Down On The Corner

By Paul Moffett

Guitarist, singer, composer and artist Jason Noble was 40 years old when he passed away on Saturday, August 4. His musical history has been noted in this space and extensively elsewhere on the Internet, including nationally, with pieces on several major sites. (Buzzgrinder.com documented a number of tweets by noted national musicians.) He was, by any measure, a significant Louisville musician, who contributed much that verged on the canonical to the Louisville (and national) music scene during a very short life. (Full disclosure: my admiration was for his work with Rachel's.Music For Egon Schele is still a favorite.)

In the ever-faster-paced world of popular music, those who have passed on are often very quickly forgotten, particularly as those who loved their music even as they aged out of the scene, which is, after all, a youth-oriented environment. In Louisville, however, fans tend to stay connected to their favorites, as boomers have demonstrated subsequent to the passing of Tim Krekel and Steve Ferguson, two of Louisville's more significant boomer musicians. It is also the case that fame sometimes increases posthumously, as less ardent fans come to realize what has been lost and take some actions to immortalize those musicians. Ordinarily, this happens at an older age; Noble's passing is much too early and his fans far too young to anticipate the death (other than by sudden accident or misfortune) of their idols. The question is, how much of what he achieved will live on and in what form? Only the passing of time will answer that, but I expect that it will primarily be from his influence on other musicians, many of whom will continue to impact the scene on all levels. We should all be so honored; Jason's honors in that way will be plentiful, though much too late and limited by the loss of what he might have done. May he rest in peace.

• Way back in the prehistoric Nineties, Louisville got tagged one of the three top Music Meccas in the U.S. courtesy ofPlayboy. It was an unscientific survey of music writers around the country and nobody much believed it, though it was endlessly touted here. Now the Atlantic Cities section ofThe Atlantic, subtitled "Places Matter," has "The Geography of America's Music Scenes, (http://www.theatlanticcities.com/arts-and-lifestyle/2012/08/geography-americas-music-scenes/2709/#slide2)" by one Richard Florida, which puts Louisville at No. 22, tied with Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta, Georgia. Needless to say, this has already caused some outrage at insiderLouisville.com, but the article is explicit in noting that: "It is important to point out that we are measuring the concentration of musicians and music-related businesses, not the vibrancy or impact or quality of artists to emerge from a regional scene."

You should go read it.

• Johnny Berry is putting together a show called "Lonesome, On'ry And Mean" that will celebrate the music that he loves best – outlaw country. He's lined up a pretty fair group of pickers to play it, too, including Steve Cooley, Eric Whorton, Scott Mertz, Kathleen Hoye and more, It'll happen at Headliners on September 28, so save your nickels and dimes, kiddies.

CODAS

Kleber, Louis A. 63, died in Louisville on August 16, 2012. He was a drummer who played with the Christopher Robin band and several others.

Noble, Jason, 40, died in Maryland, where he was undergoing treatment for synovial carcinoma, on August 4. He was a member of several notable Louisville bands, including Rodan, Rachel's, King G and the J Crew and The Shippig News.

Raible, Carl J. "Corky" Jr., 83, died on August 4, 2012. He was a trumpet player who performed with the Louisville Symphony Orchestra, was the Supervisor Of Instrumental Music for the Jefferson County Board Of Education and was a profession working musician who played whatever gig required a trumpet. He was a life member of the American Federation of Musicians Local 11-637.