Thinking and rethinking redux...

Last night we played a wild and energizing jazz gig:  our band leader had just heard Charles Neville speak about coming up in the "chitlin circuit" - the old venues for Black performers - so he was stoked on funk.  We gave "Cissy's Strut" our best shot - and it was a ton o fun. We also added Nora Jones' "Come Away with Me" and even a tribute to Don Cornelius with "Treat Her Like a Lady."  And when the official show was over, we brought back some other friends for a down and dirty jazz set based on Miles and Monk.  Sweet, sweet soul music into the night.

And that got me thinking - and rethinking - about what I get out doing this gig.  Clearly, the most nourishing times for my soul are when we are playing extended improvisations grounded in jazz.  I love to get lost in the rhythms and simply listen to what the trumpet, piano, sax and guitar artists come up with - it truly takes me to a different place - and I find myself sitting back into the drum/bass groove so that I can drift away.  As some of you know, I've had to practice - and listen - to this music as it isn't my foundation.  But working and working at it has paid off and opened me to the importance of digging deeper.

I also get a kick out getting the audience up and dancing - or singing along - and that's a whole different type of song, yes?  I mean, only those whose minds like to wander enjoy an extended free jazz improv, but almost everybody likes to shake their bootie.  So from time to time, that happens with this band, too.  We got the people up and dancing in Istanbul with "Shake, Rattle and Roll" a la Big Joe Hunter or  Stevie Wonder's great"Superstition" and when that happens over here I am a very happy man.  It is just so much fun to be a part of the energy of a club when everyone is dancing or singing their hearts out.

I've come to really groove to the Brazilian bossa nova rhythms as well as the bop/swing numbers that give my "walkin' the dog" chops a real work out.  These are songs I have to work on, too - pay serious attention to the charts - and I often feel worn out after them given the mental and physical concentration.

This brought to mind something I read earlier this month by Eugene Peterson called "the content of our lives."  It is a reflection on Psalm 124:

If God hadn't been for us —all together now, Israel, sing out!—
If God hadn't been for us
when everyone went against us,
We would have been swallowed alive
by their violent anger,
Swept away by the flood of rage,
drowned in the torrent;
We would have lost our lives
in the wild, raging water.
Oh, blessed be God!
He didn't go off and leave us.
He didn't abandon us defenseless,
helpless as a rabbit in a pack of snarling dogs.
We've flown free from their fangs,
free of their traps, free as a bird.
Their grip is broken;
we're free as a bird in flight.
God's strong name is our help,
the same God who made heaven and earth.

Peterson comments that::

Faith develops out of the most difficult aspects of our existence, not the easiest. The person of faith is not a person who has been born, luckily, with a good digestion and sunny disposition. The assumption by outsiders that Christians are naive or protected is the opposite of the truth:  Christians know more about the deep struggles of life than others, more about the ugliness of sin.


Peterson goes on to say that a person of faith can look into the heavens and see awe and wonder, but the Psalmist often looks the other way:  into the world of "the troubles of history, then anxiety of personal conflict and emotional trauma.  And it sees there the God who is on our side... the close look, the microscopic insight into the dragon's terrors, the flood waters and the imprisoning trap, sees the action of God in deliverance.

That is why we speak our words of praise in a world that is hellish; we sing our songs of victory in a world where things get messy; we live our joy among people who neither understand nor encourage us. But the content of our lives is God, not ourselves.

Like Paul wrote in Romans:

We continue to shout our praise even when we're hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next.

Last' night's gig helped me think about what I get out of all of this - there is joy and work, practice and prayer - and a chance to create something beautiful in the company of those I love.  Playing last night also helped me rethink why this is true.  And for it all - the music and the faith - I am grateful.