Touched with Fire

I met a woman the other day who was 103 years old. She walked with a cane and was 100% present in her mind. And teaching my jazz class the other day, I realized that she was born in the same year at the great jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker. That theoretically, he could have still been with us.

 

Instead, he died at 34 years old. He came unto this earth and his life was a short lightning flash followed by a roaring thunder that still echoes down to this day. Extraordinary what he accomplished in his too-short 34 years. As did Mozart in his 35 years. And so many others who left “the vivid air signed with their honor” so that their names and works continue to live on long past their physical bodies.

 

In the jazz world, there are many. Clifford Brown at 25 (car accident). Charlie Christian at 25 (tuberculosis), Bix Beiderbecke at 28 (pneumonia coupled with severe alcoholism), Bessie Smith at 43 (car accident), Fats Navarro at 26 (tuberculosis couple with heroin addiction), Chick Webb at 34 (tuberculosis of the spine), Eric Dolphy at 36 (diabetes), Lee Morgan at 33 (shot by his wife), Glenn Miller at 40 (plane crash).The list continues: Django Reinhart (43), Fats Waller (39), Art Tatum (47), Bud Powell (43), Wynton Kelly (39), Dinah Washington (39), Cannonball Adderly (46),  Nat King Cole (36), Billie Holiday (44), Lester Young (49),  John Coltrane (40).

 

By most standards, all of the above qualify for minor tragedies, life cut short by random events (car accidents), disease (tuberculosis) and the toll life on the road coupled with drug addictions and alcoholism takes on the body. I’m sure all would have preferred a long life and the world would be further refreshed as they continued to perform and create music for many more decades. (And to set the record straight that not all jazz musicians die young, note the following: Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk continuing into their 60’s, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Benny Goodman, Dizzy Gillespie, Elvin Jones, Chick Corea into their 70’s, Pharoah Sanders and Wayne Shorter in their 80’s, Eubie Blake, Dave Brubeck, Marian McPartland, Hank Jones, Ahmad Jamal in their 90’s—interesting that this last group all are pianists!)

 

By mythological standards, many of the above who left us early were of the sort where the intensity of life is condensed, where one year of their life equals ten years of another in the roaring fire of their creative spirit. Their “lips touched with fire telling of the spirit clothed from head to foot in song.” Their refusal to let the” traffic, noise and fog smother their flowering  spirit.”

Each achieving an immortality beyond any counting of physical years. Immortal gods dancing around us slowly plodding humans and enlivening our step with their work.

 

These paraphrased quotes above from an extraordinary poem by Stephen Spender speaking of those who traveled her on earth a short time, leaving “the vivid air signed with their honor.” A poem that could be a homage to each and every one of the musicians above. Read it out loud, slowly. 

 

I think continually of those who were truly great.

Who, from the womb, remembered the soul’s history

Through corridors of light where the hours are suns,

Endless and singing. Whose lovely ambition

Was that their lips, still touched with fire,

Should tell of the spirit clothed from head to foot in song.

And who hoarded from the spring branches

The desires falling across their bodies like blossoms.

 

What is precious is never to forget

The delight of the blood drawn from ageless springs

Breaking through rocks in worlds before our earth;

Never to deny its pleasure in the simple morning light,

Nor its grave evening demand for love.

Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother

With noise and fog the flowering of the spirit. 

 

Near the snow, near the sun, in the highest fields, 

See how these names are feted by the waving grass

And by the streamers of white cloud.

And whispers of wind in the listening sky;

The names of those who in their lives fought for life,

Who wore at their hearts the fire’s center.

Born of the sun, they traveled a short while toward the sun

And the left the vivid air signed with their honor.

 

I read this poem in my jazz class after listening to Charlie “Bird” Parker’s music and learning of his life story. And concluded with Parker’s own words describing his short, intense life as a musician. 

 

“I lit my fire. I greased my skillet. And I cooked.”

 

And we are still partaking of the meal.