Jazz to Heal the World
Tonight's musicians for Jazz Shabbat:
Hill Greene, Anthony Coleman, Dana Herz, Arnan Raz,
Frank London and Reggie Nicholson
Dear friends,
“I know that there are bad forces,” said John Coltrane. “I know that there are forces out here that bring suffering to others and misery to the world. But I want to be the opposite force. I want to be the force which is truly for good.’
Yesterday I asked several people how they are, and each of them went right into the state of the world. I stopped them and said “not outside, inside.” Everyone I speak to seems consumed with dread over the state of the world. While completely understandable, and I certainly am not free from it, this is a dangerous phenomenon because it has the capacity not only to lead us to miss out on the good things in our lives, but also to perpetuate and even strengthen the bad things we see happening in the world.
The great American musicians who gave us Jazz music and its evolutions lived through far harder political circumstances than ours. Many of them were Black and lived through the era of segregation. Some were Black Women who lived before or during the Second Wave of Feminism. These musical giants kept playing and innovating through financial collapses, depression, world wars, McCarthyism, drug epidemics and every imaginable social and political ill that we experience today.
The strengthening, illuminating, invigorating power of music as a mode of experimentation and communication has always been the heartbeat of imaginative resistance. We need joy, beauty and self-expression especially in times of anxiety and fear.
Moses tells the Children of Israel in this week’s Parashah that their liberation is at hand, but they are so caught up in their anxiety that they do not hear him. “They could did not hear Moses for anguish of spirit, and for hard labor.” Rashi explains “anguish of spirit,” (קוצר רוח) which literally in the Hebrew means ״shortness of breath״ like this:
“If one is in anguish his breath comes in short gasps and he cannot draw long breaths.”
Our anxiety and anguish leads us to shortness of spirit. We can’t breathe properly when we get consumed by our fears. Music is a way out, and the fun-loving, curious-about-sound, exploratory and open mode of improvisation present in Jazz is an especially good reminder of where we are and who we are.
That’s why we’re meeting tonight at the National Jazz Museum in Harlem for the funnest night of the year at The New Shul, our annual Jazz Shabbat. Our inimitable Frank London will be leading the band of musicians of the highest caliber in the Jazz world. On this MLK weekend, we’ll be looking for the liberation that emerges from coming together around the truly spiritual sounds of Shabbat Jazz.
“There is never any end,” Coltrane said. “There are always new sounds to imagine; new feelings to get at. And always, there is the need to keep purifying these feelings and sounds so that we can really see what we've discovered in its pure state. So that we can see more and more clearly what we are. In that way, we can give to those who listen the essence, the best of what we are. But to do that at each stage, we have to keep on cleaning the mirror.”
I hope to see you tonight!
Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Misha