I.R.Baboon

I'm in a Dutch television quiz on friday, and deathlist helped me recognizing Alan Alda's name. Didn't dare to mention on air how I knew him..

If you need to wear name tags on Thanksgiving you sure have a weird family..

Kurtag (97 now) was too frail to travel in 2018, and his wife for 73 years died in 2019, but he still does rehearsals:

More than 40 pounds, according to a very long New Yorker article: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/02/13/salman-rushdie-recovery-victory-city?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_brand=tny&utm_social-type=owned&mbid=social_twitter

I thought about this while riding my bike and I totally disagree. I really don't like it when someone is only mentioned on deathlist when he's dead or dying. I like 18-year old threads in which you can slowly follow someones demise. So if I read something new about Blomstedt (only doing 50 concerts a year, using a walker, breaking his collarbone while kitesurfing etc) at least I have an anchor to reply on now.

Surprised nobody has mentioned Herbert Blomstedt (95) before here, the oldest (professional) conductor still performing. He broke a hip last year and since then he uses a cane, but still goes voor 30 minute walks. He conducts 80 times a year, but he sits while doing so, and in a review of his performance at the Concertgebouw last weekend he was described as 'fragile' in the newspaper. (he looks 80 at most, btw..)

I was intruiged by the guy who's usually sitting next to Nicholson at the Lakers games (the old guy with hat and glasses, not Ray Nicholson). It's record and film producer Lou Adler (89). He is still seen at the games, sometimes next to Ray.

Considered this pretty funny:

While other singers and bands have sold their rights for tens or hundred of millions of dollars, Tom Lehrer put all of his lyrics and songs into public domain last month: https://tomlehrersongs.com/. edit: i see this was mentioned before. So not really sure what changed in november 2022.

Nazi hunter Jack Kooistra, who traced doen Luitjens in Canada in 1992 and also known as "the Frisian Simon Wiesenthal", is still alive at 92.

Edward Minghella, dad of deceased Oscar Winner Anthony Minghella, screenwriter Dominic Minghella and jazz singer Edana Minghella (who died this year), still alive at 101. And while i'm at it: Victor, the dad of José de Cauwer is still alive at 102. At 100 he was Belgiums oldest pigeon fancier, but since then he has quit. edit: found a pic from 2 years ago where Victor was handed a 100 year old pigeon gazette

I read an interview with Terry Riley (in Dutch) last month.. his tour got stuck in Japan in 2020 due to COVID and since then he's been living there, spending his time composing and teaching. He has no plans on returning to the USA.

Rudi Hemmes (99) has died. He was one of the last living Engelandvaarders , the men and women who tried to escape from occupied The Netherlands to England. Only about 1 in 10 survived the trip. You might remember the story from Paul Verhoevens Soldier of Orange . They they stopped with their yearly reunions in 2018 because there were only around 10 of them left and I've found quite a few obituaries of Engelandvaarders since then. (Bram Grisnigt, Rinus Zuidijk and Charles Bartelings died in 2019, Eddy Jonker and Jaap Hinderink died in 2020 and Jan Staal died in 2021) Looks like Ellis Brandon, Bernard Uiling and Leo Hendrikx are the only ones still alive.

Not sure if bishops are worth mentioning but at first I thought these guys are all cardinals.. Apart from the catholic church itself dying pretty quickly in The Netherlands (3.7 million people registred as catholics, but only about 100k church visitors each sunday and less than 7.000 kids baptised each year, all declining about 10% a year) i saw a picture of the dutch bishops visiting the pope last week. The bisshop in the wheelchair is Harrie Smeets, who has been suffering from brain cancer since last year and won't recover. Bisshop Jan Liesen was unable to attend because he was himself being treated for cancer. The other bishops did send him a postcard (not a joke)

Dead

Dead: https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/mike-davis-obituary/

A friend remarked that the Queens death is a great source for copy on the Mascots Minute Silence twitter

Biggest hit of the year.

I drove past a public bookshelf today and saw an abandoned book of Henk de Velde . Usually I know pretty well whether a person is alive or dead, but in this case i didn't know for sure. So back home i searched the internet.. to find out he's alive but has uncurable cancer and all treatment has stopped: http://www.henkdevelde.com/go/

Never heard about Prophet of Doom Mark Davis before, but well, he's dying. Interesting (but not hopeful) interview.

Had a lot of visitors coming over yesterday: https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2022-08/pope-francis-and-new-cardinals-visit-benedict-xvi.html And he looks really frail now (so I think he should be back on the list next year) https://youtu.be/YNCWnG3B-Yo

Wanted to share an update on David Thomas from Pere Ubu cause I saw he was mentioned in the first post. He said in an interview from 2020 that he almost died twice, and he needs kidney dialysis three times a week. Saw him performing with Pere Ubu somewhere in autumn 2019. He was driven in a wheelchair to the stage, and during the gig just sitting on a stool, drinking straight from a wine bottle and howling at his band members. Really impressive gig nonetheless (they did - apart from encores for which they didn't leave the stage cause it would take 10 minutes - only songs from their last album, which was even for their standards pretty gloomy and hard to get into. But what I wanted to share.. During covid he got really busy with remastering his own albums and hosting his own patreon show which aired once a week, but 2 months go it was suddenly very silent on their socials. According to the patreon he tested postive for covid at the end of june and looks like there haven't been many updates since then. And let's end with some banger from their commercial period edit: The Guardian had an interview with him earlier this year in which he said 'contacting covid would be fatal', so maybe he cheated death once again..

Man dies after being hit by stray hammer 'that flew over hedge' at Highland games tournament A 65 year old man who was walking in the garden of Geldrop Castle was killed today when a hammer from the nearby Highland Games tournament (ffs, dutch highland games!?!?) flew over the hedge.

Supporting his daughter with some strong anti-Trump rhetoric (Liz is running for Wyoming, but it looks like she's behind in the polls https://ballotpedia.org/United_States_House_election_in_Wyoming,_2022_(August_16_Republican_primary))

Turned 80 yesterday. I expected an interview or at least some other sign of life, but all we got were compilations of old interviews. Not sure if that means he's ill, but i'll keep a close watch..