when mark hundevad said he’s playing tomorrow around the corner from where i live – with juini booth, who i didn’t know of, but who has played with tony williams, albert ayer, thelonious monk, betty carter and sun ra – seemed like i would be a great moron to miss attending. all three musicians were amazing, juini, mark and jordan quinn on keyboards. i asked juini during their break about june tyson, the singer in the sun ra arkestra. he said she was the #1 person who got sun ra. i wish i knew him well enough to pester for more stories if he had more to share, i liked her so much, she was a star. there was youtube footage a couple years ago of her in an interview speaking candidly about life in the group. recently i looked for it and it is no longer there, so it goes. In the songwriting course I taught last year, some of the homework was reading\/ viewing\/ listening to sun ra and students were required to write about their impressions. some thought it was noise (not even a joyful noise) but most understood the power of it. one young guy wrote me today, almost a month after the course concluded, wanted me to know learning about sun ra was his favourite thing in 2019. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"