Spontaneous music improv, and unexpected group kindness is a sacred gift to the spirit. A sunset evening just before our learning of the pandemic and a shift in worldwide reality. So this is all the more precious. Especially as COVID was just unfolding and rearranging relationships and the changing world order. Generosity of welcome sharing is a profound weaver of goodness. Mahalo nui to all of you. And check out Steve Bess exuding pure joy as he does! Mahalo Alexis and John Russell for bearing witness and spirit with your creative arts. And honoring pilina with the special ‘āina of ‘Ōuli where we are blessed to live as well.
The generous note shared with the above video.
From Alexis Russell:
Aloha Music Appreciation Friends—Back on Thursday, March 12th we put together a rather impromptu evening of music-making at our house (first invitations went out the day before… last invitations went out minutes before 🙂 ). Old friend, John Patitucci, four-time Grammy-award-winning bassist was staying there for five days with his 22-year-old daughter, Grei, who is a singer-songwriter living in L.A.
I had told one of my friends, a talented musician, who knew all about John Patitucci, to bring his guitar. He texted back… “Are you kidding me? I would never presume to play with him.” I texted him back… “Presume.” Sure enough, by the time the evening was over my friend had played four or five pieces with John P., and had also engaged in some very lively conversation with him and a cadre of four or five other jazz aficionados.
John Patitucci shares a very special and rare quality… he is a truly humble man even though he is a very successful artist. In a humorous tone he volunteers… “I am a bassist. I’m used to following.” That evening he played with five or six different local musicians playing “Hawaiian” music… a genre that John was not familiar with. He followed beautifully and effortlessly. John made it sound like they’d rehearsed and played the pieces many times before. The smiles and the music that went back and forth between the local musicians and John was priceless. These guys demonstrated that music certainly is a universal language.
Buy why try to describe it?… check out the attached video link. Hope you enjoy it.
Thank you, John Patitucci and Mahalo i ke Akua— JR
P.S. One of our great friends, a psychiatric nurse who a few years back enlisted Alexis to work with her on her own approach to art as therapy… “Self Discovery Through Art” arrived at our gathering looking and feeling… in her own words… “haggard.” For weeks she had been immersed in trying to put together a project and it had worn her down. Though she’s not a musician, her partner is quite a jazz aficionado and so they were “definites” on our short list of invitees. As the music ended for the night with that Hawaiian classic… “Mr. Sun Cho Lee,” she came up to me with a huge smile, gave me a big hug and gushed her gratitude. The music… and the love had refreshed, restored and healed her spirit!
P.P.S. Some of the clips on the video are not from our Thursday night kanakapila… John jamming with daughter, a young bassist fiddling with John’s 6-string electric bass, John and Brian in an electric and acoustic bass duet… and of course the lead off segment of “Chef Boy-R-P”… cooking Italian in the minimalist kitchen at Anekona.
ALEXIS W RUSSELL
http:// alexis-art.com