Homage to Gertrude Stein

 EVERY MORNING WHEN I WAKE UP

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Sweet Carrots

Amidst all the hullabaloo of this busy, noisy world, all the struggle to get through the day’s lists, all the striving to make a name for yourself and get ahead (of what? of who?), all the partaking of the roaring stream of texts and e-mails and Facebook posts and entertainment, sometimes the greatest pleasure comes down to simply this— the taste and crunch of a sweet fresh carrot.

 

In the vegetable world, there are many members who you can mostly count on. The difference between any two zucchinis, heads of cabbage, peppers, onions, in my experience is relatively small. But I find a yawning gap between the incarnations of three different vegetables, so that the gift of a fresh, tasty, sweet and succulent one is like an offering from the Gods. My list?

 

• Tomatoes— Those pale, anemic excuses for tomatoes that sometimes find themselves in grocery stores can’t hold a candle to the ruby, red, juicy ones fresh off the vine. Extra credit if they’re the “early girls” variety.

 

• Corn— Growing up in New Jersey, there was some statewide pride in our corn, rivaled by my wife’s home state of Michigan. Sweet corn should live up to its name and not try to get by disguised as its starch cousin. In the past few decades, the corn that appears in California has narrowed the gap between the authentic and the passable. Don’t know how or why, but I’m happy.

 

• And then carrots. Still a mystery, as I’ve not found a consistency in any of my local grocery stores. Seems to be the luck of the draw, though lately (shh! don’t tell) if I buy loose carrots in a bin, I snap off a small bite to taste before buying. (With my clean fingers, just to be clear.) And this last batch was the jackpot. I grabbed one before my afternoon walk and believe that its deep sweetness with nothing added (not even salt) was enough to make me a better human being. Or at least a happier one.

 

I’m sure there’s more to say about celery, cucumbers, avocados and more, but I’ll stop here with this little homage to the carrot. Long may it prosper!

Benevolent Colonialism

In the 1990’s, a rich American businessman moves to a foreign country and starts buying up land. Lots of it. Like a few million acres. A 20^th century version of colonialism, with big money instead of guns taking over—literally—another land. Same old, same old— disrespect for a people, for a culture, for the land itself, exploiting all for one’s own pleasure and profit.

 

Except not. Instead of buying it to earn yet more money or exploit the land or the workers on it, the man actually is buying it to preserve it, to keep it safe from deforestation and mining and military exercises and instead, to re-populate it with endangered species and restore it to its original habitat. And at the end of the vision, having spent his personal fortune to purchase it, to donate it all back to the country to create 17 National Parks. 

 

The country is Chile (also Argentina) and the man is Doug Tompkins, founder of Northface, co-founder with his wife Susie of Esprit and the subject of a new (and excellent) film called Wild Life. (He also was a parent at The San Francisco School where I worked, though I think his daughters Summer and Quincy may have left before I arrived in 1975. )

 

The film is an extraordinary testament to an extraordinary man who was wildly successful as a businessman, but throughout his career, combined the day-to-day grind of big business with rock climbing, kayaking, bush plane flying and a genuine love for the outdoors. Near the end of his time with Esprit, he started suggesting to customers that they only buy what they need, a radical thought in the endless-growth-and-profit mentality of capitalism. So he just opted out, moved to Chile, remarried another remarkable woman, Kris,  who had a similar epiphany as a CEO in the Patagonia Company and together, they began their quest to create national parks in both Chile and Argentina. When Doug died in a tragic kayak accident in 2015 (at 72 years old, almost my age!), Kris was emotionally shattered, but re-grouped and carried on their vision to completion, signing the agreement in 2018 with then-Chilean president Michelle Bachelet to create five new national parks and expand three others in an area the size of Switzerland! These were people that got things done!

 

So what from the outside looks completely inappropriate turns out to be a kind of benevolent colonialism, an American using his privilege and power and money on behalf of sustaining bio-diversity and preserving a planet that benefits all, human, plant and animal.

Billionaires, take note! 

Bookends

Here’s the truth. If Harvard University offered me an Honorary Doctorate Degree in Music Education, I wouldn’t refuse it. If Wynton Marsalis asked me to head his Lincoln Center Jazz Education for kids program, I’d consider moving to New York. If the Secret Song film won an Oscar for Best Documentary, I’d buy my plane ticked for L.A. to attend the ceremonies. And if my ABC’’s of Education book made the New York Times bestseller list, I’d be mightily pleased. But as my 3-year old student Bella said when I tried to describe to the preschool how to sing a tricky song, “Doug, that ain’t gonna happen.”

 

What did happen and moved me so deeply was singing the old jazz standards at the Jewish Home for the Aged yesterday and noticing a new resident mouthing the words with a look on her face that announced, “Thank you for bringing me home.” Again, the Harvard Degree would be a dopamime rush of public acknowledgment about what I think is important, but that hour spent with this woman and all the others is the real deal, the actual living in the supreme importance of music’s power to articulate the full range of our joy and sorrow, our love requited and unrequited, our power, our spirit, our soul.

 

I carry inside me another image of a 4-year-old in Preschool Singing, eyes shut, body swaying, singing out with her whole being “Free at last, free at last…” with such joy and abandonment. She had no idea of the song’s history or what freedom means and yet, she felt the song’s power enter her and knew in her bones that something important was taking place. The details would come later—for now just the song spoke for itself.

 

So here are the bookends of a life lived with hope and promise, disappointment and forgiveness, possibility and wisdom. A four-year- old singing herself forward into her life to come and a 94- year- old singing back to her life that has been. Music by our side at the beginning, music by our side at the end. No trophy on the mantelpiece can top that. 

Ugly Beauty

Kids are so damn smart. That is, if you train them to look and listen and think, give them something worthy to look at, listen to and think about— and then invite them to express what’s on their mind. That’s what I tried to do with all the kids in all my classes, but was consistently particularly astounded by the 8^th graders comments on the music we listened to in our weekly Jazz History class.

 

I happen to believe that mandatory Jazz History—well-taught, of course, not just dates and facts— is something worthy of children’s attention. That Thelonious Monk is one of many whose music is worthy of deep listening.  You wouldn’t guess that right away if you know his music or listened to it for the first time. On some level, it’s quite abstract and complex.  But inside of all that is a childlike simplicity and spirit that connects with listeners of all ages— which apparently includes 8^th graders.

The following quotes reveal that kids get Monk. They notice his ambiguities, the way he connects apparent opposites so that there is no contradiction. Like the title of one of his compositions—Ugly Beauty— he plays chords that seem like they should be wrong according to standard Western theory but somehow sound right. (In describing Ugly Beauty, one of the kids got the essence of the title without knowing the title: “ Sounds like a lot of mistakes: pretty.” Things that in one context would sound ugly in his context sound beautiful. Go figure. 

 

One of the first recordings I have the kids listen to is his improvisation on a blues (not his composition) called Bag’s Groove, recorded with a Miles Davis group. Listen to how the kids describe it:

• Childlike, yet complex.

• Relaxing, off-key notes.

 • He’s thinking and you can tell, choosing the notes systematically. It sounds like he’s playing the wrong chords, but it works. He’s thinking, remembering and then thinking again. It’s odd, but I like it!  

• Sounds kind of off-key, but also like he planned his solo out before he did it. He knew what sounded good together, even if we don’t think so. 

 

This would all mean much to you if you actually could hear the same thing the kids are describing. So in a daring first multi-media Blogpost experience, I’m going see if this Youtube link works. Monk’s solo begins at 6:49.  https://youtu.be/Wfpwt21Lglc

    

Then I played a solo piano interpretation of another jazz standard (again, not his composition) called I Should Care.  Listen to how intelligently this 14-year old speaks of it.

 

"The suspense is hard to take. You want to hear it, but he’s thinking and he knows you want it so he doesn’t give it to you right away. He draws you deeper in, then surprises you with odd chords and fast scales. It’s romantic with a twist, his thoughts coming at you through the notes."

 

Listen and see if you agree.  https://youtu.be/vTC2mRkaEzg

 

Like I said, kids are smart. Now if only adults were smart enough to serve them Monk and Miles and Milt and more at the table of compulsory education. 

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. 

Jazz History in Twelve Tunes

…is the name of the course I just taught for the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) sponsored by San Francisco State University. It’s basically college for seniors, without the pressure of exams and grades and figuring out who to date. Also noticeably less alcohol and drugs— at least during the class. 

 

Amongst the many things I do that I love beyond reason— singing with children, playing piano for elders, giving workshops to teachers— teaching Jazz History classes is near the top of the list. I did four or five online versions during the pandemic, but the live version—with real interaction, dialogue, a better sound system, a larger screen for my Powerpoints and a piano to demonstrate points and play tunes is head and shoulders above anything possible online. 

 

Because of all the years thinking about how to present this extraordinary history to 8^th graders at my school and younger kids as well, I know how to talk about it to beginners of all ages, as well as give perspectives and insights to those already somewhat knowledgeable about the history and familiar with the musical material. I know how to help people listen with new ears by giving them the key as to what to listen for, the cultural and historical background, the extra-musical viewpoint of jazz as storytelling, as conversation, as a poetry-in-sound that captures both the zeitgeist of a particular time and a universal experience of all times.

 

Why do I love it so much? Partly for the social duty of showing how “Jazz is what America could become if it ever became itself.” (Wynton Marsalis) and the insights into both how systemic racism works and how people resist it and move the needle closer to justice. My hope is to help people pay their dues for a music that gives so much joy, so much pleasure, so much affirmation of the human spirit by letting them know who to thank and how to thank them yet deeper once we understand what they went through. 

 

But while necessary, our social obligation to moving that needle can often feel like something we’d rather not do because it’s so difficult and painful and sorrowful. Hard to face. But side by side with these extraordinary musicians, it is simply a joy to be in their company and to feel ourselves rise up as they did out of the murky swamp of prejudice, hatred, injustice. 

 

To get to spend two hours a week shutting off our damn phones and just being in a room together listening is a great privilege and pleasure. While some of the stories and the musical information were challenging to all of the students some of the time and some of the students much of the time, it was a worthy challenge, the kind that was worth taking the bus or driving and looking for parking at 3:00 in the afternoon. I believe we all left refreshed, invigorated and intrigued to know more. And whether you’re 13 or 83, introducing you to these jazz musicians available to you at the drop of the needle, the insertion of the CD, the click on Spotify or Youtube, people who can soothe you in your sorrow and lift you up yet higher in your joy— well, that’s a teacher’s dream. 

 

Below is the course I taught, though in 6 two-hour classes, we didn’t get to the last two. Hoping to do a Part II next year. And if I repeated Part I, I might stop at Monk, add Benny Goodman’s Sing Sing Sing and Dizzy Gillespie’s Manteca, maybe switch Billie’s tune to God Bless the Child and Monk’s tune to Round Midnight. Tunes are listed below for your listening pleasure. Enjoy!

 

SUMMARY: JAZZ HISTORY IN 12 TUNES

 

1. Maple Leaf Rag— Scott Joplin

 

2. Empty Bed Blues— Bessie Smith

 

3. West End Blues— Louis Armstrong

 

4. Hotter Than That — Louis Armstrong

 

5. Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue—Duke Ellington

 

6. Jumpin’ at the Woodside— Count Basie

 

7. How High the Moon— Ella Fitzgerald

 

8. Body and Soul— Billie Holiday

 

9. Shaw Nuff— Charlie Parker

 

10. Misterioso —Thelonious Monk 

 

11. So What— Miles Davis *

 

12. A Love Supreme— John Coltrane *