Saturday, April 30, 2022

APOD - M44: The Beehive Cluster

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2022 April 30

M44: The Beehive Cluster
Image Credit & Copyright: Drew Evans

Explanation: A mere 600 light-years away, M44 is one of the closest star clusters to our solar system. Also known as the Praesepe or the Beehive cluster its stars are young though, about 600 million years old compared to our Sun's 4.5 billion years. Based on similar ages and motion through space, M44 and the even closer Hyades star cluster in Taurus are thought to have been born together in the same large molecular cloud. An open cluster spanning some 15 light-years, M44 holds 1,000 stars or so and covers about 3 full moons (1.5 degrees) on the sky in the constellation Cancer. Visible to the unaided eye, M44 has been recognized since antiquity. Described as a faint cloud or celestial mist long before being included as the 44th entry in Charles Messier's 18th century catalog, the cluster was not resolved into its individual stars until telescopes were available. A popular target for modern, binocular-equipped sky gazers, the cluster's few yellowish tinted, cool, red giants are scattered through the field of its brighter hot blue main sequence stars in this telescopic group snapshot. Dramatic diffraction spikes highlighting the brighter cluster members were created with string crossed in front of the telescope's objective lens.

Tomorrow's picture: black hole shadow

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Flora Purim is still searching for a universal sound

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April 30, 2022

by Marissa Lorusso

This week, we’re bringing you a career-spanning profile of artist Flora Purim — plus, a long conversation with rising composer and violinist Jessie Montgomery.

Mel Gabardo/Courtesy of the artist

This week, we published a profile of the Brazilian musician Flora Purim by my colleague Ann Powers. It’s a wonderful, illuminating, career-spanning read, so I asked Ann to tell me a bit about why it felt so important to tell Purim’s story right now, and about her conversations with the jazz fusion legend. Here’s what she wrote:

I’m always interested in the stories buried in the mix of popular music history. When I started researching the jazz fusion movement of the 1970s for a project I’m working on, I quickly realized that this genre’s story was balanced on a binary: white rock-infused music versus black funk-powered grooves. While the biggest jazz fusion bands often clearly tilted one way or another — Weather Report was so rock it was almost prog, while Herbie Hancock’s Head Hunters were Sly Stone-inspired funk — often other influences complicated this divide. One major one was Latin music. A whole cohort of musicians from Latinx New York and California, Puerto Rico, Cuba and Brazil infused this supposedly black-and-white mix with rhythms and other sounds of the global diaspora.

Exploring these musicians’ stories, I discovered that while some — José Feliciano, Eumir Deodato, Mongo Santamaria — had received their due, one Brazilian musician was often mostly mentioned only as a name in a long list of names, despite being one of the most popular and admired artists on the scene. This was Flora Purim. Plus, Flora was a woman in a dauntingly male-dominated field whose innovations emphasized her versatile, distinctly feminine voice. I decided I would try to interview Flora for my book project. As luck would have it, only days after I’d obtained her email address from a mutual friend, I received an email from her publicist: Flora would soon be releasing a new album, her first solo effort in 15 years.

I immediately arranged a Zoom interview with Flora, who spoke to me from her living room in Curitiba, Brazil. Our talk brimmed with wild stories of Flora’s time alongside her husband, the percussionist Airto Moreira, remaking jazz from the 1970s onward; and afterward she answered more of my questions via voice note. Never have I met a more generous legend. I’m happy to see that Flora’s fantastic new album is receiving much media attention — I hope that this round of acclaim will cement her place in jazz history as much more than merely a “girl singer,” but an innovator on par with any of her beloved friends, like Chick Corea and George Duke.

Speaking of those friends, one wonderful story I didn’t get to include in my profile of Flora was that of her friendship with Dizzy Gillespie. She toured for three years with the United Nations Orchestra in the 1980s and grew quite close with the jazz legend. Here’s what she told me about that: “I always sat next to him on the airplane,” she told me “And after the shows, I spent nights and nights in his suite, talking about life. I was very curious about Billie Holiday and other people he had worked with. Every night was a lesson — it was like going to class. What a journey! I was so lucky. Most Brazilian singers came in singing bossa nova, lightweight Brazilian pop; none of them took a chance to go against that, because they were afraid. And fear — when you don’t have fear, you don’t have love.”

Ann Powers, NPR Music

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New Music

Miranda Lambert's new record, Palomino, is all about the freedom afforded by the open road. But where so much of country music is still stuck on back roads, writes critic Brittney McKenna, Lambert speeds down the interstate.
The singer-songwriter Tomberlin says when she made her sophomore album, i don't know who needs to hear this..., she wanted to create a kind of altar for her feelings. Ahead of the album’s release, she spoke with my colleague Elle Mannion about the importance of community and the relief that comes with not knowing all the answers.
Jazz saxophonist Albert Ayler wanted to make all-encompassing, sublime and joyful music — though when he was performing in the 1960s, the world was not ready, writes my colleague Lars Gotrich. But in recordings from his 1970 concerts at Fondation Maeght in France — recently released as a box set and made available digitally this week — you can hear his seemingly disparate sound worlds come together.

Featuring

With orchestras clamoring for her work, composer and violinist Jessie Montgomery feels a responsibility and opportunity to help reframe classical music and the institutions that present it. Ahead of the world premiere of her Hymn for Everyone at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra this week, she had a long conversation with my colleague Tom Huizenga about the canon and where classical music might be heading, as well as the role her own work plays in that journey.
Athens, Ga. is often regarded as one of the best college towns in America, but around 30% of residents live below the poverty line. Mariah Parker — aka rapper and activist Linqua Franqa — is looking to bridge that divide.
There's something undeniably magnetic about Spanish singer Rosalía, whose music — which combines elements of reggaeton, R&B, trap and traditional flamenco — pulls from every corner of her world. The genre-bending star recently spoke to my colleague Anamaria Sayre about her new album Motomami, expressing sexuality in music and her global approach to pop.
This week on Jazz Night in America: Learn how saxophonist, activist, composer, educator and 2022 NEA Jazz Master Donald Harrison has made a career that expertly tangles the boldness of bebop with the roots music of his hometown of New Orleans — plus, hear music from a January 2022 concert.

Tiny Desk

NPR

This week, after a two-year delay, the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical A Strange Loop finally opened on Broadway. To celebrate the show’s opening at the Lyceum Theater, the cast got together for a Tiny Desk (home) concert, singing a five-song medley led by the show's writer and composer.

Also this week: We shared a (home) concert of gentle music from the bucolic English countryside by Roger Eno, with a special appearance by his two daughters. Plus, we aired the first episode of Tiny Desk Contest Top Shelf, our series where Tiny Desk Contest judges share some of their favorite entries.

One More Thing

El Último Tour Del … Muerto

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Friday, April 29, 2022

APOD - Portrait of NGC 3628

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2022 April 29

Portrait of NGC 3628
Image Credit & Copyright: Wilhelm Michael Kasakow, Olaf Guillaume

Explanation: Sharp telescopic views of NGC 3628 show a puffy galactic disk divided by dark dust lanes. Of course, this portrait of the magnificent, edge-on spiral galaxy puts some astronomers in mind of its popular moniker, the Hamburger Galaxy. It also reveals a small galaxy nearby (below), likely a satellite of NGC 3628, and a very faint but extensive tidal tail. The drawn out tail stretches for about 300,000 light-years, even beyond the upper left edge of the frame. NGC 3628 shares its neighborhood in the local universe with two other large spirals M65 and M66 in a grouping otherwise known as the Leo Triplet. Gravitational interactions with its cosmic neighbors are likely responsible for creating the tidal tail, as well as the extended flare and warp of this spiral's disk. The tantalizing island universe itself is about 100,000 light-years across and 35 million light-years away in the northern springtime constellation Leo.

Tomorrow's picture: diffraction attraction

5 good-for-you natural sweeteners

These Natural Sweeteners Are Actually Healthy

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Not All Dietary Fibers Are Equal: Here's Why

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Republicans have the advantage with voters in 2022 elections, our poll finds

Republicans have the advantage with voters in 2022 elections, our poll finds

Of voters surveyed, 47% said they are more likely to vote for the Republican in their district, as opposed to 44% who said Democrats. The GOP is also favored on a raft of issues.

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Saturday, April 30, 2022

APOD - M44: The Beehive Cluster

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Flora Purim is still searching for a universal sound

April 30, 2022

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Friday, April 29, 2022

APOD - Portrait of NGC 3628

Astronomy Picture of the Day

5 good-for-you natural sweeteners

Republicans have the advantage with voters in 2022 elections, our poll finds

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