MUSIC IN THE MEMOIR
From Chapter: Winter Moon
From Chapter: Winter Moon
I don’t remember how many takes they did. Plenty, too many, given the limited amount of time we had with the strings, but every effort fizzled….
Who knows what mental trick Art used to wrench himself away from an improvising jazzman’s lifelong understanding and to rise above it? But he did it. He dragged himself out of the quicksand of that chart, ignoring it, at last, relying just on what he heard inside. It sounded as if he was ripping his own guts out in the studio. He was magnificent, and when he heard the take he knew it. He loved it. And I still love to listen to it.
A friend recently talked about good black gospel churches, how they sometimes have nurses, even ambulances there for people who, through the preaching and singing, are kayoed by the Spirit. Art could blast you just that way, and he does it for a while, if you’re at all susceptible, when he plays “The Prisoner” on Winter Moon.
Who knows what mental trick Art used to wrench himself away from an improvising jazzman’s lifelong understanding and to rise above it? But he did it. He dragged himself out of the quicksand of that chart, ignoring it, at last, relying just on what he heard inside. It sounded as if he was ripping his own guts out in the studio. He was magnificent, and when he heard the take he knew it. He loved it. And I still love to listen to it.
A friend recently talked about good black gospel churches, how they sometimes have nurses, even ambulances there for people who, through the preaching and singing, are kayoed by the Spirit. Art could blast you just that way, and he does it for a while, if you’re at all susceptible, when he plays “The Prisoner” on Winter Moon.