The Combinations Yield All

Unexpectedly Mafouz has begun to drag.  Perhaps it is just me.  I’ve been reading in smaller increments.  I think I need to make a bold commitment soon to breathe back in immediacy.  We have moved ahead ten years or so second book “The Palace of Desire” and the youngest, Kamal is in love.  He’s been in love for a while.  And while it is evocative, certainly of anyone's obsession during first adoration, the regular, unexpected epiphanies which the first book: “The Palace Walk” had so regularly yielded are more rare now and I find I don’t care.

And now we have Kamal jilted and brokenhearted and treated unjustly by his love for a transgression he maintains is illusory.  His blues are similarly rather prolonged.  Any real blues is too long.  No question.  But I haven’t enjoyed returning as much as I used to, now 750 pages in.  When I’m not with Kamal, I’m over with his sister Khadija, the scheming, complaining trouble maker.  Her house is in trouble.  Surprise.  Her mother in law hates her.  Again, I’m not particularly concerned.  Khadija’s jibing used to be fresh.  What’s happened to Mafouz?  What’s happened to me?

I’d written about Freddie Hubbard last week.  Seems every day since then I have just been going through his work, album by album.  No one album has the same line up of musicians.  On his debut album he’s joined by the brilliant, tragic tenor player Tina Brooks, and then Hank Mobley followed by Pepper Adams before he’s playing with Wayne Shorter.  What a tremendous progression.   McCoy Tyner to Cedar Walton and back and forth again and again on the keys.  What’s it like to have Elvin Jones vs. Philly Joe Jones on the drums?  The combinations yield all these majestic possibilities.

“The Artistry of Freddie Hubbard” was on the ride to the gym this morning.  Tommy Flanagan on keys, Curtis Fuller on the trombone and a real treat which I tried to listen with particular attention to, John Gilmore on the tenor.  He goes on to be the Sun Ra’s aide de camp.  Coltrane for one was a big fan.  “Happy Times” is more aspirational than confessional this morning but I allow myself a bit of sophisticated buoyancy before sun pushes itself up over the horizon.   “Summertime” now with an infectious, swaying head, turning under the denuded winter, willow strands as I turn north for the final block.

Wednesday 02/13/14