And Some More Thoughts On His Love For Music, And Mine
We walked onto the patio area at a recent family wedding reception. The band played “Friend of the Devil,” one of my favorite Grateful Dead songs. But what happened next changed things.
My son and a few of his cousins began dancing, and I mean dancing hard. It became apparent that the adults of the group were not the intended audience. The set list shifted. The band followed “Friend of the Devil” with “The Wheels on the Bus.” My son is no music elitist. The band played to the kids, and he loved it.
It’s not your normal cover band one-two punch, but it paid off. A 2-year-old, a 3-year-old and a 4-year old were all shaking their bodies, moving with everything they have to the banjo on this Charleston, South Carolina patio, while the adults stood back laughing.
My son’s love for music is a beautiful thing. When the music moves him, he dances with his whole body, bobbing his head and shaking his butt. It looks both ridiculous and liberating at the same time. If you happen to witness it, you cannot help but laugh.
Jamie is a huge Talking Heads fan. Sometimes he will say “Hi, hi go!” out of nowhere, which is actually a reference to the song “Swamp” on the album Stop Making Sense. He’ll begin bobbing up and down immediately, as an instinctive reaction while the first few notes of this song play.
He is only 22 months old, but his love for music dates back. He began kicking on a regular basis as he heard the same Straight No Chaser song, while my wife was still pregnant.
Watching the way Jamie enjoys music is a reminder of the power of the art form. It can maintain a high level of personal meaning through childhood and early adulthood. There comes a time when we become busy with the stresses of school, work and family. It is important to hang onto it through all the various stresses life brings our way.
Music can be reduced to the pop songs playing as background noise as we run errands, or the smooth jazz that plays as we sit in waiting rooms. It can become the detail that is glossed over while fretting about something else. To call it “the soundtrack of our life” at this point would overinflate its importance.
I know I spent a lot of time obsessing over the guitar notes of Jimmy Page and the immaculate vocals of Robert Plant in junior high and high school. A friend brought me into a whole new world when he bought me Led Zeppelin I and Houses of the Holy for my birthday one year. It took me several weeks to change the CD from one to the other because I wasn’t done appreciating the first album yet.
I remember the feeling I had when my friends and I passed on attending a Grateful Dead concert, saying that we would catch them the next time around. Not long after that decision front man Jerry Garcia died. As a reaction to that and for the pure obsession, I began attending every show that I could.
Neil Young, Radiohead, Tom Petty, U2, the Who, the Black Crowes, I wanted to see it all. If a rock band I cared about to any degree came passing through the greater Chicago area, I wanted to be in attendance.
It led to some great moments. I walked to the front of the stage at the Rosemont Theater as Radiohead belted out classics from OK Computer. I stood in amazement at the World Music Theater as Neil Young punched out notes from “Keep on Rocking in the Free World.” I slid down the hill at the World Music Theater on a stormy weekend night as Jimmy Page and the Black Crowes traversed the Zeppelin catalog.
There are insightful lyrics from all my favorite bands that stick with me and often seem perfect for any occasion. I find myself thinking about the U2 line from “If God Will Send His Angels”…”Jesus never let me down. Jesus used to show me the score. Then they put Jesus in show business. Now it is hard to fit through the door.” Saw them live, too.
My whole life there has been a song for every mood and every feeling… happy, sad, angry, bored. Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of jazz as I write. There is something about the melodious piano of Dave Brubeck that can provide the backdrop for whatever I am working on. When I run or work out, it is the hard-hitting riffs of AC/DC that seem to do the trick. But, if I mix up the occasions, it may take me twice as long to run an already slow mile.
The point is, that music has had a lasting impact on my life. I am so happy that my son who’s not even 2, feels the power of the tune resonate through him. I am hoping that the music that he loves sticks with him for a long, long time.
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