Quincy Jones
Hey Sookie Taudry, Jenny Diver, Polly Peachum, Ol' Miss Lulu Brown
Photo - credit Times of Trenton. Reprinted with permission.
Like many others his death sent me to YouTube to listen and recall. His collaboration with Frank Sinatra who called him “Q.” “I loved him as much as anyone else I ever worked with,” wrote Jones. The joyful competence in doing Mack the knife. And the two of them doing Fly me to the Moon with Count Basie. Will Friedwald said, "Jones boosted’ and "when Sinatra decided to address it with the Basie and Jones combination they recharged it into a straight swinger...all but explodes with energy". There was his work with Michael Jackson on Billie Jean. They argued over the drum and bass beginning. Jackson had his way. Jones said, “When Michael Jackson tells you, ‘That’s what makes me want to dance, well, the rest of us just have to shut up.” The New York Times has a couple of pieces today - Giant of American Music and 14 Essential Songs. The Times reported, “He may have made his most lasting mark by doing what some believe to be equally important in the ground-level history of an art form: the work of connecting. Beyond his hands-on work with score paper, he organized, charmed, persuaded, hired and validated. Starting in the late 1950s, he took social and professional mobility to a new level in Black popular art, eventually creating the conditions for a great deal of music to flow between styles, outlets and markets. And all of that could be said of him even if he had not produced Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” the best-selling album of all time.”
The man had a vocation. “No vocation is born of itself or lives for itself. A vocation flows from the heart of God.” Pope Francis
You Have to Listen
Photo - credit Times of Trenton. Reprinted with permission.
Bob Smith and I were at the Times (Trenton Times) waiting for a photographer. He was going to take a shot to go with Curt Yeske's piece on the “Jazz in Worship” series. People would stick their head in to say hello or assure us that he was on his way. One fellow was having a running conversation with Bob – he also played the guitar – he did rock – he couldn't get it (he couldn't get jazz),. Finally, he asked Bob, how do you know when to come in? The answer was descriptive, a statement of reality, how things worked – “Well, you have to listen.” Bob knew about listening. For years, he played jazz and blues with Tom and Newt and taught and lead church choirs. Listening is obedience to reality. Listing allows the diversity of talents and egos to create music. There are people who seem to share in such a deep, often hidden, listening that they have a rhythm together. -From “Reflections on Jazz and Spirituality” Robert Gallagher, An unpublished book from the 1990s.
This abides,
Brother Robert, OA
Pictures - The first is from a Trenton Times article “Honoring Creative Freedom” Article - credit Times of Trenton. Reprinted with permission.
The second is the picture that was finally taken. Article - credit Times of Trenton. Reprinted with permission.