SPIRIT IN FLIGHT

From Beginning To Beginning, Again And Again Eternally

SPIRIT IN FLIGHT

From Beginning To Beginning, Again And Again Eternally

STORY TO NARRATIVE

Narrative flows from stories within stories lived moment to moment. In the liminal space of repeated memory storying narrates indelible slices of life that overflow into memories mirrored in visions that resonate in appearances of earlier and later moments lived. We story our lives NOW, then narrate in morphing shapes of memory without end.

All elements of narrative are inextricably entwined. Who, what, where, when, and why are inseparable. 

We can take the elements apart to reflect and contemplate. Which makes for a worthwhile ACTING HUMAN practice when done with skillful intention. Revealed are the many ways a ‘rewrite’ might ‘work.’ 

Never stuck in an exclusive, singular identity, nor trapped in a set of immutable circumstances we are forever free. With curiosity, imagination and creative skill we are liberated to live life alive.

ACTING AND WRITING

Acting and writing are essentially the same process, they are practiced as crafts,  employing differing means of expression. 

We write our lives as we act the moments, and in the acting create a store of stories we use to reflect and narrate. As narrators, on stage or page, we change the whole of our perceived lives, every element and the relationships established and transforming revise all that came before and everything that follows.

All life lives in perpetual motion. It shakes and shimmers in infinite variety.

We live our lives in improvised patterns of vibrational energy. We are music made of stardust and spirit playing without beginning or end in a Universal Theater.

Every narrative, with skill, can take many truthful shapes. Lacking skill we can confound, mislead, and erode trust in ourselves. When we can’t trust, we cannot inspire trust. Our lives shrink and vital relationships wither. The value of living truthfully is inestimable. 

I’ve written elsewhere: “In the process of living our ongoing stories we quietly give meaning to our lives. The deep intention to value life with full and generous attention is what animates our story and initiates a search for truth. Not a static representation of truth but an animating and animated truth, a truth always in motion, always in shifting relation to our stories as they unfold in surprise and reveal fresh truth. Truth is not a fact. Truth erupts out of story lived alive. When we live life alive truth emerges spontaneously and moves us in truthful ways to continuously discover truth.” 

As we learned from Stanislavski and the gang of teachers he inspired:

“Acting is doing truthfully. . .”

Truth is the beating heart of infinite play.

Creative change when experienced in body and soul, with skillful and keen attention paid, ignites life lived alive.

The narrative/story shared now is imbued with the enlightening experiences that spawned it, and speaks to me profoundly, always anew. 

A NEW DAY DAWNS

Sixty years and six days ago, Richie Tringalli beeps his car horn early on a humid morning in August. He’s come to drive me and Willie Dennis to the airport. I’m running a minute, maybe two, behind. 

In five minutes I’m down. I throw my horn, an overnight bag and a hanging show change onto the back seat, slide into the front and we’re off. 

Settled in and under way Richie passes me a match book. I light the reefer hanging from my lips take a hit and pass it to Richie T, an avocational drummer, apprentice electrician, and avid pot smoker.

We drop down onto the Saw Mill, straight ahead to the Henry Hudson Parkway, toss a dime into the toll basket as we hit the West Side Highway above which Willie lives near the 158th Street Exit.

As we pull up Willie awaits with his wife Morgana (King). She asks if we mind her riding along to bid us farewell at The Marine Terminal where we are scheduled to depart on a chartered flight. No Problem. Richie T is totally cool. 

A slight rearrangement of horns, Willie plays trombone, and baggage. Now with Morgana and Willie comfortable in the back it’s off to Queens.

I pull out an ample bag of pot (gage, weed) to twist one up for Willie. Morgana snatches the bag. “What are you doing?” I’m thinking - isn’t it obvious? - getting high.

Morgana is a jazz singer of note and considerable experience, hardly a stranger to musicians and their ways. She insists in a ‘what are you an idiot tone’ that taking a bag of weed to Birmingham (Alabama, not England) is way worse than a bad idea. “I’ll hold onto this until you get back.” I glance at Willie, he glances back with a ‘what are ya gonna do’ face. We’re resigned. She’s Sicilian.

MARINE TERMINAL

The joint is jumping. It’s a jungle of photographers and reporters. Television cameras. 

We wend our way through, toward the other cats in the band. A radio guy thrusts a mic in my face. “Are you afraid of what awaits you?” “No man, I’m cool.” 

I knew it was a different kind of gig but didn’t truly grok the significance of flying into what I now know was the historic Summer of 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama.

NOTE: Much has been written about the events in Birmingham in the early 60s leading to this day.

Followed only mere weeks later by the “I Have A Dream” March on Washington which this show enabled, raising significant money and proving, in its way, that hard won progress had been made.

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In short order the press gaggle disbands. The performers including The Apollo Orchestra (the show band in which I play) assembles for a photo in front of the turbo-prop we are about to board. 

Only a few photographers are left, from Life Magazine, Jet, Ebony, The Saturday Evening Post, News Services and the like. Some board with us to document “The Salute To Freedom.”

I begin to more fully absorb the notion that this is way more than just another show. The plane is called “The Spirit of 76,” so named for the 76 passengers in flight to perform the “first integrated variety show to play before a non-segregated audience in Birmingham, Alabama.” Indeed, anywhere in the Deep South. A pivotal event in civil rights history energized by the arts and entertainment. Especially the spirit of music.

According to Rev. Martin Luther King, we would “invade the social consciousness of white America and encourage African Americans, with songs of hope and determination.”

In the Autumn of 1964 Rev. King opened the inaugural edition of the Berlin Jazz Festival with these words:

"God has brought many things out of oppression. He has endowed his creatures with the capacity to create - and from this capacity has flowed the sweet songs of sorrow and joy that have allowed man to cope with his environment and many different situations.

Jazz speaks for life. The Blues tell the story of life's difficulties, and if you think for a moment, you will realize that they take the hardest realities of life and put them into music, only to come out with some new hope or sense of triumph. This is triumphant music.

Modern Jazz has continued in this tradition, singing the songs of a more complicated urban existence. When life itself offers no order and meaning, the musician creates an order and meaning from the sounds of the earth which flow through his instrument.

It is no wonder that so much of the search for identity among American Negroes was championed by Jazz musicians. Long before the modern essayists and scholars wrote of "racial identity" as a problem for a multiracial world, musicians were returning to their roots to affirm that which was stirring within their souls.

Much of the power of our Freedom Movement in the United States has come from this music. It has strengthened us with its sweet rhythms when courage began to fail. It has calmed us with its rich harmonies when spirits were down. And now, Jazz is exported to the world. For in the particular struggle of the Negro in America, there is something akin to the universal struggle of modern man. Everybody has the Blues. Everybody longs for meaning. Everybody needs to love and be loved. Everybody needs to clap hands and be happy. Everybody longs for faith. In music, especially this broad category called Jazz, there is a stepping stone towards all of these."

My sense of things when leaving the house on the morning of August 5, 1963 is that I was off to play a one nighter with great section mates, E.V. Perry (with whom I would split the lead book) and Thad Jones, both vaunted veterans of the Count Basie Band, and with Panama Francis on drums, the show drummer at the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem’s heyday, and a big band loaded with other top-notch musicians. You know, like Willie Dennis, trombonist par excellence. (Check out Mingus’ classic “Ah Um” recording for a delectable taste of superb jazz featuring my dear friend Willie Dennis.)

Whatever we are asked to play, we play. We are professional musicians. And, each of us, in this outfit, is deeply steeped in the traditions of Jazz. We know how to swing hard and laugh heartily.

ON THE PLANE

There’s food. All from The Stage Deli, compliments of its proprietor, Max Asnas, a Russian-Jewish immigrant, a lover of all things show who was disgusted by the mistreatment of Negro entertainers and an avid civil rights supporter forever, from before there was a ‘movement.’ He was also a funny Jew. To wit:  

Reuben (not related to the sandwich) Phillips, the bandleader, wants to go over a few things for which there are inadequate charts (written arrangements). So while flying we do some going over. 

The Magid Triplets, three dancing white boys, have a dixieland section in their act. I’m a decent traditional jazz player, so I was elected to handle the trumpet chores. Life Magazine caught me in the midst of a sky high rehearsal. Thanks to Morgana only the plane was high.

In hours we would land in Birmingham which was roiling in unrest.

Taxi drivers refused to transport the show's cast and personnel. Rev. King collected a caravan of 50 private-car volunteers. Hotels had refused lodgings; Adams got a motel, run by A. G. Gaston, former Negro undertaker and now owner of the motel, the local Negro bank and Negro insurance company to provide lodgings. ~Leo Shull in “Show Business”

We checked into Gaston’s and it was straight ahead to the dining room. Can one ever get enough to eat? I was soon self-seated at a table for eight one chair away from Rev. King. Lunch!

More story/narrative to follow. As you’ll see in the next post or two, my reflection on this storying experience grows spokes that angle, that poke and pulse, in directions unexpected when I sat down to write this dispatch. Such is the nature of story. . . it lives many truthful lives in memory and narrative. The protagonist (me as of this telling) morphs in life lived alive, not in the least bound strictly to a single, exclusive identity.

Until next time. . .

Lights Up!

If you’re thirsty for a 30 minute version of Birmingham ‘movement’ history, here it is: