Welcome To Our Blog!

Welcome to the XPN All About the Music Blog. Why a blog you ask? Mostly to get in to another side of the hosts and people here at XPN who produce the music you hear.

The blog is just another way for XPN on-air folks to meet you where you are going and to share some of the behind-the-scenes stories and insights about the music that we play and love so much.

So, enjoy the music.

And enjoy the blog.

Philly Local

Philly Local continues to grow...
I have a wonderful team working with me on Philly Local many thanks to Trang Do, Eric Everwine and KT.

Of course we are showcasing many local artists this coming weekend at our All About the Music Festival www.xpn.org

this week on Philly local at 9pm (Tuesday 7/19) new music from Denison Witmer www.denisonwitmer.com

and Fran Smith, Jr bassist with The Hooters...and a new cd coming in September www.fransmithjr.com

A Love Supreme: Coltrane legacy needs attention

Yesterday (July 17th) was the thirty-eighth anniversary of the passing of John Coltrane. The great saxophonist lived in Philadelphia for much of the 1940s & 1950s. For the last six years of that time, he lived in a house on North 33rd Street. A tattered painting of Coltrane on the front of the shell of a house next to Coltrane's is all that presently seems to exist of the John W. Coltrane Cultural Society, founded to preserve & foster his legacy years ago.

In the liner notes of his 1964 masterpiece A Love Supreme, Coltrane wrote, "During the year 1957, I experienced, by the grace of God, a spiritual awakening which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life. At that time, in gratitude, I humbly asked to be given the means and privilege to make others happy through music."

"Happy" hardly suffices to describe what I feel listening to A Love Supreme. It's some of the deepest music I've ever heard. A Love Supreme is awesome, in the old sense of that word-- inspiring wonder. Gone is the band-supporting-succession-of-soloists model. Coltrane, pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison, & drummer Elvin Jones are pretty much all soloing together simultaneously much of the way through. There is a splendid intimacy between them, & as many times as I have listened to the album, I still discover new wonders in it, always marvel at its intricacy & perfection, & never tire of hearing it.

Coltrane had a huge influence on rock and pop musicians. In fact, at the 2001 Grammy Awards, Joni Mitchell & Carlos Santana were on stage to announce the Grammy for the record of the year, and without opening the envelope, they announced in unison that the record of the year was A Love Supreme by John Coltrane. Then they laughed, opened the envelope, and read out the actual award, for U2's Beautiful Day. That may just have been the Grammy's finest moment.

A Love Supreme is surely one of the greatest musical works of the past century. I hope that here in Philadelphia we can revive the remembrance & celebration of John Coltrane's legacy. The way I see it, there should be both a shrine that makes his music & life story available, & some sort of forward-looking thing in his name, an effort to sponsor & support musicians who, like John Coltrane, are expanding the frontiers & challenging us to listen with open minds. It'll take a lot of work, & a lot of money.... but I hope we can work together & do something about it.