past my bedtime

We have officially kicked off the Big-Birthday-Anniversary Celebration, extended version, with the Gonzalo Rubalcaba Trio. They played the Konzerthaus on Sunday night and it was a weird evening. The trio was breathtaking at times - the drummer, technically flawless, did not seem to be inhabiting the same rare space as piano and bass, whose players sighed and struck in symbiosis for two hours. Gonzalo sounded like Alban Berg had gone to Havana and partied until four in the morning, still playing at the club but getting all Mitteleuropaly homesick. Half the audience left in the course of the concert, which was just bizarre, since the playing was world-class and they are usually all about that here in Vienna. Were people expecting his dad? Was it just getting too late on a Sunday night? In any case it was strange, the best playing imaginable in that glorious gilded room, and people walking out in droves.

MtMn and I started our whole sordid affair at a jazz performance, the Art Ensemble of Chicago playing at the Kerr Center in Scottsdale, Arizona. He gave me a ride on his motorcycle at the last minute when my planned ride canceled due to a last minute dating opportunity (I hadn't learned to drive and mooched shamelessly off my friends for a decade until MtMn talk me to drive stick on the hills of Tacoma, Washington, a feat which stands as stubborn proof of his love, or at least tenacity). Joseph Jarman and Roscoe Mitchell painted their faces and blew up a storm the night that several of my foundations began to crumble. Seems right that we should begin an extended marking of our path together at another concert, this time so very classical in nature and venue but still marked with misbehavior.

We stayed up late talking about music and Vienna and anything else that kept us talking. Friday night was also too late, wonderful conversation and music at a friend's house that led to more staying up at home. So this morning's Regiesitzung will be a little foggy. In tribute to that February night in 1983 when I stayed up longer than I should have to talk about music and books in the lobby of McClintock Residence Hall, I salute every single sleepy morning of my life that has followed such a lack of judgment. Here's to knowing you should be in bed but not quite going yet, just to make sure you don't miss something good.

dkz