|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Birth of the Cool
Once the obligatory “mama” and “dada” are out of the way, I can’t help but believe my son’s first words may very well be “A Love Supreme”.
This four-note prayer, spoken in a hushed, resonant baritone by John Coltrane on the album of the same name, has been bouncing off our corridors since the day Grady came home from the hospital.
And, yes, while the obvious is true – that the phrase “A Love Supreme” captures the essence of how we feel about our new son – there’s something else at work here too.
You see, while many new parents are optimistically playing CDs titled “Mozart for Baby” and “Build Your Baby’s Brain with Bach”, I’ve decided my son’s source of early post-natal musical education will be America’s only truly original art form - Jazz.
I respect the studies that report classical music will make you smarter. While I have no scientific evidence to back it up, I will say that I have been to the symphony numerous times, and I always feel more intelligent and cultured than I do when I leave, say, a Dixie Chicks concert.
When I listen to classical music around the house or at work, I always feel I should have a smoking jacket and a pipe…perhaps a glass of Bordeaux instead of the requisite Turtle Mocha.
So, I will see to it Grady gets some Beethoven and Vivaldi in his dulcet diet, but before you feed the mind, you must feed the soul.
Soul. Like Miles, Monk, Trane, Bird, Diz, Mingus, Duke, Pops, Gil, Fats, Chet, Wynton, Branford, Papa Ellis, Cannonball, and Sonny. Like Frank, Tony, Sarah, Billie, Ella, and Cassandra..
Grady and I have spent many nights perched on the bed, playing with his colorful toys, while in the background, Mingus righteously slaps his fertile upright, Bird chases down his darkest demons, and Miles raises the very stakes of what music is capable of right there on our tiny tape player.
Grady has nary a clue. It’s just some melodious cacophony in the distance, but secretly I know, it’s God whispering in his ear the very secrets of life. The street secrets. The be-bop, beat secrets. The love secrets. The spontaneous, live-in-the-moment, know-the-script-but-improvise-like-hell secrets of jazz and life.
Believe
me, I’m aware of the ramifications. If classical music teaches a
child’s brain structure, am I feeding my son aural chaos? Will too
much Ornette Coleman give him ADD? Will Chet Baker’s heartbreak become
his own? Will Dave Brubeck’s experimentation with time signatures
like 5/4 and 9/8 make him deficient in math?
Will
he be kicked out of school for being the only six year old with a beret
and goatee?
No, I don’t think so. Instead, I think he’ll have a great insight about how, as Neitzsche once said, “out of chaos, comes order”. Somewhere in those embroiled antiphonies, those improvised scales and modes, so seemingly random to the naïve ear, he’ll pick out the blueprints in “Kind of Blue”, ‘Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting”, “Swing Low, Sweet Cadillac”, and “Giant Steps”.
He’ll learn to hear the hidden riffs beyond the diatonic melody. To find his own downbeat with which to march. To share the bandstand graciously with his fellow players in life, and relish every opportunity to solo. Mostly, hopefully, he’ll simply learn life is one sweet tune, played best by those who love it most. Straight, no chaser.
And
he’ll know that he has been invited to sit in on a beautiful, limitless
gig. A Love Supreme. A Love Supreme. A Love Supreme.