Strummin' Into Spring ...

"... I hitchhiked all the way down to Memphis ...
Just lookin' for a place to play,
Well, I thought my pickin' would set 'em on fire,
But nobody wanted to hire a guitar man ...

So I slept in the hobo jungles, 
Roamed a thousand miles of track,
Till I found myself in Mobile Alabama
At a club they call Big Jack's,
A little four-piece band was jammin',
So I took my guitar and I sat in,
I showed 'em what a band would sound like,
With a swingin' little guitar man.
Show 'em son ...

Guess who's leadin' that five-piece band,
Well, wouldn't ya know, it's that swingin' little guitar man."     
                                ~ "Guitar Man"
                                      ~ written by Jerry Reed
                           ~ recorded by the great Elvis Presley
                                                           ~ 1967   

This guitar, mounted on the outside wall of
Guitar Villa, Nazareth Pike, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
is strummin' into spring on a sunny day in early April,
reminding me of the great Elvis Presley singing
"Guitar Man," which he recorded in 1967.    

                                

In The Key Of Cool ...

"Hot can be cool, and cool can be hot, and each can be both.

But hot or cool, man, jazz is jazz."

                                       ~ Louis Armstrong

                                                   ~ 1901-1971 

 

Silhouetted hands bring a hot jazz number

to a crescendo in the key of cool in this image,

a portion of a jazzy mural in Easton, Pennsylvania

that I shot on a chilly November day. This is my

artistic interpretation of the mural image. 

 

I captured this cool mural of jazz silhouettes of musicians on the façade of the Hotel Lafayette as they literally paint the town. The mural features the shadows of musicians on keyboard, saxophone, trumpet and other jazz instruments against bright colors.

The mural is an Easton Main Street Initiative public art project created in 2012. It is a gift of the Easton Rotary Service Foundation in memory of Ted Pierce, who was the station manager of WEST radio, an outstanding and devoted citizen. He was a generous benefactor of the Easton community and Easton Rotary Service Foundation, as well as an exemplary journalist and key reporter on the Nuremburg War Crimes Trial for the Armed Forces Network. Pierce left a large amount of money for the Rotary Club to use on Easton-based projects.

           

The mural was designed and painted on the Fourth Street side of the building by the Freehand Mural Group of Easton.

 

                                                             

Street Sax ...

"It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing."

                                                           ~ Duke Ellington

                                                                     ~ 1899-1974

Can you hear the cool jazz floating from this saxaphone, swingin' through the hot air of a sweet summer night? That's the image that popped  into my mind when I shot this portion of a jazzy  mural in Easton, Pennsylvania on a chilly November day. This is my artistic interpretation of the mural image.

I captured this cool mural of jazz silhouettes of musicians on the façade of the Hotel Lafayette as they literally paint the town. The mural features the shadows of musicians on keyboard, saxophone, trumpet and other jazz instruments against bright colors.

The mural is an Easton Main Street Initiative public art project created in 2012. It is a gift of the Easton Rotary Service Foundation in memory of Ted Pierce, who was the station manager of WEST radio, an outstanding and devoted citizen. He was a generous benefactor of the Easton community and Easton Rotary Service Foundation, as well as an exemplary journalist and key reporter on the Nuremburg War Crimes Trial for the Armed Forces Network. Pierce left a large amount of money for the Rotary Club to use on Easton-based projects.

The mural was designed and painted on the Fourth Street side of the building by the Freehand Mural Group of Easton.