This was a much needed quiet week at home after New York, New Orleans, back to New York, Nashville and San Diego. Our only out of the normal 
routine activity was dinner with Patty and Brent on Friday night. The food was amazing as usual with smoked pork and chicken and an excellent sauce for the pork. They were celebrating their wedding anniversary on Saturday and so we picked up some funny gifts at the Groovy Coop in downtown McKinney after coffee on Friday. Patty loves cats and so this towel seemed appropriate.
Brent has taken to calling McD “The Instigator” based on an evening a few months ago where he apparently caught her coming around the corner into the kitchen with 2 bottles of wine from the fridge and a huge smile on her face. We prefer “The Facilitator”. Here’s Brent’s reenactment of the incident.
Diana woke up quite a bit earlier than me on Saturday morning (3:30am) to watch the Royal Wedding. We both enjoyed the ceremony with my highlights being the gospel choir doing “Stand By Me” and the cello soloist. The wonderful rendition of Ave Maria was performed by 19 year old Sheku Kanneh-Mason who had to break a previous engagement with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. He won the BBC Young Musician award at the age of 17 and comes from a very musical family. All of his brothers and sisters play classical music on various instruments with 2 others enrolled at the Royal Academy of Music.
I’ve put in my birthday order for the light blue convertible vintage E-type Jaguar that Harry drove to the evening reception.
The gospel choir singing “Stand by Me” reminded me of an article I’d read earlier in the week about an organization called Playing for Change. It’s co-founder, Mark Johnson, says “Music is the connection to overcome all the divisions in our world”. The organization records videos of musicians from all over the world collaborating on well known songs and uses the proceeds to fund musical education facilities in under served areas. Here they are doing “Stand by Me”.
I highly recommend the other videos in the series and love the way the production builds up as new musicians are added into the mix. What an excellent organization.
Here’s a video that I’ve been meaning to share for a while from a series that features musicians touring around the New Orleans French Quarter in a horse drawn buggy and playing music. This one is Taj Mahal doing his great song “Queen Bee”. A great one for a Sunday afternoon.
Now back to the gospel chorus arena again. Here’s an excellent version of the incomparable Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”. There are way too many disappointing covers of this song but this one has the right blend of quiet delivery combined with the Apollo gospel choir from Chicago.
I’ll finish out this shorter than normal post with the song I’m listening to just now. Soul eyes performed by Stan Getz on the tenor saxophone and Kenny Barron (two weeks ago at the Jazz Standard in New York) on piano. Getz is one of a handful of saxophone players who has such a unique and beautiful sound that you can pick him out almost immediately.