Patti and Lou!

Always friends fellow artists and one the 'fan' of the other always....Big O post some new Patti meets the Pontiff and Lou from London 1992......

Lou Reed - London 1992 The Masterclass Bootleg [Kiss The Stone KTS079, 1CD]
Live at the Hammersmith Odeon, London, UK; March 23, 1992
 

 Lou Reed – vocals, guitar
Mike Rathke - guitar, piano, viola
Rob Wasserman - electric upright bass
Michael Blair - drums, percussion
Guest
Little Jimmy Scott - backing vocals

Patti Smith Group - Rome 2013 Live at Sala Santa Cecilia, Auditorium del Parco della Musica, Roma, Italy;  April 14, 2013 on a Sunday night. Broadcast on Live and Direct by “BBC Radio2 Live”, RAI. Excellent FM stereo.

 Patti Smith - voice, guitar
Lanny Kaye - guitar
Jackson Smith - guitar
Jesse Smith - piano, keyboards
Tony Shanahan - bass, piano
Jay Dee Daugherty - drums
(guitarist Jack Petruzzelli was also allegedly part of this line-up, but he’s not mentioned by Patti during band’s intros, Track 203)

 Why? On April 10, days before this concert, a photo caught Patti Smith shaking hands with the newly elected head of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis.

This picture released by the Vatican press office on April 10, 2013 shows Pope Francis greeting US singer Patti Smith during the pontiff’s weekly general audience at St Peters square at the Vatican. - AFP

 Patti Smith is not Roman Catholic but she has a great sense of history and context. Her songs display that sensibility. Her concerts are always timely with songs that evoke the past by linking to the present. Whether it is a dedication to one of her rock heroes, remembering a birthday of a jazz giant or a call to arms for people power, Smith confesses she has “a relic sensibility”. A sense of time and place. Of events.

 Constantine's Dream

I dreamed a dream of St. Francis who kneeled and prayed
For the birds and the beasts and all human kind
All through the night I felt drawn in by him
And I heard him call like a distant hymn

I retreated from the silence of my room
Stepping down the ancient stones washed with dawn
And entered the basilica that bore his name
Seeing his effigy I bowed my head

And my racing heart, I gave to him
I kneeled and prayed and sleep
That I could not find in the night
I found through him

I saw before me the world of his world
The bright fields, the birds in abundance
All of nature of which he sang singing of him
All the beauty that surrounded him as he walked

His nature that was nature itself and I heard him
I heard him speak and the birds sang sweetly
And the wolves licked his feet
But I could not give myself to him

I felt another call from the basilica itself
The call of art, the call of man
And the beauty of the material drew me away
And I awoke and beheld upon the wall

The dream of Constantine
The handiwork of Piero della Francesca
Who had stood where I stood
And with his brush stroke

The legend of the true cross
And he envisioned Constantine
Advancing to greet the enemy
And as he was passing the river

An unaccustomed fear gripped his bowels
An anticipation so overwhelming
That it manifested in waves
All through the night the dream drew toward him

As an advancing crusade
He slept in his tent on the battlefield
While his men stood guard
And an angel awoke him

Constantine within his dream awoke
And his men saw a light pass over the face
Of the king, the troubled king
And the angel came and showed to him

The sign of the true cross in heaven
And upon it was written
“In this sign shall thou conquer”
In the distance, the tents of his army were lit by moonlight

But another kind of radiance lit the face of Constantine
And in the morning light the artist seeing his work was done
Saw it was good in this sign shall thou conquer
He let his brush drop and passed into a sleep of his own

And he dreamed of Constantine
Carrying him into battle in his right hand
An immaculate undefiled and simple white cross
Piero della Francesca, as his brush stroked the wall

Filled with the torpor and fell into a dream of his own
From the geometry of his heart, he mapped it out
He saw the king rise, fitted with armor set upon a white horse
An immaculate cross in his right hand

He advanced toward the enemy and the symmetry
The perfection of his mathematics
Caused the scattering of the enemy agitated, broken
They fled and Piero dela Francesca, waking, cried out

All is art, all is future, oh Lord, let me die on the back of adventure
With a brush and an eye full of light
As he advanced in age the light was shorn from him
His eyes, blinded, he layed upon his bed

On an October morning, 1492 whispering
Oh Lord, let me die on the back of adventure
Oh Lord, let me die on the back of adventure, oh
And a world away, the world away

On three great ships, adventure itself as if to answer
Pulling into the new world
And as far as his eyes could see, no longer blind
All of nature, unspoiled, beautiful, beautiful

Such a manner it would have lifted
The heart of St. Francis into the realm of universal love
Columbus set foot on the new world
He witnessed beauty unspoiled

All of the delights given by God as if in Eden itself
As if Eden had opened up her heart to him
And opened her dress and all of her fruit, gave to him
And Columbus so overwhelmed

Fell into a sleep of his own
All the world in his sleep, all of the beauty
All of the beauty entwined with the future
The 21st century advancing like the angel

Advancing like the angel
That had come to Constantine
Constantine and history
Oh, this is your cross to bear

Oh Lord, oh Lord, let me deliver
Hallowed adventure
To all mankind in the future
Oh art, cried the painter

Oh art, oh art, cried the angel
Art, the great material gift of man
Art that hath denied the hungered pleas of St. Francis
Oh thou, artist, all shall crumble in the dust

Oh thou, navigator, the terrible end of man
This is your gift to mankind
This is your cross to bear

Then Columbus saw all of nature aflame
The apocalyptic night
And the dream of the troubled king
Dissolved into light

Patti Smith