We all know that life and just about everything else we see are impermanent. We all know that we need to savor what we have because it may not last. This is especially true of love, that most precious of elements in our universe. We all know this, and yet it is so easy to forget. As the dust settles a bit (hopefully) after a few years marked by loss, I have become more determined to incorporate this awareness into my own life and consciousness.
Continue ReadingNormally I go simpler than this for pancakes, but for a special occasion this weekend I wanted to go for something a little more exotically flavored. It was a bit more labor intensive, but was not super-difficult and didn’t require anything not already in our fridge or pantry. Served up with some maple syrup and/or fruit, this was/is mighty tasty stuff!
Continue ReadingThich Nhat Hanh keeps breathing, MLK lives on and we all can take lessons from both of them to help us learn to question what is real. Whoa.
Continue ReadingI am a sucker for musicians who play overtly soulful music and then turn around and play the hippest modern jazz, especially when they find organic ways to integrate the two. Joe Locke is one of the hippest and most technically facile vibraphonists active today, but can always be counted on for achingly soulful music as a player, composer and arranger of others’ material. Here are some of the tracks that most embody that to me.
Continue ReadingHumans have an amazing capacity to heal, whether physically or emotionally, from profound trauma. Maybe we never get back to 100%, but even when our bodies and hearts seem irreparably broken, there is great potential for recovery. We can tap into that even more potently if we acknowledge that this healing may not take the predictable, sequential route that we might expect or hope for.
Continue ReadingSince it’s Thanksgiving today, it seems like good timing to address a subtle yet surprisingly powerful shift that I’ve learned to make in the realm of gratitude.
Continue ReadingNovember 25 marks the release of A Beautiful Life, a musically brilliant and emotionally potent new album by Jimmy Greene in tribute to his murdered daughter, Ana Grace. I could write a long essay about Jimmy the human being – we’ve been friends over half our lives by now – his humility, his strength, his faith and his caring responsibility. But that’s not what this is. Instead, I wanted to whet your appetites with some personal highlights from the catalog of Jimmy the musician. Though he is my friend and a major formative figure in my own development as a young musician, I have also been a fan of his music since I first heard his soulful, mature playing when he was 16. It has of course only gotten better. As a saxophonist and composer he has developed a distinct and important voice.
Continue ReadingSpecificity of expectations is the biggest obstacle facing so many musicians (and, for that matter, every other human being). It’s easy to get into the trap of evaluating the value or satisfaction of something based on these expectations. It’s hard enough to objectively ask ourselves “where am I?” Hard becomes virtually impossible, though, when our own sincere thoughts are being drowned out by a sea of other questions: “Where should I be?” “Where are the people I envy?” “Where do others think I am?” “Where did I expect I would be by this point when I was younger?”
Continue ReadingJack Bruce finally succumbed to his liver woes yesterday at the age of 71. I’ll always be a fan of his most famous work with Cream, and could certainly have done a Top 10 list of just those tunes. But as a person interested in jazz, rock and the sometimes nebulous crosshairs between them, I find Jack Bruce to be a particularly important (dare I say unique?) figure, with credibility in both worlds and a long track record of exploring the intersections. This list was compiled with a particular slant towards showing his diversity in that regard.
Continue ReadingThis tasty dip is good any time of year, though if fresh herbs are available, all the better.
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