In the dozen years I’ve lived here, my apartment has slowly morphed into a combination library / computer workshop / recording studio / and who knows what, based in the living room, with various effusions of CDs, books, external hard drives, cassettes, photographs — generally confined to the living room. To my left, cassettes from the late Seventies on; to my right, a four-speed phonograph with (as I write) a Jess Stacy Commodore 78 of RAMBLIN’ and COMPLAININ’ on the turntable, adjacent to a newer stereo system. Also on my left, long-playing records and hard drives; to my right, a wall of CDs.
There are rules: a new CD will migrate to the kitchen counter, but it knows it shouldn’t be there and it tends to hide and look abashed when discovered. The bathroom and bedroom are off limits to music-infestation. No, don’t ask for photographs.
But having JAZZ LIVES since February 2008 is like living inside a giant multi-sensory photograph album. Insubstantial in some ways, seriously substantial in others. I’ve posted nearly six thousand videos on YouTube, which means I’ve been a busy tech-primate. And some more videos haven’t been posted, so the bits of information are thick in this one-bedroom palace of sound and sight.
Photograph by Michael Steinman
Every so often I want to hear and see something that gave me pleasure several times: at the moment of experience and, later, in writing about it, posting it, and enjoying it. One that came to mind today was a performance I witnessed and savored in California at San Francisco’s The Lost Church, almost four years ago: Tamar Korn, Craig Ventresco, Jared Engel, Gordon Au, and Dennis Lichtman — mellowly celebrating the lunar power of love with SHINE ON, HARVEST MOON:
Awfully sweet, this speaks of a world where young people could ask the cosmos for help in romance and receive it. Life before phones.
I will indulge myself in this again, and I encourage you to do so also. When I take a day off from blogging, the search bar on front page will lead you to treats.
May your happiness increase!
JAZZ LIVES 