Art also known as the expression or application of human
creative skill and imagination, is what took place just this past weekend with
the jazz superstar Kenny Barron.
With undeniable talent, and beautiful style Barron, on piano, accompanied
the Whitworth jazz ensemble for a night of wonderful music.
One piece; a solo Barron performed that I think deserves to
be shared. In my opinion the piece
Out Of Nowhere by Heyman and Green and Bill Liston was played to perfection,
with such beauty.
This piece began with mellow excitement, that of a young
boys excitement over the first snow falling gently outside. The piece then began to build up more
and more excitement until BOOM… a rush of sounds flowing from the piano caused
an unbelievable catharsis of emotion throughout every person in the auditorium;
an excitement in sappy love stories when the man and woman finally embrace
after months or even years of absence from one another.
The piece continued on into the second part within the piece. In this part there was a calm feeling
that fell over the crowd, a feeling of contentment, of completeness, of pure
joy. It was beautiful, wonderful,
and amazing all at the same time.
I pictured an experience that happened to me a few summers
ago, one I will never forget. It’s
me sitting on top of a mountain with my brother and my dad. But this is not just some mountain, and
its not just somewhere. This
Mountain is Mount Kilimanjaro, located in Tanzania Africa. The crack of dawn is approaching as we
waited with excitement. And then
it happened. The first sign of
daylight peeked out from under the sea of clouds. It was in that moment I found pure joy. Watching that sunrise was one of the
best experiences of my life.
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I like your comparison to the sunrise on Kilimanjaro; I find a similar joyous satisfaction in watching the sunrise from the top of Haleakala. As I have not yet heard the piece (although I'm looking it up right after this!), that image helped me to connect to the feeling of listening to Barron play. That always has been, in my opinion, one of the most amazing things about music. While music is entirely an auditory "expression or application of human creative skill and imagination," people have a tendency to connect to it from many different angles, across all senses.
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This concert was amazing. Exposure to the talent of students involved was worthy of praise. Though I was quite impressed, Baron did something cool that night that made spectators rethink about what solo jazz means. I have heard a lot of live music in the past, but Barron showed everyone present what being a world-class musician means. His expression was calm and confident. He knew exactly what he was doing. Each improvised phrase showed an expression that was unique to this artist's heart.
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