In this morning’s issue: “Dilla Time” | Penny A Parrish – Memories, Photos, and our special attachment to our four-legged friends | NDP Books
DILLA TIME
by Dan Charnas
Published by Swift Press (January 13, 2023), Paperback – $20
Paperback edition
Kindle Edition
Reviewed by Cori Blanch
FREELANCE WRITER
Where does genius come from?
Some argue that it is born of our creativity and imagination. Others point to the nurturing we received growing up and in our educations.
In the case of James DeWitt Yancey – J Dilla – it was all of the above … plus.
The plus is Dilla’s hometown of Detroit, Michigan. Detroit is the city that gave America Motown, Ragtime, and Swing. It’s also the place where the two dominant schools of musical time squared off – straight time (where every beat is even) and swing time (where beats are uneven). Dilla’s genius was to fuse the two into something new – Dilla time – where straight and swing coexist in the same space.
This combination formed intentional uneven beats that today define most every stream of music today.
A key piece of Dilla’s rhythms was his drum machine, which today sits in the Smithsonian Institution.
Having grown up in the era of Neo-Soul, Dilla shaped the way I came to understand and today perform music.
Though he’s lauded today, Dilla never realized fame in his lifetime. He never had a hit record. Musicians oftentimes argued with him about the creative rhythms he was developing. While others, who recognized the power of what he produced, took his creation and never bothered to credit the creator.
Dilla was, and is, genius. Taken too young by a rare illness, his genius continues to shape the world of music we experience.
Where does genius come from?
Wherever it is planted in places that nurture, grow, and celebrate it.
Cori Blanch and his spouse Megan Samples co-own Curitiba Art Cafe in Fredericksburg. Cori is also a musician and the producer who records and mixes the New Dominion Podcast.
Memories, Photos, and our special attachment
to our four-legged friends
by Penny A Parrish
FREELANCE WRITER
In early 2001, I found some kittens outside my house. It turns out their mom was feral, and I managed to capture all five of the babies and found homes for them … except for two, which I kept.
I had been a dog person all my life and had to seek expert advice (my sister) on how to feed them and care for them. They were a delight – mischievous, playful, cuddly and loving.
Over time other cats were added as my originals passed away. Each loss was painful and emotional. But I always had others at home and could bury my tears in their fur.
Until this week, when I had to put down my last cat.
She was about 19, deaf and blind in one eye (the other eye didn’t miss a thing). Unlike my other cats, Sweet P was not a cuddler. She was more of the “feed me and leave me alone” variety. But she let me pet her, she purred, and she always wanted me near her.
I never realized how much I talked to her and my other cats. The biggest difference with this loss is the silence in my house.
Opening the door I am not met by anyone. No one scolds me for being late with dinner.
I always said when I lost my final cat, I would be free to travel more, to rent a place – maybe in France or Italy or Maine – for a month and not worry about an animal who misses me at home.
I can do that now, but I never realized how this freedom would come with such an emotional price. Perhaps, when I am less mobile and less able to travel, there will be more felines in my life.
I donated most everything I had to the Fredericksburg SPCA, but kept a few bowls and toys just in case, down the road…
Today, I pay tribute to my beautiful cats, who for more than two decades brought me joy and comfort.
For readers who have also lost pets, they know the pain. I leave you with a poem by Christina Rossetti “On the Death of a Cat” and with some pictures of my beloved cats.
Who shall tell the lady’s grief
When her Cat was past relief?
Who number the hot tears
Shed o’er her, beloved for years?
Who shall say the dark dismay
Which her dying caused that day?
Penny A Parrish is a long-time book reviewer and artist. Learn more about her by visiting her page at Brush Strokes Gallery, which is in downtown Fredericksburg.
NDP Books
Each week, the New Dominion Podcast brings interviews with the movers, shakers, and people of interest in the greater Fredericksburg area. Each episode ends by asking our hosts and guests: “What are you reading?”
The answers are wide-ranging and endlessly fascinating, so we have decided to weekly add these titles to our Books & Culture page. Enjoy, and join us each Monday for a new edition of the NDP.
Shaun Kenney – Cohost: The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P Kennedy, by David Nasaw
Martin Davis – Cohost: Men Without Women, by Ernest Hemingway
Cori Blanch – Producer and Cohost: Dilla Time (See above)
Megan Samples – Producer and Cohost: Paramilitarism and the Assault on Democracy in Haiti, by Jeff Sprague
Scott Mayauski – Guest: A Gentleman in Moscow, by Amor Towles
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