The Shifting Beat of Mother Nature's Drum
Music provides the rhythm we need to go with the inevitable flows
There was an earthquake last week whose initial rumble and roll I did not feel under my feet, but whose aftershock vibrated the yoga studio where people lay listening to my soundbath, and I was still enough on my cushion to notice. There will be a solar eclipse today that I may or may not see. I have no special glasses with which to stare straight at it, but maybe sidelong is all it takes to get it.
Even without feeling the earthquake’s rumble, or seeing the eclipse turn daytime briefly into night, I get it. I know the Universe is more powerful than I, that it has the ability to turn things upside down and change things in our lives at any moment. Change is often relegated into ‘good’ or ‘bad,’ when really neither of those monikers are nearly nuanced enough to ever really be true. There is a balance we mostly need to figure a way to strike, playing along with the rhythms of nature, feeling into its movements, vibrations and shifts, and breathing deeply through the messages it sends, sometimes startlingly, along our path.
I suppose this is the beauty I see, the power, in sound and music. Playing my various instruments during a sound meditation, or watching other performers—like those I braved downpours and distances to witness last week—I am aware of the intention to offer something otherworldly, something searing and arresting, something that might command earthquake- or eclipse-style attention, something that might pull people away from the cacophony of their worried minds, might divert them from depression.
I popped in to Colony in Woodstock to see KidBess & The Magic Ring. The opener, Ithaca-based singer/songwriter Tenzin Chopak, was super soulful and great. The featured band leader KidBess, aka Binghamton-based Bess Greenberg, a former professional basketball player turned visual artist and musician, joined him for a couple of songs, and I noted offstage that she was sitting near her bandmates, sending notes at one point. I was moved by the way three of them — Bess and cellist Jeff McAuley and drummer Moses Valle — came together in a deep hug, wishing each other the best onstage. The connection and closeness of the three, in addition to the guitarist Joe Alston and bassist Mike Amadeo, was obvious as they played.
It was an electric performance I enjoyed fully. It made me realize how deeply envious I am of the connection between bandmates and players. What a rhythm they share together.
I have that during the drum circle I facilitate at the men’s shelter in downtown Brooklyn. Last week, a young Nigerian man sat down across from me. As the art therapist and I began to drum, he took the shakers I’d given him and smiled, trying to find our beat with his own. He switched to a drum and we jammed for a bit, other residents coming in to the room, invited by our pounding rhythms.
“Aaah,” he said, when the great joyous jam ended, nodding. “I see. ‘Culture.’” I nodded, thinking of so many different cultures where music has been/is the backbone of community life, one that has often been eradicated through history with a change of power. I spoke a bit about beautiful cultures of music, like the Moroccan Gnawa music I long followed, that help people tune out the challenges of things even as terrible as slavery by allowing them to tune in deeply to trance-like rhythms. And then we jammed some more.
At the next break in the music, the gentleman nodded again. “I see,” he said. “‘Spirituality.’” I smiled. “Yes,” I said. “There is indeed a connection to something larger than us with the creation of music,” I said. “You can feel it, right?” He nodded.
After my sound bath, when he removed his mask and stared, slightly bleary-eyed, right at me, he said, “Wow.” And I smiled. To offer a few minutes’ respite from the worried mind, to help bring people someplace higher, is a powerful thing. And I so appreciate it when others do it for me.
Here is a calendar of diverting musical offerings this week:) Make a point of trying to get out to even one…
In peace and harmony,
Steph
XX
Focus on Piano (mostly) for April 8 - 14
Monday, April 8
Leo Genovese Trio
Tower Records, Brooklyn
8 PM - Free!
Just saw one of my very fave pianists Leo Genovese last week, as I wrote here. So happy he’s back in New York. Did I note last week how he has somehow become even deeper and more emotive in his playing than before he went back for a while to his hometown in Argentina? The idea of how musicians morph and change in their playing with their own personal growth fascinates me. And is a big selling point to go see Leo in his new fabulous iteration!! He plays with Francesco Marcocci on bass and Billy Mintz on drums at Tower Records in Williamsburg. Do it if you can, perfect capper for the eclipse day!!! Change is afoot…
Tuesday, April 9
Mitsuko Uchida + Jonathan Biss
Carnegie Hall
8 PM
I first encountered Japanese pianist Mitsuko Uchida while writing for the Concertline publication of Northwestern University’s Pick-Staiger Concert Hall, the dream job I had for my work-study position as a scholarship student. (I guess I’ve always wanted to write about music.) Mitsuko came to Pick-Staiger in 1990, my sophomore year, to play and teach a Master Class, a performance I created a promotion to get more students to come to by playing her music (whether CD or cassette tape then, I can’t recall) on a boom box in the student union. I stood behind the table with a poster of her, playing her searing sonatas as loud as possible, and beseeched frat boys I knew to enter a raffle for free tickets. “Great date idea!” I remember suggesting. Ha. When I saw that she was coming to Carnegie Hall this week, I walked in the pouring rain to the famed concert hall to pick up tickets directly (and avoid the ridiculous fees.) It is always amazing just to step into that hallowed hall. I can’t wait!!! She plays with Jonathan Biss, a fellow pianist and her co-artistic director of The Marlboro Music School and Festival, a summer classical piano training retreat in Marlboro, Vermont. If there are still tix, get them, and go.
Wednesday, April 10
Paul Cornish Quintet
Jazz Gallery
Sets at 7:30 PM + 9:30 PM
Los Angeles-based pianist and composer Paul Cornish, who hails from Houston, leads this quintet featuring Chris Lewis on tenor sax, Kalia Vandever on trombone, Phillip Norris on bass and Kayvon Gordon on drums (who I’ve seen and met, and he’s great). He aims with his music to inspire “freedom and collaboration.” Sounds like a great aim. Go hear!
Thursday, April 11
Maxime Zecchini: Piano for the Left Hand
La Maison Francaise NYU
7 PM - 8:30 PM - Free!
Catch this beautiful French pianist in a performance at this forum for French-American cultural and intellectual exchange at New York University’s Washington Square campus. Music is certainly one of the greatest forms of cultural exchange…One doesn’t often hear pianists who use only their left hand, something Zecchini has supposedly mastered. Will certainly be fascinating to behold!
Friday, April 12
Lage Lund Quartet
Jazz Gallery
Sets at 7:30 PM + 9:30 PM
Ok, I’m cheating a bit here as this quartet is led by Norwegian jazz guitarist Lage Lund rather than the pianist in the group, Lex Korten. But the group also includes my drummer friend Johnathan Blake, who I haven’t seen play in way too long:) They are joined also by Matt Brewer, on bass, so it looks like a spectacular evening.
Saturday, April 13
Shake Rattle & Roll Dueling Pianos
Chelsea Table & Stage
10 PM
Dueling Pianos is a concert, comedy show and cabaret in one, apparently. The audience picks the playlist for two pianists who then create an interactive singalong show, no tune off limits. Hmmm…sounds fun. And Chelsea Table + Stage is a beautiful venue, with yummy food.
Sunday, April 14
Beatrice Rana Plays Rachmaninoff
New York Philharmonic, David Geffen Hall, Lincoln Center
2 PM (ALSO APRIL 12th and 13th at 8 PM )
At 31, Italian pianist Beatrice Rana has been the guest of the most impressive orchestras around the world, performed at the most esteemed concert halls and festivals. “A transcendent lightness of touch,” is what is said about her playing. Catch one of the three times she will play with the New York Philharmonic as a soloist in Rachnaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 at Lincoln Center’s new Geffen Hall this weekend if you can. Part of a Star Pianists series all season long. Definitely a wow wunderkind.