moon traveller herald

The passing of blues guitar great Hubert Sumlin has brought forward many tributes. One thing that comes across is that he was kind, sweet, and a unique player, to which I can attest. When the blues came first my way via a Boston visit by Sunnyland Slim and Paul DeMark, I soon met Hubert. When I was a kid of 16 I had a 45 of Killing Floor/Going Down Slow so I knew his playing – if not his name - from early on. Later, in the 1980s he was, together with Sunnyland Slim, Louisiana Red and Sam Burckhardt (see picture above of him and Hubert) a house guest, especially quiet and thoughtful of others. When Slim and Paul arrived in Boston 1979 the talk soon turned to Hubert. It was Paul who told me he was Howlin Wolf's guitar player and that said a lot. The first day Sunnyland and Paul DeMark were in town the first thing they wanted to do was hook up with Hubert Sumlin. How did we find people in those days? It's hard now to imagine. There was a grapevine, not a cellular phone network. ...

MIT researchers have created a semiconductor chip that is said to imitate how the brain’s neurons adapt in response to new information. With about 400 transistors, the silicon chip can simulate the activity of a single brain synapse — a connection between two neurons that allows information to flow from one to the other. The chip could also be used in neural prosthetic device research related to artificial retinas, says Chi-Sang Poon, a principal research scientist in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. On my technology blog... http://wp.me/p1UfV-1D