Use It or Lose It

We have a voice. Let us sing.

We have hands. Let us clap.

We have a body. Let us dance.

We have a mind. Let us think.

We have an imagination. Let us create.

We have a heart. Let us feel.

We have a soul. Let us rejoice.

With and without words, this is what I told the 60 children and adults who came to my hands-on jazz workshop (with help from my fellow Pentatonics musicians) at The San Francisco Jazz Center.

And for some 70 minutes without a pause, from the six-month old to the 60-year old, that is precisely what we did.

There is nothing sadder than human possibility untapped, nothing more glorious than using the whole spectrum of our marvelously expressive selves. When one six-year old boy was crying because the class was over, he was saying in child-speak, "Here I felt wholly alive. Don't let it stop."