Lifelong Learning

Last year my friend Barbara told me about a series of programs at Payap University. I decided I would attend some this year. Friday was the first one (for me), a presentation about a jazz musician. The presenter was Benjamin Tausig, an ethnomusicology professor at SUNY Stony Brook, who specializes in music of Thailand. The topic was Maurice Rocco, a gay black jazz pianist whose height of fame in the US was in the 1930s-1940s. He lived and performed in Bangkok from 1964 to 1976, when he was murdered in his apartment. It was interesting to hear about this musician who has mostly been forgotten in the US.

Wikipedia about him:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Rocco

One of the outstanding features of his performances was that he played the piano standing up, often dancing along to his music. This video shows his amazing abilities. It was made in 1940.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xBx5nmnGXA

The room was fairly small and there were about 20 people in attendance. Interestingly, two women in the audience had seen Rocco perform in Bangkok back in the day.

When I was at the Woodstock School reunion in Phoenix in October, I talked with Xina Kingshill, a student I remembered from the early 1970s. It turns out that her father was the founder of Payap University, which is a large institution offering liberal arts and pre-professional courses of study. 

I'm signed up for two more sessions while I am here. More about those later!

After the presentation, I headed out with Barbara to have lunch and visit. We ended up at Duke's, a well-known Chiang Mai institution serving excellent Western food. We had a Greek pizza and pumpkin quesadillas. There was enough pizza left for Barbara's breakfast the next day and Dan's supper that evening.