TT: Passing by

I blew through New York last night, staying just long enough to pick up my mail, get caught in a traffic jam, sweat profusely, eat sushi, and update the right-hand column with fresh "Top Five" and "Out of the Past" picks.

Today I fly to Minneapolis for a Guthrie Theatre revival of Neil Simon's The Sunshine Boys . From there I head to the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival in New York, followed by a quick trip to Connecticut to see Goodspeed Musicals' Carousel . Come Tuesday I report to Shakespeare & Company , where I'll be spending the next three weeks rehearsing Satchmo at the Waldorf with John Douglas Thompson and Gordon Edelstein.

Whew!

In lieu of anything more elaborate, allow me to pass on two interesting links:

• The mills of academe grind slowly, but the Journal of Jazz Studies has finally gotten around to reviewing Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong . The reviewer is Michael Cogswell, director of the Louis Armstrong House Museum , and what he says about Pops is...well, see for yourself:

Terry Teachout's Pops is the definitive, one-volume, narrative biography of Louis Armstrong....Teachout's ability to place a whirlwind of events in context is masterful and is easy to overlook because it does not draw attention to itself.

I've never been so proud of a review.

Read the whole thing here .

• After you've finally gotten around to seeing Margaret , you might enjoy knowing what music Kenneth Lonergan listened to while making the film.