Remembering Francis Poulenc on his birthday 🎂
📷 Boris Lipnitzki, c. 1930
"As the decades pass, he grows in stature, and his aloofness from musical party politics matters less."
- @alexrossmusic
A great photograph by Boris Lipnitzki from the garden of Charles de Noailles's hotel in Paris, 1932. Igor Markevitch, Charles Koechlin, Francis Poulenc, Georges Auric & Henri Sauguet.
Francis Poulenc by Fred Plaut, early 1960s.
Plaut was the great Columbia recording engineer who also took fabulous photographs (most notably of Glenn Gould).
Fred Plaut's wife was the soprano Rose Dercourt, who happened to be a close friend of Francis Poulenc. So his LP cover photo from 1963 has the intimacy of family friendship.
Francis Poulenc & Arnold Schoenberg, in a photo taken by Darius Milhaud, 1922
Milhaud comments:
"He invited us to his home in Mödling. We had a wonderful afternoon there. The walls of his apartment were full of pictures that he had painted himself: faces & eyes, everywhere eyes!”
Les Six, more or less, by Boris Lipnitzki, 1931.
Francis Poulenc, Germaine Tailleferre, (Jean Cocteau), Louis Durey, Arthur Honegger & Darius Milhaud. Georges Auric was missing, but Cocteau adds a drawing.
Boris Lipnitzki took some great shots of Les Six at a December 1951 reunion in Paris.
A fairly formal photo of Darius Milhaud, Georges Auric, Arthur Honegger, Germaine Tailleferre, Francis Poulenc & Louis Durey, with Jean Cocteau at the piano.
But best are the informal photos from Boris Lipnitzki's 1951 Les Six photoshoot:
Poulenc greets Milhaud
I love this shot!
Les Six by Boris Lipnitzki, Paris, December 1951.
Georges Auric, Arthur Honegger, Germaine Tailleferre & Louis Durey in the back, & up front, Francis Poulenc & Jean Cocteau on either side of Darius Milhaud, who seems to have nodded off.
Boris Lipnitzki tries to get Les Six + Jean Cocteau together for a portrait, 1951. Like herding cats...
An earlier photo of Francis Poulenc by Boris Lipnitzki. Francis can often seem a bit stern when he gets in front of a camera, so it's nice to see him more relaxed. The Getty caption says 1929.
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#RIP Marilyn Bergman
📷 Lawrence K. Ho, 1996
"Lyrics as unabashedly romantic and time-conscious as the Bergmans’ require a singer’s complete emotional immersion to come fully alive."
- Stephen Holden
You Must Believe In Spring
I couldn't track down a photographer for this lovely 1969 shot of Alan & Marilyn Bergman. The #Oscar is for "The Windmills of Your Mind", one of many Michel Legrand songs for which the Bergmans provided the lyrics. #RIP
My favourite version is by Dusty!
The Bergmans by Lawrence K. Ho, 2015 #RIP Marilyn
So many great songs, so many award night triumphs.
The Way We Were, an Oscar-winning song from 1975, with music by Marvin Hamlisch. Grammy Song of the Year as well!
Remembering Graham Chapman on his birthday 🎂
📷 Chris Steele-Perkins, 1987
The parrot sketch was originally about a car.
"While John Cleese was typing it up, & dotting the Is & crossing the Ts, Graham took his pipe out of his mouth & said ‘what about a parrot’?"
- Bob McCabe
A more formal shot of Graham Chapman by Chris Steele-Perkins, 1987
Boxing Tonight: Jack Bodell v. Sir Kenneth Clark
Sir Kenneth (Graham Chapman): "This then is the height of the English Renaissance, the triumph of Classical over Gothic..."
(Bodell knocks Sir Kenneth down)
Voice Over: "He's down! Sir Kenneth Clark is down in eight seconds." #MPFC
Happy birthday Elvis Presley 🎂
📷 Gary Null
A shot from Elvis's 1968 Comeback Special on NBC.
"Elvis kicked 'How Much Is That Doggie in the Window' out the window and replaced it with 'Let's fuck.' The rest of us are still reeling from the impact."
- Lester Bangs
Henry Leutwyler
Elvis Presley's glasses
Henry Leutwyler
Elvis Presley's television
"The story goes that as he watched singer Robert Goulet performing on television one night, he shot out the screen of his 25-inch RCA TV."
Remembering Bill Graham on his birthday 🎂
📷 Thomas Monaster, New York, 1968
"Bill was our power guy, he’s the guy that made rock n’ roll into an art-form."
- Jerry Garcia
The Fillmore East marquee on the night Bill Graham pulled the plug, June 27, 1971.
"In a fitting climax, Albert King ripped up the joint. He was on opening night bill March 8, 1968. The house that rock built is dead."
- NY Daily News caption
📷 Thomas Monaster
Here's Bill Graham in the Fillmore East - nearly a full house.
📷 John Olson for Life, 1970
Remembering José Ferrer on his birthday 🎂
📷 Kurt Hutton
He's contemplating an assortment of noses for his role as Cyrano de Bergerac in Michael Gordon's 1950 film. He won an #Oscar for the movie, & a #Tony for the play; I'm trying to think of another instance of that happening.
José Ferrer & Judy Holliday both won acting Oscars on March 29, 1951. They were in New York that night, following the proceedings at La Zambra nightclub. They're having fun in this Slim Aarons shot.
Cyrano, meet Billie Dawn.
When José Ferrer wins for Best Actor, his close friend Gloria Swanson jumps for joy. Ferrer gets a hug from the eventual Best Actress winner, Judy Holliday.
📷 Hal Mathewson, 1951
Remembering David Bowie on his birthday 🎂
📷 Norman Parkinson
Town & Country, 1982
"Bowie was his generation’s standard-bearer for rock as theater: something constructed and inflated yet sincere in its artifice, saying more than naturalism could."
- Jon Pareles
David Bowie by Mick Rock
New York, 2002
Another fine photographer we lost in 2021 #RIP