Chronicles Continued

….yesterday, was crossing the street at an intersection with 14th Street.  At the light waiting was a black car.  A somewhat beat up 4 door sedan.  Do not know what originally caught my attention, but what I quickly came to notice was the late teens, early twenties blonde girl in the back seat by the left window.  She looked neither drugged nor sad so it wasn’t her facial expression which I continued to try to read when I passed the car again at another spot along 14th Street.  It was the configuration of the car’s occupants.  A male driver and a male passenger riding shotgun.  Not blonde and if I had to make a snap judgement – Eastern European in their late 30’s or early 40’s.  In the back seat, two more of the same ethnic background.  It was their ages compared to hers and the bravado with which they were navigating the street that caught my eye.  Of course my mind went to the question, was she being held against her will?  I actually walked beside the car, wanted the men to feel they were observed – probably not a wise choice – but could get no further reading as now she was away from the sidewalk side of the street and I could no longer gauge her.  Those moments stay with me a long time.

This trial that just ended with Ellen Pao losing her complaint of bias against Kleiner Perkins is important for a number of reasons.  All of those reasons can be found in the New York Times account of the complaint and the trial.  What I found fascinating was the similarity to a play in progress for which I was a reader.  A year or so ago, one night a week, I was a reader for a master play writing class.  This means you show up and are given pages of the current work of a playwright to read in character with other such actors in order to give the playwright an opportunity to hear their work out loud.  One of the plays for which I read many times was by an American woman of Asian decent about her time at a financial institution on Wall Street.  It detailed how she was subjected to outright slander and humiliating situations by her male boss.  How she would ask for consideration and be told that there was no consideration for females in this this world.  The play was definitely first person though the names had been changed to protect the innocent.   As the details played out on the page, it was mind-blowing to realize that in this day and age and education levels such discrimination was in full force.   And as of today, nothing has changed.

Today, I was lost in the East Village.  1.  I am almost never there.  2.  As I walked by 2nd Ave and 7th Street.  I noted the french fry shop… the chairs sitting outside and how small it was.  I was on edge all morning.  And then at 3:15 the exact place was engulfed in flames as an apparent gas explosion took out the building and the building next door.  I was gone from the area by 1:00 am but my feeling of ‘unease’ lingered.  A friend I was with, found me scattered, unsettled and later I asked myself if I felt ‘something’ as I walked by earlier.  The fumes could be smelled all the way in the West Village in the early evening.

Below is another letter from “Spike” of Smalls Jazz.  So well said.  Applicable to all forms of life.

Dear Friends:

I recently paid a visit to my father who lives on the New Jersey shore. I took him out for a steak at a local steak house that had been there forever. We sat in the dimly lit restaurant and there in the corner was a piano and an old-timer playing it. We ordered our food and conversed and I listened and observed this pianist. It was something that I hadn’t seen in a long time – a real cocktail pianist. Having donned a tuxedo and sat behind dimly lit pianos playing for indifferent audiences for many years, I have a deep sympathy and admiration for those that can do it. This gentleman (who turned out, I found out later, to be 80 years old) played in a style that no longer exists. One tune after another, great old chestnuts such as “Dancing In The Dark”, “Deep In A Dream”, “Indian Summer” – one after the other in a continuous segue. Not jazz either, no “blowing” or hip originals or far out harmonies or grandstanding but just the tunes – played clearly and simply and with the most correct chord changes you’ll ever hear. I mentioned to my Pop – “this is a rarity, like seeing a dinosaur”. I observed this guy play, with a gentleness and grace, while televisions blared and people talked at the top of their lungs and some stupid kid walks by and plays “chopsticks” while the guy is in the middle of tune. He is unfazed. Just patient and playing his songs – creating a lovely background fabric for the restaurant. A lost art, indeed, this style of cocktail piano. It made me think about Humility and particularly humility as a musician, as the kind of musician who can serve a public and create a music that is not a “performance” but rather something environmental – lovely background for people to eat and speak. In this day and age of self-proclaimed masters on Facebook, extolling their own virtues or emailing about their EPK’s of their “amazing” shows to promote themselves. Or musicians who simply regurgitate what they think is hip or the self-righteous ones who claim lineage to some kind of tradition – they all need to shut up and sit in a corner and play for 5 hours with minimal breaks (this guy didn’t take one in the entire time we sat there, not one). Musicians today need to learn about service and also about taste and playing tunes correctly – really knowing those melodies and the right chords, not the ones taken from some jazz-class. It’s hard to play this way. It can be crushing but it’s real work, something that a lot of young musicians have never known or have forgotten about. Real musical work, which is to say, not playing your original tunes for a one hour set in front of a appreciative audience but rather as a way to create background. A throwback to the days before iPods when the only way to have music in a restaurant was to hire a pianist. It made me think about the great masters that I’ve known in my lifetime – musicians like Harry Whitaker or Mark Thompson or Walter Davis Jr – they were musicians who knew about work, could play in pizzerias, could play for hours without complaint, who were joyful and not slanderous but through their love of music only saw the good qualities in others. Musicians, who like boulders in a river that have been rubbed smooth by the current were natural, uncomplaining and spoke with their hearts. Humility, Taste and Grace – the highest qualities a musician can aspire to and what is most sorely needed today.

My best wishes to everyone and their loved ones – I hope to see you at the clubs!

Spike

Two hours, on a Friday night.  Packed house at BB King.  And ‘Mengus’ only plays the Blues.  No jazz, no R&B only the Blues.  Nothing else like it!  Livin’ in the City!

Cigarette butts, spittle, and other mucus fluids, from the mouth, onto the sidewalk.  The men who do this, what gives them the right?  The snow has melted, the cigarette butts are in vast displays outside on the sidewalk in front of every bar and lounge.  During the snow time, loads of other items were being dropped, the ‘dropper’ thinking they were covered by snow.  This includes dog excrement.  Awful in the bright sunlight and melting snow.

Today I had reason to revisit the Bernie Madoff story.  A very City story.  The story ends with the family: the father in prison for 150 years, both sons dead, one from cancer and one from suicide and the mother is living alone somewhere.  What kind of life is there for a woman in her 70’s with this history.  Were the ‘wealthy years’ worth it?  How does it feel to lose your all your children due to choices made as a couple? An older woman once said to me, ‘ When you are young, you are busy and can keep the unpleasantness at bay, but when you are old, you must think because you can not alleviate the thoughts with activity.

 

Have been hoping to catch one of these fashion plates without being too conspicuous. Perhaps other cities have the same garb for their dogs?  Saw one yesterday, and he had three black ones and one blue.  Guess he lost one, like one loses socks in the dryer.  I get that it’s to keep the salt from between the pads.. but when you match the collar, the sweater, the boots and the owner, well it is quite an investment and statement.

 

If among your friends you have one who does not accept the scientific findings supporting ‘Climate Change’ [some folks got hung up on the word ‘warming’] let them come to the City pronto.  Yet another early morning snow storm.  Yesterday it rained.  Rain began Tuesday, early evening and by Wednesday afternoon, on the west side of the streets, the snow was, for all intents and purposes, gone.  Then early this morning the snow began again.  It is slated to be another 4-6 inches.  So what’s wrong with a little snow?  It impedes daily routines, [which is perhaps a good thing, forcing some to ‘back off’ the hurry].  It costs the City a bundle to keep the roads passable.  No matter what my schedule may be, there are others who must show up at their nanny/house cleaning/service jobs.  A little bad weather isn’t going to stop their employers from demanding that they be at their positions.  Schools close which works havoc for the working parent responsible for getting off-spring to the classroom. And masses of sodium chloride is being added to the water system via the street drains.  Never a good thing.

The upside?  It is beautiful to watch the process as the trees become dressed in white fluff on top of the stark black branches

Read the current newspapers, then book a seat at this play at Signature Theatre.

Well cast, directed, and a powerful script/story.