una Mae Carlisle (1915-1956) was quite a character. I 1st came across her name on the UCSB DAHR - Discography of American Historical Recordings - page for Fats Waller and His Rhythm. She is listed on the recording of "i can't give you anything but love", 1939-11-03:

  Una Mae Carlisle; Fats Waller and his Rhythm
  Jazz/dance band, with female-male vocal duet (take 1); with male vocal solo (take 2)

  Fats' manager decided that for Fats to get national airplay, he should move to Cincinnati OH & play on WLW, 1 of the strongest radio stations in the USA. After a demo or 2, Fats was given a 2 year contract. The Waller family moved to Cincinnati, OH late in 1932. The regular show gave Fats a chance to grow confident in his singing, and to start his smart-alec patter when he found the lyrics just a bit too trite. The show lasted through 1933.

  Meanwhile, Una Mae Carlisle was growing up (17 YO in 1932) in Xenia, OH - near Dayton, not far from Cincy. She was a piano prodigy, performing publicly since she was 3 YO. She won a vocal contest & impressed Fats into inviting her to come to Cincy to play in his 1932 Xmas programs. She was still in high school, her parents were against it, but sent a sister along to chaperone. It didn't go well.

  In short order Una Mae became Dad's shadow. Everywhere he was, she was close behind. Pop taught her to drink and to stay up late and party. Their relationship soon went far beyond the protégé-master level. Una Mae moved into a boarding house just across the street from where we were living, and when Christmas vacation ended, she refused to return to Xenia or school. Her mother came to town to fetch her but, after Una Mae carried on, vehemently, Mrs. Carlisle returned home without her. The only consession Una Mae would agree to was to move across town to live with friends. If Mrs. Carlisle was unhappy, my mother [Anita] was no more pleased with the turn of events. And when Una Mae became a regular on the show, Mom started talking about how she'd prefer to go back to New York and place me in a Harlem school. [And shortly thereafter did so.]

  Fats' show was a monster hit, so they decided to take it on the road for the summer. Meanwhile, I think Una Mae was just a bit too intense for Fats - damn, Una Mae was close to a force of nature, what a talented woman! - & he was trying to figure out how to dump her. They bought a car together to drive to a gig in Louisville (80 miles SW of Cincy), Fats leaves without her, she takes the train & finds him, & that was a scene - Una Mae stepping in front of the car.

  She eventually went her own way &, per her Wikipedia page, had a great career.

  • Her 1941 song "Walkin' By The River" made her "the first black woman to have a composition appear on a Billboard chart".
  • She had her own radio show, The Una Mae Carlisle Radio Show on WJZ-ABC, making her the "first black American to host a national radio show".

  I've only been able to find 5 tracks of her music on Amazon, "Una Mae Carlisle And Her Jam Band", 1944. Oh, another 8 on Apple. She also has 2 numbers in this incredibly good/bad movie, "Boarding House Blues" (1948). This movie will get its own post.

  Here's an incredibly detailed & good article about her. I lifted this photo & caption from there.

  

  She appears in the book 1 more time, in London in 1938. Fats was there with a big (24 pc) band, & had bought the whole band tickets to a benefit concert, & was supposed to deliver them to the band at the stage door. On his way there he runs into Una Mae, who was living & performing in London at the time.

  She told him that she had been feeling very poorly and they began to talk.

  Fats spent the rest of the day with her. His bandmates did talk their way into the benefit concert.

  She died in November, 1956, only 40y 10m old. She outlasted Fats, tho, who only lived to 39y 7m. But they both beat George Gershwin, who died at 38y 10m. The good die young. :(

• After Cincinnati, Fats moved back to Harlem to be reunited with his family. He was hired by WCBS in NYC.

  Columbia had Dad working regularly, appearing on many programs, particularly "Harlem Serenade". He was a name now, recognized all over the country, and Victor was ready to deal. Pop was offered a Victor recording contract wihch guaranteed him three percent on all records, plus a one hundred dollar advance for each selection, whether it was issued or not.

  Fats put together his band carefully. The guitar player, Al Casey (1915-2005), was an 18 YO high schooler, a cousin of The Southern Suns, with whom Fats had worked. More on him below.

  On 1934-05-16, Fats Waller and his Rhythm recorded their 1st 4 tracks. From then to their final recording date 1942-07-13, per the DAHR database, they recorded 307 tracks. A handful of tracks with other vocalists:

  1. With Herman Autrey 1935-08-20, "Loafin' time";
  2. With Dorothea Driver 1937-10-07. "Call me 'Darling'". Googling this woman's name returns only this record in the DAHR database. No record of this recording. I worked the song up anyway, as part of my 1937-10-97 project - I have recorded the other 6 songs from this recording session, once I record CMD I will create a blog post about these 7 songs. I luv the DAHR database. There are a couple of other Fats Waller and His Rhythm sessions where I'm doing most of the songs, so it seems appropriate to fill those out & post about them. Nice 1/2 set lists. On my TODO.
  3. With Una Mae Carlisle, 1939-11-03, "I Can't Give You Anything But Love". See above. I just found this video of hers from 1946, "T'ain't Yours". She is 31 YO, saucy, sassy, confident, joyful, goddam, how alluring! Playful, like Fats! & I luv her bad teeth! & her piano solo makes you remember, she was a protégé of Fats Waller! But, gawdam, dat rook rike trouble to me!!!

     She is referenced as "the 'Walkin by the river' girl", so here's that tune. Nice, going in the list!

  4. With the Deep River Boys, a gospel/barbershop quartet, 1942-07-13, Fats Waller & His Rhythm recorded their final 4 tracks:
     1. By the light of the silvery moon, w the Deep River Boys.
     2. Swing out to victory
     3. Up jumped you with love. The last song Fats sung with His Rhythm. Already mentioned, + & - now.
     4. Romance a la mode, w the Deep River Boys. In the list, will get to it soon. Oh boy, a "romance as food" song, I can pair it with "you're my dish" and "you go to my head".

  For most of this period, Fats was RCA Victor's top recording artist. Fats sold well with white people as well as blacks. Here's a pic from YouTube, I can't get over the faces of the people. Adulation? Worship? Love?

  

• Al Casey (1915-2005) was the guitarist at the creation of Fats Waller and his Rhythm, 1934-05-16. He was from Louisville, KY (like me, yay!!!) & met Fats when he was still in high school at DeWitt Clinton in NYC. Fats told him to finish school - he could play on the recording sessions in NYC & tour with them in the summer.

  Oddly, for several of my early favorites, he was not the guitarist. The guitarist was James Smith, who is completely lost in internet anonymity. Per the appendix of this book, he played for Fats in recordings from 6 sessions, 1935-06-24 to 1936-02-01 - 41 tracks. Al is back 1936-04-08.

• Fats made 4 "soundies" (primordial music videos) in 1941. They are all so excellent, although I've never been a fan of "your feet's too big". Al Casey gets some screen time. I posted at 1 point I thought he might be James Smith - when I thought the video had been recorded in 1935-36 as some of the songs 1st were. The book sez, the 4 soundies were recorded in 1941.

  These are all so fun, I'm going to inline them all here.

  ain't misbehavin'

  I've been trying to identify the 5 dancers that appear in these. So far, 2 names, Paulene Myers & Vivian Brown. I don't think that the woman who sings in this one is Myra Johnson. I think Myra Johnson is the larger woman who appears in "the joint is jumpin".

  honeysuckle rose

  Al Casey gets some good screen time for his tasty solo. I have worked that solo up pretty much note for note.

  the joint is jumpin'

  This is such a fun song, when I recorded it I could not play it fast as Fats and his Rhythm.

  I'm pretty sure the woman who comes in with 2 attendants & sings at 1:22 is Myra Johnson. I grabbed a screen shot:

  
  In the summer of 1935, she & Fats were both playing Atlantic City. He liked her act & tried to get her to join his band. She didn't particularly want to work with another lead singer, but Fats talked her into it, and they developed some great duets, including 1 of my favs "two sleepy people". She toured with Fats on and off.

  The woman wrongly identified as Myra Johnson in "ain't misbehavin'" doesn't enter until 2:29 after the line "what is that that just walked in? Just look at the way it's twitchin'!" Some fine twitchin' indeed!

  I cannot get a name for this woman, who sings a lead on "ain't misbehavin'", which should give her a cred, yes? She is the star of this & "honeysuckle rose".

  LOL, I love the drummer, Slick Jones, in this one!

  your feet's too big
• As of 1936, Walter Winchell became a Fats fan and gave him lots of press.

  Winchell took a shine to my father and ofter referred to him as his favorite songwriter.

• Fats & Andy Razaf wrote the smash hit all-black musical "Hot Chocolates" in 1929.

• Fats was big in Europe, particularly England & Scotland. He recorded his London Suite in 1938. He also backed Adelaide Hall on organ on a couple of tracks, which I have, yay!

• 1942-01-14, Fats played Carnegie Hall, a lifelong dream. The 1st 1/2 of the program went well, but in the intermission, so many of his buds showed up backstage to toast his success, that Fats surprisingly drank too much & pretty much pooched the 2nd 1/2 of the concert. The reviews were scathing.

• In 1943, Broadway producer Richard Kollmar hired Waller to play a comic performer in the 1943 musical Early to Bed. When his classsical composer quit over artistic differences, Kollmar realized he had the perfect composer for the piece in Fats. But composing, performing, & gin proved to be to much for Fats, so his role became composer only. This was the 1st Broadway musical written for white folks by a black composer.

  [Boomer trivia, Richard Kollmar's wife was Dorothy Kilgallen, of "What's My Line" for decades. Small world ...]

• Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller died in Kansas City, on a train headed back to NYC, 1943-12-15, 39 years old, of pneumonia, probably assisted by Fats heavy drinking.

OK, done. 1 thing I will say about the book in general - it needed more dates. I spent too much time trying to figure out when a particular anecdote was taking place. I also really, really missed the features of an eBook.

I guess I'm kind of going whole hog here: I have 3 more Fats books on order:

1. "Ain't Misbehavin': The Story Of Fats Waller", by Ed Kirkeby (1891-1978), 1966, 276 pages. Kirkeby was Fats' manager, but he also was a musician and lyricist. He is credited as a collaborator for several songs, including "Up Jumped You With Love", the last song Fats sang on a recording with His Rhythm, 1942-07-13.
2. "Ain't Misbehavin'", by Thomas Fats Waller (Composer), 1983, 104 pages. It looks like this was published as a companion to the 1978 Broadway musical "Ain't Misbehavin'". 24 songs, not sure if it is just lyrics or charts too. I currently have only 1 Fats song that I think does not have the right lyrics: "Thief in the Night", the bridge.
3. "Fats Waller", subtitled "THE CHEERFUL LITTLE EARFUL", by Alyn Shipton, 2005, 194 pages. [Just arrived today, 2024-10-03.] "Alyn Shipton presents jazz radio programs for the BBC and is a critic for The Times in London. He is the author of several books on music, as well as a music publisher and editor."

Since Art Tatum & Una Mae Carlisle both tried to take over this post, I think we'll be seeing more of them in the future. I've stumbled across so many interesting (mostly female) singers from this period, I may do that as a post.