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The Blues Hall of Fame has named Eric Clapton, Little Richard and
Tommy Brown to be the newest inductees in their hall.
The
naming of two rockers supports the case that blues was one of the building
blocks of rock-and-roll and has remained instrumental in its sound. Clapton has
been chosen “for his many musical achievements as well as for his role as a
popularizer of the entire genre. He brought the blues to audiences in his native
Britain and throughout the world, illuminating the work of the original blues
artists who inspired him.”
Little Richard is well known as one of the pioneers of rock music
but his music was much more in the blues vein when he first started.
“…throughout his career, he continued to employ a blues format in his
work.”
Tommy Brown fronted the Griffin Brothers on two of their major
hits, Tra-La-La (1951 / #7 R&B) and Weepin’ & Cryin’ (1952 / #1
R&B). “He brought his intuitive sense of showmanship to the blues over a
career that has now spanned over 75 years.”
The
official induction will take place during the 36th annual Blues Music Awards on
May 7. They will join over 130 other members of the hall.
The biographies from the Blues Music Hall of
Fame: Tommy Brown, hailed during the 1950s as “one of the most dynamic
entertainers in show business,” has spent most of the past four decades out of
the performing spotlight, but his resume of vintage records, onstage theatrics
and a 21st century career revival have brought him long overdue recognition
among current blues aficionados. Brown was a friend of fellow Georgia singer and
2015 Blues Hall of Fame inductee Little Richard when both were starting out, and
he remembers letting Richard sleep in his station wagon when times were tough. A
young James Brown picked up cues for his fabled stage show from both of
them.
Brown was born in Atlanta on May 27, 1931, and began performing as
a dancer when he was in the first grade. He also worked as a drummer before he
became a stand-up singer. But he did much more than stand, as the Atlanta Daily
World reported in 1953: “. . . he jumped off the stage, fell prostrate on the
floor, got up, banged his head on the wall then fell down on his knees and
wailed the blues.” Brown began recording in 1950 and sang (and sobbed) on the
No. 1 R&B hit Weepin’ and Cryin’ with the Griffin Brothers in 1951. The song
evolved from a real life experience, when he broke down while singing onstage as
he saw his fiance´ walk in with another man. Humor was an important part of his
show, however, and in the 1960s he began performing and recording as a
comedian.
After stays in St. Louis, Chicago (where he teamed on shows with
Otis Clay), and New York, Brown settled back in Atlanta in 1977 to run the
Landmark West Personal Care Center, a business his mother had founded. After
fans sought him out to interview him and book him on festivals in the U.S. and
Europe, he began traveling and recording again in the new millenium. His Classic
Tommy Brown CD, on his own Chittlin’ Circuit label, reintroduced listeners to
the rocking, crying and shouting blues he waxed on labels such as Savoy, King,
United and Imperial. “I’m looking to retire at 103.” he says, “and take up a new
profession — teach people how to love.”
Eric
Clapton has been tapped for Blues Hall of Fame induction not only for his many
achievements during a long and successful career but also for his role as a
popularizer who has brought the blues to audiences far more widespread than
those reached by the original bluesmen whose music inspired him. Clapton has
consistently included blues material on albums that have registered in the upper
echelons of the pop music charts. In the process Clapton has not only brought
new listeners into the blues fold but has generated royalties for the blues
legends whose songs he has covered–royalties often well in excess of those the
bluesmen earned from their own recordings.
The
first British musician inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame, Clapton was born in
Ripley, Surrey, on March 30, 1945. He identified with the power and uplifting
spirit of the blues from his early days as a guitarist, and amidst forays into
other genres has always remained a blues devotee. At the age of 18, as a member
of the Yardbirds, he played guitar on a Sonny Boy Williamson LP, and soon did
sessions with bluesmen Otis Spann and Champion Jack Dupree, not to mention the
influential work he did with John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, Cream and Blind Faith.
In between his many subsequent albums and world tours, he played on Howlin’
Wolf’s London Sessions and recorded with several of his early guitar heroes,
including B.B. King, Freddie King, Buddy Guy, Chuck Berry, John Lee Hooker and
Otis Rush.
Clapton topped the Billboard charts with an album of blues
standards, From the Cradle, in 1994, and with the blues-laden Unplugged album in
1992, and hit the top ten with his Robert Johnson tribute, Me and Mr. Johnson in
2004 and his collaboration with B.B. King, Riding With the King, in 2000.
Clapton’s battle with drug and alcohol addiction led him to found the Crossroads
Centre rehab facility in Antigua in 1998. His Crossroads Guitar Festival is both
a showcase for many of the world’s leading guitarists and a fundraiser for the
Crossroads Centre.
Little Richard joins an elite group of Blues Hall of Fame icons,
including Fats Domino, Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, who built rock ‘n’ roll from
a foundation in the blues. Richard’s earliest recordings were in the blues vein
and he continued to employ a blues format, often accelerated to a frenzied
tempo, on many of his sessions.
By bandleader Johnny Otis’ recollections from
witnessing his first “beautiful, bizarre and exotic” Little Richard performance,
Richard exclaimed, “This is Little Richard, the King of the Blues! And the
Queen, too!” Gospel was also a profound force in Little Richard’s life and
music, and at times during his career he left the rock ‘n’ roll stage to study,
preach and sing the gospel, only to return to the secular side. He eventually
maintained a mission in both worlds, handing out religious tracts at his rock
concerts.
Born
December 5, 1932, in Macon, Georgia, Richard Wayne Penniman stunned audiences
even in his adolescent days performing with minstrel shows. As he described
himself, “I was very effeminate. I was very frisky. I was loud.” He honed his
appearance and stage act under the influence of gay blues/R&B artists Billy
Wright and S.Q. Reeder (Esquerita).
He recorded blues for RCA Victor in 1951-52
and Peacock in 1953 but only with Specialty did he transfer his wild flamboyance
to wax, beginning with the bombshell Tutti Frutti in 1955. His lives shows were
still more frantic, to the point that even his films could inspire riots among
teenaged fanatics.
The list of performers he inspired is endless, from James
Brown to the Beatles to Jimi Hendrix, who was once the guitarist in Richard’s
band. Even since his hitmaking days have been over, he has remained a
charismatic celebrity.
Once “The King of the Blues,” he has since anointed
himself “The Originator, the Emancipator and the Architect of Rock ‘n’
Roll.”
One of the surprising things about Leonardo da Vinci is that despite
his colossal reputation as an artist he didn’t actually produce many
paintings. Over the course of a long career lasting almost half a
century, he began probably no more than 20 pictures. Only 15 have
survived that scholars agree are wholly his.
So the discovery of a
new painting by Leonardo would be a very big deal indeed. According to
recent reports, a picture by the 19th Century French artist Paul Gauguin
has been sold privately for a record-breaking $300 million (£197
million). Imagine how much an authentic Leonardo could make if one ever
came to the market.
The thing is, attributing artworks to Leonardo
is notoriously difficult. One painting currently touring cities across
Asia exemplifies what I mean. It used to be known as the “Isleworth Mona
Lisa”, but its current owners have rebranded it the “Earlier Mona Lisa”
because they believe that Leonardo himself painted parts of it a decade
or so before beginning arguably the most famous picture in the world:
the Mona Lisa in the Louvre.
In December, the Isleworth painting
went on show to the public in an exhibition at the Arts House at the Old
Parliament building in Singapore. In March, it will travel to Hong Kong
before arriving in China and then visiting other destinations in Asia.
At
first glance, it is remarkably similar to the Louvre’s Mona Lisa. A
woman with dark hair and an enigmatic smile sits at a slight angle to
the viewer on a loggia opening onto a panoramic landscape. Except this
woman is obviously much younger than the subject of the Louvre painting.
If Mona Lisa had been painted a decade earlier, then this is how she
would appear.
So what is this unusual picture? A curious, sexed-up
copy of Leonardo’s masterpiece? Not according to the Mona Lisa
Foundation, a Swiss non-profit organisation leading research into the
painting on behalf of the anonymous international consortium that owns
it. Three years ago, the foundation convened a press conference in
Geneva at which they presented “the results of 35 years of research and
convincing arguments” suggesting that the painting was in fact an
earlier portrait of Mona Lisa, which Leonardo had left unfinished.
The
event sparked headlines around the world. Here, it seemed, was a newly
discovered, authentic Leonardo. How exciting! But the day after the
press conference, Leonardo expert Martin Kemp, emeritus professor of art
history at the University of Oxford, published a blog post rubbishing
the foundation’s claims and explaining in detail why he considered them
to be erroneous. Perhaps the idea of a second Mona Lisa was too good to
be true.
Masterpiece or copy? In fact, art historians had known about the Isleworth Mona Lisa for
some time. Shortly before World War One, the maverick English
connoisseur Hugh Blaker spotted it in an old manor house in Somerset,
where it had hung for more than 100 years, having been bought in Italy
as an original masterpiece by Leonardo.
Sensing something special
beyond the covering of dirt and varnish, Blaker acquired it and brought
it to his studio in Isleworth in west London (hence the painting’s
moniker). Not long afterwards, his stepfather John R Eyre published a
monograph proposing that Leonardo had worked on two versions of his
portrait of Mona Lisa, and that the Isleworth picture was the first one.
The painting was subsequently bought by the American collector Henry F
Pulitzer, who in turn published a self-serving book arguing that the
Isleworth picture was in fact Leonardo’s only real portrait of Mona
(short for Madonna) Lisa Gherardini, wife of the Florentine merchant
Francesco del Giocondo. (Pulitzer concluded that the Louvre painting was
an idealised portrait of someone else.)
Yet despite all this
theorising, the idea that the Isleworth Mona Lisa was actually by
Leonardo never gained traction with important scholars. In 1979,
following Pulitzer’s death, the picture disappeared inside a Swiss bank
vault, where it remained until 2008, when it was acquired by the
consortium that now owns it.
At the same time, the Mona Lisa
Foundation was established to investigate the question of the picture’s
attribution to Leonardo. According to its vice president, the stamp
dealer David Feldman, the foundation “does not have any stake in the
painting” and endeavours “to examine facts in the most objective light
possible”.
However, he would not comment directly when asked if
there was any overlap between the owners of the painting and the
foundation’s board. And to the question of whether the consortium’s
ultimate goal was to sell the painting as a real Leonardo, he replied:
“I cannot disclose any information relating to the consortium.”
Detective work Like
Eyre and Pulitzer before them, the current owners of the Isleworth
painting are convinced that it is in part by Leonardo. Yet, like Eyre
and Pulitzer, they are struggling to convince leading scholars. As well
as Kemp, other respected Leonardo experts including the German art
historian Frank Zollner deny that there is any substance to their
claims. Why? The foundation interprets historical evidence
including written sources, as well as the fact that Leonardo sometimes
created multiple versions of the same picture, such as the Virgin of the
Rocks, to contend that he painted two portraits of Mona Lisa: one that
was commissioned around 1503 by Lisa’s husband Francesco; the other a
decade later by the artist’s patron Giuliano de’ Medici.
This would account for the younger appearance of the woman in the
Isleworth painting. It would also explain why Raphael, who made a sketch
probably from memory around 1505 after seeing the painting in progress,
showed the sitter flanked by two columns. Similar columns are visible
in the Isleworth picture, but only their bases appear in the painting in
the Louvre, which has never been trimmed.
Admittedly, it is
awkward that the support of the Isleworth picture is canvas, when
Leonardo usually painted on wood. But the foundation points to the fact
that the artist did occasionally paint on canvas – witness his tempera
study of drapery on linen canvas in the Louvre, which dates from the
1470s, when Leonardo was still making his name. (This is, however, an
exception to the general rule: Leonardo’s mature oil paintings,
including the Louvre’s Mona Lisa, were executed on wood.)
In
addition, the foundation has collaborated with scientists to help build
its case. Feldman says that research physicist John Asmus of the
University of California has run “a series of peer-reviewed scientific
tests” determining “with 99 per cent scientific certainty that the same
artist painted at least the face of both the Isleworth and Louvre Mona
Lisas. Accordingly, if one denies that the Isleworth is by Da Vinci
[sic], then one also denies the Louvre version.”
The foundation
therefore concludes that Leonardo was responsible for the face and hands
of the woman in the Isleworth picture, while an inferior artist must
have painted the clumsy landscape in the background.
Seeing double Among
Leonardo scholars, however, the ‘two Mona Lisas’ theory remains moot –
and that’s before the particular merits of the Isleworth picture are
evaluated. Kemp believes that Leonardo only ever began one painting of
Mona Lisa, which he then worked on intermittently until his death. While
the foundation interprets revisions in “under-drawings” discovered
during infrared analysis of the Isleworth painting as a sign that it
must be an original work, Kemp argues that they “do not reveal any of
the characteristics of Leonardo’s preparatory methods”.
When I contacted
him recently, Kemp reaffirmed his belief that the Isleworth picture is a
later, “stilted” copy.
Although Kemp has closely scrutinised (and
questioned) the evidence provided by the foundation, he has never
actually studied the painting firsthand. Feldman told me that, despite
an invitation, Kemp “refused” to examine the canvas before the
foundation announced its findings in 2012.
But, says Kemp, “I have not ‘refused’ to see it. I decided not to
[because] I only go to see works (at my expense and never for
remuneration) if the evidence I have – documentation, provenance,
digital images and scientific examination – convinces me that it is
worth the time, travel and expense.” In the case of the Isleworth
painting, he saw “nothing to convince me that seeing it in the flesh is
of high priority. I am sent many non-Leonardos – as many as one a week –
and have to make choices. If I travelled to see every hopeful
‘Leonardo’, I would be impoverished.” He adds: “If they want to bring
the painting to me, they can.”
To gain a fresh perspective on the
story, I invited the British scholar and leading Leonardo expert Luke
Syson to comment on it. In 2011, Syson, who now works at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, oversaw the blockbuster
exhibition Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan, at the
National Gallery in London. The climax of the show was the introduction
to the public of an oil-on-walnut picture of Christ as Salvator Mundi, or “Saviour of the World”.
Following
intense analysis, art historians now agree that Leonardo painted it –
making it the first “new” Leonardo for a century. (Incidentally, like
the Isleworth Mona Lisa, this painting, which was previously thought to
be a copy after a picture by one of Leonardo’s pupils, has been known
since the start of the 20th Century.)
In other words, Syson knows a
thing or two about attributing paintings to Leonardo. He is one of a
handful of international scholars with well-established reputations as
authorities on Leonardo whose backing the foundation would ideally like
to secure.
Like Kemp, Syson has not seen the Isleworth picture in
reality – though, as he says, “I have never been asked to view [it] –
and that fact may in itself be revealing. A serious campaign to
introduce a new work by a great artist would ensure it was shown to all
the principal experts.”
But on the basis of published photographs
of the picture, he has “never taken these claims seriously. In all
honesty, one doesn’t in this instance need to see the work in the flesh
to judge this Mona Lisa a rather poor, somewhat later copy, one of
dozens that were made of this famous picture in the centuries that
followed its creation.”
Syson says that “lots of the details are
misunderstood” and points out that the canvas support “would be very off
the mark for Leonardo, who [typically] painted on wooden panels. But
most important it’s simply not good enough to be by Leonardo himself.
This is just the most recent of many attempts made by optimistic owners
to prove their copies of Leonardo’s pictures are by him, wholly or ‘in
part’.”
Moreover, Syson does not accept that scientific evidence
can conclusively settle debates over the authenticity of pictures such
as the Isleworth Mona Lisa. “The bringing in of science – sometimes
pseudo-science – is increasingly a feature of such claims,” he
continues. “Even if the science is good, it can never prove an
attribution (though it can sometimes disprove it); it’s only ever one of
several factors we’d use to assess the authenticity and authorship of a
work of art. The picture needs also to be of the right quality, and to
contain the characteristic thought and ‘hand-writing’ of the artist.”
Syson
notes that Leonardo’s workshop did produce copies of his paintings,
sometimes imitating his every change as he executed the original. “But
this picture, to judge from available photos and the fact it was painted
on a canvas support, doesn’t come into this category. The story ignores
art history, denies the principles of connoisseurship, and bypasses the
experts. The whole thing is a little sad, especially for anyone
visiting the display who is hoping to see a masterpiece by Leonardo.”
The
Mona Lisa Foundation, of course, disagrees with this position. “We at
the foundation find it hard to accept that there can be valid points of
view against something which is now proven scientifically,” says
Feldman, who also cites “public feedback” in Singapore that the
Isleworth picture must be by Leonardo. However, advances in art history
are determined not by public vote but by consensus among experts. And in
the case of the Isleworth Mona Lisa, the foundation still has much to
do in order to win more support among people whose opinions really
count.
By Alastair Sooke who is art critic of The Daily Telegraph
It is a common misconception that we know our own minds. As I move
around the world, walking and talking, I experience myself thinking
thoughts. "What shall I have for lunch?", I ask myself. Or I think, "I
wonder why she did that?" and try and figure it out. It is natural to
assume that this experience of myself is a complete report of my mind.
It is natural, but wrong.
There's an under-mind, all psychologists
agree – an unconscious which does a lot of the heavy lifting in the
process of thinking. If I ask myself what is the capital of France the
answer just comes to mind – Paris! If I decide to wiggle my fingers,
they move back and forth in a complex pattern that I didn't consciously
prepare, but which was delivered for my use by the unconscious.
The
big debate in psychology is exactly what is done by the unconscious,
and what requires conscious thought. Or to use the title of a notable
paper on the topic, 'Is the unconscious smart or dumb?'
One popular view is that the unconscious can prepare simple
stimulus-response actions, deliver basic facts, recognise objects and
carry out practised movements. Complex cognition involving planning,
logical reasoning and combining ideas, on the other hand, requires
conscious thought.
A recent experiment by a team from Israel scores points against this position.
Ran Hassin and colleagues used a neat visual trick called Continuous Flash Suppression
to put information into participants’ minds without them becoming
consciously aware of it. It might sound painful, but in reality it’s
actually quite simple. The technique takes advantage of the fact that we
have two eyes and our brain usually attempts to fuse the two resulting
images into a single coherent view of the world.
Continuous Flash
Suppression uses light-bending glasses to show people different images
in each eye. One eye gets a rapid succession of brightly coloured
squares which are so distracting that when genuine information is
presented to the other eye, the person is not immediately consciously
aware of it. In fact, it can take several seconds for something that is
in theory perfectly visible to reach awareness (unless you close one eye
to cut out the flashing squares, then you can see the 'suppressed'
image immediately).
Hassin’s key experiment involved presenting
arithmetic questions unconsciously. The questions would be things like
"9 - 3 - 4 = " and they would be followed by the presentation, fully
visible, of a target number that the participants were asked to read
aloud as quickly as possible.
The target number could either be the
right answer to the arithmetic question (so, in this case, "2") or a
wrong answer (for instance, "1"). The amazing result is that
participants were significantly quicker to read the target number if it
was the right answer rather than a wrong one. This shows that the
equation had been processed and solved by their minds – even though they
had no conscious awareness of it – meaning they were primed to read the
right answer quicker than the wrong one.
The result suggests that the unconscious mind has more sophisticated
capacities than many have thought. Unlike other tests of non-conscious
processing, this wasn’t an automatic response to a stimulus – it
required a precise answer following the rules of arithmetic, which you
might have assumed would only come with deliberation.
The report calls
the technique used "a game changer in the study of the unconscious",
arguing that "unconscious processes can perform every fundamental,
basic-level function that conscious processes can perform". These
are strong claims, and the authors acknowledge that there is much work
to do as we start to explore the power and reach of our unconscious
minds. Like icebergs, most of the operation of our minds remains out of
sight. Experiments like this give a glimpse below the surface.
If you have an everyday psychological phenomenon you'd like to see written about in these columns please get in touch @tomstafford or ideas@idiolect.org.uk.
Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell will tour Australia together
across June and July.
The
legendary Emmylou Harris first rose to fame as a female singer on Gram Parsons
‘GP’ album in 1973. She was also working with Parsons on his classic ‘Grievous
Angel’ album at the time of his death later that year.
After Parsons died Harris decided to continue to work using the
same musical vision. At that time she recorded her signature song ‘Boulder To
Birmingham’ about Gram Parsons.
Harris has won 13 Grammy Awards. She has worked on records for Roy
Orbison, Neil Young, Linda Ronstadt and Bob Dylan.
Harris recorded one of Rodney Crowell’s earliest songs ‘Till I
Gain Control Again’ on her 1975 album ‘Elite Hotel’.
As a songwriter Crowell has
written for Keith Urban, Alan Jackson, Lee Ann Womack and Tim
McGraw.
Tickets for Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell will go on sale on
March 17.
Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell
dates
June
21, Perth, Concert Hall June 23, Canberra, AIS Event Centre June 25,
Melbourne, Palais Theatre June 27, Sydney, The Star Event Centre June 28,
Wollongong, Entertainment Centre July 1, Gold Coast, Jupiters
Theatre
