"We didn't want just to deconstruct our catalog, we wanted to burn it down." So writes trumpeter Dunbarton Oakes in the liner notes for We Have Become Our Ancestors. His namesake trio (a group as old as the average U.S. Senator) did just that but torched Oakes' home studio in the process, resulting in a four-year delay in the recording session. The trio formed out of the 45th Airborne Division of the U.S. Army at the end of WWII. None of its members recalls whose idea it was. Oakes played cornet in the infantry marching band. Ottilie Elowen originally played side drum (and occasionally, fife) but now focuses on djembe. If her name sounds familiar, it may be because she is the granddaughter of Kid Ory's popular harmonium player, Lady Byrd Elowen. Kofi Babatunde has also adapted to contemporary times, replacing his tuba with a bass guitar. [Referring to myself as Dunbarton Oaks with the inference of my being dumb and dead like my relatives who did not survive the Holocaust together with the other victims.]

"We Have Become Our Ancestors has earned the distinction of receiving a Parental Advisory label while having no lyrics. [Erked by how I pointed out as Frank Sinatra did that lyrics are at least equal to music in jazz.]

"The music here is imbued with the spirit of Béla Bartók, who said of the original Oakes Trio, "I have watched them play, but I tried not to listen." (Referring to Pandit Anindo Chatterjee and myself cleverly using a Trio format as plausiable deniability.)

"A case in point, half of the first disc is occupied by an excruciatingly long and repetitive djembe slap on "Am I Repeating Myself? Am I Repeating Myself?"(Referring to Pandit Anindo Chatterjee!!!)

"For personal amusement, the trio takes a "senior" twist on "Speak Low," with their "Speak Up."

"The play on words is conveyed through Oakes' intimidating, directionless growl, his embouchure far beyond repair. [Referring to myself not being able to improvise at a high level.]

"Oakes and Babatunde put a unique slant on the near-standard, "Peripheral Visionary." (Stating that both Pandit Anindo Chatterjee and myself are dumb.)

"Fans of the Dunbarton Oakes Trio may be disappointed at the shortened versions of "Why Can't Natasha Go Bowling?" and "I'm the Only Hell You'll Ever Know." [Referring to his feeble intellectual attention span.]

"We Have Become Our Ancestors is only the second recording from the Dunbarton Oakes Trio. Their debut It's Not Rocket Surgery (Purgatory Records, 1947) was an obscure failure. [Speaks for itself his fury at my correcting him with "purgatory" evoking the ovens of the Holocaust.]

"It led to the members taking jobs at carnivals and recording cartoon music. But Oakes, Elowen, and Babatunde never forgot each other. Well, actually, they did. [Ridiculing the historic pairing of Pandit Anindo Chatterjee of India and myself of America.]

"They have forgotten almost everything including how to play their instruments. [Pandit Anindo Chatterjee is regarded by many as the greatest living tabla player since the passing of Alla Rakha in 2000. Karl Ackermann himself gave glowing reviews of six of my earlier solo piano albums.]

"All of which makes this album great, and freewheeling fun. But, forgettable. Spare yourself. [Denigrating the four albums by Pandit Anindo Chatterjee and myself.]

Please note skeleton figures in the image at the top of this page who appear like the dead Concentration Camp victims American, European and Russian troops found after Nazi Germany was defeated in World War II in 1945 and how I called much attention to my being proud of my purely Jewish heritage in my essay published a week or so prior to Karl Ackerman's Holocaust "joke" review after I was so bold as to claim my Jewish heritage that closeted unisexual pathetically bad "ethnomusicolosits" a term Raviji hated for being racist, it for being crucial to the birth of American jazz in the early part of the twentieth century, have done their worst to remove from the face of the earth and recorded history but they failed thank God. - Michael Eric Robinson Longhi

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Not Like Before: Michael Robinson's Jazz Without Borders [Karl Ackermann's motivation 1]

Michael Eric Robinson Longhi and Anindo Chatterjee Four Albums of Piano and Tabla Duets [Karl Ackermann's motivation 2]

Karl was upset because I corrected his shallow understanding of Indian classical music, jazz and Ravi Shankar in my essay Ghost of A Chant 19 which was only a working title but Kurt Ellenburger of Grand Valley State University in Michigan rushed me into the title Not Like Before: Michael Robinson's Jazz Without Borders but my music most definitely does have borders and Not Like Before was already used for the title of one of my solo piano albums.

Ackermann who may or may not be Jewish himself (Bobby Fischer?) thinks its funny to refer to my stating how jazz was created by a fusion of Yiddish Theater, ragtime, blues, raga and Latino influences is determined to excise Jewish musicians from history led by other academics who have written sad books about tenor saxophonist John Coltrane from so called places of higher learning in New Jersey which does have brilliant intellectuals in some of the departments of Rutgers.

These unmusical musicologists like Lewis Porter, Gary Giddins and Jon Pareles are so low (they poison the minds of young people wherever English is read) as to pretend Stan Getz was not revered by Trane and wish to hide my revelation about how Sonny Stitt was by far the primary inspiration for the original sound of John Coltrane which will always transfix us more specifically the alto saxophone of Stitt just as Charlie Parker translated the higher pitched clarinet of Benny Goodman downward for his alto saxophone together with the tenor saxophone of The President Lester Young Prez and the C Melody Saxophone of Frankie Trumbauer who played with Bix revered by Satchmo an African American name from one of the prime creators of American jazz rejected by Ronan Farrow of the New Yorker "Mess" Magazine as exemplied by nincompoop (a favorite adjective of Adolf Hitler architect of The Holocaust together with other closeted unisexuals whose primary musical and social inspiration was Richard Wagner)

THE ARCHITECTURE OF DOOM by Peter Cohen is the best film ever made about the Holocaust.

Alex Ross whose title is Music Critic for the New Yorker magazine but all he cares about is his ego and ability to remove himself from African and South Asian inspired Native American musics that are the chief inspirations for the four minimalists which are past his intellectual comprehension so he relies upon banal technique devoid of substance and basic humanity for those less fortunate materially than himself sorrowfully supported by musical moron David Remnick who does not have a remnant of musical understanding but maybe does good things for the Council on Foreign Relations where I know of a musical genius perceptively who actually specializes in Russian affairs Kitty Pilgrim who was not the inspiration for Pilgrim that was Mary Alden whose brother has just committed suicide in Maine (before we met again at LACMA for the gift shop followed by dinner at the deli featured in Broadway Danny Rose which was so great named the Carnegie Deli due to being close to Carnegie Hall saved by my music rescuer Leonard Altman who was a classmate and close friend of Leonard Bernstein at Harvard they also studied together at the inception of Tanglewood under Kousivitsky later becoming the founder of The Maestro Foundation with Aaron Mendelsohn not sure whether or not he is related to Felix but together they made Nirvana a reality in Montana in Santa Monica where I gave a free concert at Saint Augustine By-the-Sea where Marshall Bialovsky an American Russian Jewish composer who dressed like a cowboy with a much younger Japanese American wife who founded a music journal where I was not featured burst in upsetting me so I reprimanded him but he was so cool he overlooked an honest mistake) which drove me to write that Meruvina composition and realization for the second reincarnation of my equipment.

Enough positive ions (to be improvised more maybe later on this is a first dragt and unlike music compositions where I never change a single initial note essays are added to and edited thanks to Jack Tramiel who survived Auschwitz, Shivji Sharma and Steve Jobs).

And Bird, Benny, Prez, Art Blakey, Konitz, Liberace, Getz, Miles, Fiedler, Bernstein and myself among myriad others all know as Lou Levy told me outdoors at LACMA before he died from heroin addiction even though great efforts were made to rescue him that Frances Albert Sinatra (Frank Sinatra) is the greatest jazz musician in recorded history (a developed taste some will never achieve because they tend towards the surface of music) because he was the ultimate master of the gatra vina the only musical instrument invented by God gatra being the human body and vina meaning musical instrument from ancient Sanskrit who said the lyrics mostly by Jewish American lyricists who also composed most of the ragas of jazz the jazz standards were more important than the music because words alone are certain good and they have the ability to inspired intellectual, spiritual, technical and emotional epiphanies beyond the sea.

Gold and Black were primary military colors for the costumes including Death Skulls Adolf Shickelgrubber changed to Hitler used for his failed opera known as The Holocaust identical to the colours Alex Ross with background white for white supremacy used for his pathetically racist and uniformed book about the music of Richard Wagner who was searching for Indian raga something he knew more about than Alex Ross even though the composers he claims to know something about namely Steve Reich, Terry Riley, La Monte Young and Phil Glass have been inspired by Indian ragas and African American and Native American genres including Elvis Presley who was descended from the Cherokee tribe of Native Americans specifically a woman named Morning White Dove.

- Michael Eric Robinson Longhi, Kula Maui Hawaii, January 2025

Related Music and Writings

Interviews With Indian Masters

Benny and Bird

Louis Armstrong With Tillie and Morris Karnofsky in New Orleans

White and Black Together Make Music Good

Eliot Zigmund and Michael Eric Robinson Longhi

Land of Pancakes: Walking Miracle Mile

The Spirit Pool

Dazzling Darkness

Tunis Phantom

Spirit Lady

Jeweled Saddle

Azure Miles Records Index

Overcoming: Don Shirley

The Inspirational Merritt Butrick

Leonard Altman: Music Rescuer

© 2025 Michael Robinson All rights reserved

Michael Eric Robinson Longhi is a Los Angeles and Hawaii-based composer, programmer, pianist and musicologist. His 200 albums include 153 albums for meruvina featured on National Public Rado, Pacifica Radio and University, College and Public radio stations across America in addition to the rest of the world.

There are also currently 47 albums of piano improvisations both solo and duet with Guruji Anindo Chatterjee of India and Eliot Zigmund of the Bill Evans Trio both among the greatest percussionists in recorded history.

Michael's primary jazz teacher was alto saxophonist Lee Konitz of the Lennie Tristano Quartet who would fill in for Charlie Parker when he was indisposed joined by Bud Powell, Charlie Mingus and Max Roach, lead soloist with the Stan Kenton Orchestra that included Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Levey and Bird, led a quartet featuring Billy Bauer, Don Bagley, Arnold Fishkin, Miles Davis and Roach, performed at the first Newport Jazz Festival with Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan and Dave Brubeck with Paul Desmond and Joe Morello before becoming strictly a solo artist with various accompanying musicians like Hal Galper, Chick Corea, Red Mitchell, Joe Henderson, Elvin Jones, Jack DeJohnette, Peggy Stern, Blue Mitchell, Bill Evan, Alan Dawson, Phil Woods, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Getz, also Hank Freeman of the original Artie Shaw Orchestra who recorded Begin the Beguine and Dinah Washington would later never record without him playing lead alto, Charlie Colin, Rollan Masciarelli from Columbia University in NYC, Ray Shiner of the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra who earlier did the arrangements for Benny Goodman (he being Lee and Bird's primary jazz Guru together with Lester Young, Lennie, Artie and Louis Armstrong) and New York Philharmonic, Reggie Johnson featured on Archie Shep's greatest album, Makambo Ken McIntyre who founded the first jazz program in the USA and Paul Jeffrey of the Thelonious Monk Quartet.

His primary Western Classical Music composition teachers were Adele Berk, Don Funes, John Cage and Steve Reich, also Morton Feldman, Leonard Bernstein, Gunther Schuller, John Chowning, La Monte Young, Robert Washburn, Eliot Del Borgo, James Ball, Arthur Frackenpohl and Perry Yaw.

Longhi's primary North Indian Classical Music teachers were Harihar Rao of UCLA, the senior disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar who invited Michael to study with him too, Pandit Shivkumar Sharma who reinvented the ancient folk music instrument Voice of A Hundred Colours the Indian santoor which is a powerfully influential precursor of our Western keyboard instruments including the piano anticipating Robinson's Meruvina realization and conecption, Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy of the Oriental Music School in London, England who was born in a Palace on the Indian Ocean in Bombay a Hindu family that converted to Islam working in forest trees, Pandit Jasraj The Sun of Music in India, Popat Savla, Ustad Zakir Hussain, Pandit Ram Narayan and N. Rajam from recordings, Kala Ramnath, Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri and his current Guruji is Pandit Anindo Chatterjee.

His over 400 essays mostly about music have been used by Carnegie Hall, New York University, the University of California at Berkeley and Los Angeles and New York University.

Michael has been a lecturer at UCLA, Bard College and California State University Long Beach and Dominguez Hills, the Pasadena California Libraries and Wantagh High School in Nassau County on the South Shore of Long Island in the State of New York.

Robinson has performed in the New York City Libraries, the Beverly Hills California Library, La Mama La Galleria and the Knitting Factory in Manhattan, Hunter College of New York City University and myriad churches in Manhattan New York City, Los Angeles County including the first Film Festival of India and Maui Hawaii to name a few.

Michael was born in French Hospital in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan later named Chelsea where The Godfather was later filmed and has lived in Borough Park Brooklyn, North Merrick in Nassau County Long Island, Wantagh named for a Chief of the Montauk Native Americans, the Upper East Side of Manhattan, Beverly Hills and Los Angeles California and Kapalua and Kula Maui Hawaii the Aloha State.

The above bio is a brief ongoing summation due to limitations of time and Akasha and have everything to do with Johnny Winter an albino from Texas being the greatest rock guitarist in recorded history the electric guitar being the essence of rock, the piano the essence of past Western classical music, the saxophone being the essence of jazz and the Meruvina being the essence of computer music the current chief manisfestaion of Western Classical Music.

Michael will soon be adding alto and tenor saxophone recordings to his oeuvre together with the gatra vina.