24/09/2024
What is music?
Yep, a tough one for any time or day, let alone a chilly Tuesday night/Wednesday morning! Anyway, let’s go there, we've got a big birthday to celebrate. Quit scrolling and chew this gargantuan question with us, for a couple of precious minutes…
So is music the “decoration of time” as the painter Basquiat mused or maybe it is what Beethoven considered “a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy”. Maybe its primary manifestation is the construction of internal worlds, a mirror to gaze upon oneself and a means to walk through one's own past and time; “it brings back the feeling of life when nothing else can” (Oliver Sacks). Is it just slabs of pure colour and emotion (Duke Ellington’s synaesthesia is well documented) or maybe it is a remnant echo of divine creation?
Maybe it is all these things or none, we don’t know! Not trivial stuff is it?! And who dares to really probe such deeply complex and possibly futile, quixotic questions through their art? To stretch a medium to breaking point to push it deep into new territory, alienating the majority but enthusing the minority? Few artist dare to take this on, completely understandably.
Well yesterday was the birthday of one person who did, Mr John Coltrane. And we’re fortunate enough that he left behind a rich corpus of music that documented his journey and quest for something beyond this mortal coil. Thanks John and happy birthday ❤️❤️❤️
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Love Sax? Love Jazz? Live in the South of England? Lucky you! This Thursday at Epsom Jazz Club we have the Hannah Horton Quartet performing LIVE for us. Tickets still available via www.epsomjazzclub.com. See you there!!!