Sunset at the Holland Tunnel

It's Friday.

I like Friday.

Everyone seems to be so happy that the weekend is coming.

I'm writing from the Jerome L. Greene Performance Space at WNYC and WQXR at the moment. The light from the sunset has that special orange haze from the roaring sun at the horizon!

Yeah!! It's almost nighttime, and we have two wonderful Brazillian musicians playing tonight at the Greene Space - pianist Helio Alves and bassist Nilson Matta. The event is called "Global Salon - Cities in Brazil!" produced by our friend Indira Etwaroo at New York Public Radio.

Outside the window at Varick and Charlton, cars are at a standstill outside trying to get into the Holland Tunnel to get home. Everybody will get into the tunnel - in about 45 minutes to an hour!!

But for now, they are stuck. 

What are you thinking about when you are stuck in traffic and everyone wants to go where you want to go? Does your blood pressure rise? Your temper? 

What moves you when you cannot move???

I was thinking the other day about the different colors that appear each morning at dawn outside my bedroom in the heart of the . How quickly they come and go. First light pink into black, then a sprinkle of gray, a splash of silver, a sliver of orange, a blast of blue and a sweet taste of apricot. I try and hold on to the color. With my eyes. And then with my mind's eye. And poof, it's impossibly gone. white gray and blue with a little orange sunshine peeking through… wow! white silver blue, white blue blue… 

That's the first 5 minutes of every single day. A symphony!

I have to tell you, it's more than fantastic that I have those 5 precious minutes of sunrise to refer to when I get stuck at Varick and Charlton on my way back to New Jersey.

Oh, music is very helpful. Roy Hargrove. Yeah… great tone, swing and references of the entire history of jazz. Elio Villafranca! Elio is being discovered and it's exciting to watch. How can a man play piano like that? And what power in the pen of composers Nikolai Kapustin and Gyorgy Ligeti! Have you heard the voice of Leon Thomas? Power to change the world I say… and no sweat to get me through the Holland Tunnel.

It's Sunday morning now. Yeah, it was a beautiful sunrise. I'm making pancakes because… well because it's Sunday morning! Outside my window, the geese are practicing takeoff and landing. How do they know how to form a V like that? Where does that come from??? Soon people will be out and about doing what they do, and me? I'm putting the morning aside for music this Sunday. Spiritual calisthentics. Gotta get ready for the rat race. It's coming tomorrow - right on time!!

So friends, every once in a while, shut your personal digital device off and try some quality time on for size. Try a 5 minute experiment. Listen to music in the foreground, not the background. Not in your earbuds but live or on a real stereo system. Do you know how that sounds? Something special happens when you listen to new music as an activity for its own sake. You learn, you grow and it's stunning!

And so my dear friends, I have to run. I have some music to listen to and I'm preparing to  welcome two of my favorite musicians, vocalist José James and pianist Kris Bowers to on Sunday, December 18th at 6 pm. Perhaps you'd like to join us? We're right next to .

Kris is a special pianist. He just won the 2011 Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Piano Competition at the Kennedy Center in Washington a few months ago. José James? He's the next Marvin Gaye and then some.

José says "Let every day ring with the sound of the laughter of your Spirit."

Now that's a concept! 

Music is a power unto itself. Try it on for size!

Drop by anytime.