Monthly Archives: June 2012

Mike Melvoin

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(from the International Review of Music, 2012)

I got a few wonderful emails from Mike Melvoin over the years. Beautiful things.  He wrote just as he talked, which is my favorite kind of writing, and then talked a lot like he played. Jazz players write the coolest emails sometimes, just perfect little written things, honest and funny and down to the bone true.  Anyway, this was the last one I got from Mike Melvoin. He was responding to my first Keeping It Real post. As usual, I was incapable of saying something intelligent in return. I get so flustered when a jazz master writes anything back, I don’t know what to say and I don’t think I said anything in reply to Mike except maybe a thanks. I had no idea he was so sick. You can’t tell from what he wrote here.  It’s from Jan 20th, just a month before he died.

Here’s what Mike wrote:

Dead on, Brick!

I pass along a couple of defining ideas to the occasional student I meet.

First: “The only thing more important than having a good time is having good time.”

And the former is dependent on the latter. The core purpose of our music hasn’t changed since we were hired to grease up Saturday night. If we achieved that, the music had a healthy fan base. If we put some other purpose in front, the fan base was sure to desert us as you are so right in observing. Those of us players who fire the blood pulse with the historic language of the blues put asses in seats. Not just geriatric or academic ones but across the board asses who come to us to feel good. 

And second: “There are no points for being admired, only for being believed.” 

I don’t do this to be thought of as a good player. I do this to get those who hear me to feel as good as I do.  Jazz well played is a physical music first and foremost.  Thank you for the much needed reminder.

Hoping your Saturday night is delicious and our music helped make it so.

Best,

Mike Melvoin

That last line says it all.  No wonder everyone’s missing him.  Very sorry to see him go.

Just trying to capture the spirit of the thing

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(2012)

It just dawned on me that if I hadn’t stopped writing the Brick’s Picks jazzcolumn I could have used my LA Weekly cachet to score some righteous press passes to the Los Angeles Kings victory parade on Thursday. 

I spent seven years writing that goddamned column. I spent twenty years a devoted Kings fan. I hated writing Brick’s Picks…maybe not at first but by the end it was nothing but misery. And you had to be a masochist to be a goddamned Kings fan all those years. Sure jumping on the bandwagon in ’92 was great, but staying on meant getting used to the cellar, humiliation, failure, pitying looks from Canadians or insults from people from San Jose in those fey teal jerseys. It meant watching your team finally make the playoffs only to be swept–swept–in the first round. And then doing the exact same thing two seasons later. It meant only once making it to the second round.  It meant watching the owner go to jail for counterfeiting old coins. It meant watching Rob Blake and wondering why the hell he was still here. It meant saying goodbye to the Great One when he left for a shot at a cup. It meant Lakers fans who had no idea who or even what the Kings were. It meant trying to believe it every time they said the miserable failure of  a hockey franchise was in a “rebuilding phase”. It meant feeling kinda sorry for Bob Miller but never saying so. It meant being a little heartbroken when Warren Wiebe died. It meant watching the Mighty Ducks win the cup. It meant not being sure what was lonelier, being a Kings fan or a jazz fan in Los Angeles. And not caring. Because I loved jazz, and I loved hockey. So what if sometimes it felt like nobody else did. 

But if I had known the goddamn Kings were going to be Stanley Cup Champions this year after one of the most improbably glorious post-season runs in NHL history, I would never have quit the Weekly. I’d still be there, grinding out the column every Sunday night and hating every second of it. I would have done it because I could have called in some favors and gotten me a couple passes to the press section and watch this silly-assed parade. I would have so loved that. I could stop watching the end of Slapshot and being jealous of the extras cheering like mad for a fictional hockey team.

So this is the first time I have regretted quitting my gig at the L.A. Weekly. It’s a dumb reason, I know.  And it’s a selfish reason, I know that too. But it’s a good reason. You see, the Charlestown Chiefs have won the championship of the Federal League. Yup. Finally. And all that stuff before, the failures and disappointments and the what-the-fucks?…well, who cares. It only makes this year even better. Amazing. Miraculous. Great. Just great. Beautiful, even.

Oh…and my second favorite team?  The New Jersey Devils. Now what are those odds?

OK…..and I have another confession, and now that the Kings are Stanley Cup Champions it’s not so embarrassing. Well, it’s embarrassing, but not so pathetic. You see, I have only been star struck once in my life. It was a couple years ago, at the height of my hipness. While leaving the St. Patrick’s Day festivities at LALive (press passes with free everything, of course) I run smack dab into Luc Robataille. Luc. Ohmygod. I said–and I quote–wow, you’re Luc Robataille. He said yes I am. I tried to say something hip and knowledgeable but nothing came out. Just a few incoherent syllables. He nodded and walked on. I said to my wife–and I quote–that was Luc Robataille. She said yes I know. I told everyone I that week that I had met Luc Robataille. They said who? Except for Kings fans. They said wow. And then they said Luuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuc.

That Like thing

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I would “Like”, Amanda wrote,  a whole lot more of your writings (because I love & enjoy your writings)… but I just hate to sign up and sign in, in order to do the “Like” thing.

The Like thing? Wow. I had no idea there was a like thing on WordPress. I thought that was a Facebook thing.

So I looked. Sure enough, there it as. Right below the Share This thing. Which I had never noticed either.

I don’t think I’ve quite gotten the hang of this blog thing. 

I told Amanda things were different on my planet. I say that  a lot, things are different on my planet. A nice way of saying clueless.

I am clueless about the like thing. I don’t quite understand why people care or not if people “like” what the wrote. Personally I don’t give a fuck. I don’t sit here writing and hoping somebody will be moved enough to do the like thing. I don’t think about that at all when I write. It’s not like I’m writing advertising copy. I’m writing for me. If I like it I post it. If I don’t like it I do the delete thing. I do the delete thing a lot.

If I kinda like it I do the edit thing. I have a couple hundred pieces here that I kinda like but not enough to do the edit thing yet . They’re stuck in the draft category. It’s like limbo for blog posts.  If I lit a candle for each you could read a book by their glow.

And how come there’s not a hate thing? That’d be a lot more fun than a like thing. If you post something and people do the hate thing, then you know you’re doing something right.

(This was a while ago…I understand that whole Like Thing thing now. And am a much better person thing for it.)