reetings, dear Readers,
This summer I seemed to have wandered off. I had a ravishing trip to France in the spring, and then more travel, plus Covid and a broken toe!
I’d like to jump in now to wish everyone a splashy but not crazy return to work. In France, as you may know, this is called the re-entry or La Rentrée after les grandes vacances of summer. I think we all go through re-entry, at least in our minds, after yea these many years when we logged back into school in September.
I want to recount a brief visit from Godot at the beginning of August. Ron Carter came to town! To little Rochester, NY. Some of you are like, oh, my gawd. And others, Ron Carter who? Last year I found out that the bassist Ron Carter was performing in New York City. I calculated train fare from Rochester, plus hotel, plus food and of course the ticket. Chasing Ron Carter didn’t seem to be in the cards. And then, he appeared. In Rochester, NY, population 200,000.
WHO IS RON CARTER
Well, let’s start at the beginning. Has anybody heard of Miles Davis? Ron Carter played in the Miles Davis Second Great Quintet for several years, along with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock.
In my effort to give a brief overview of Miles, for the sake of history, I found myself in the rabbit hole of Wikipedia’s discussion of Davis. At the very end we learn that he was called both, “The Prince of Darkness,” and “The Picasso of Jazz.” He was a brilliant jazz innovator who influenced many jazz movements; he played the trumpet; he physically abused his wives. Drugs addled his brain (cocaine and heroin); illness and treatment drugs (sickle cell anemia and diabetes) contributed to his temper. I hate this particular conundrum, a brilliant musician and an abuser of self and others. In a testimony to the angel trying to tame the devil within, here’s something from Davis’s Sketches of Spain.
Now, Ron Carter is a saint in comparison. In an interview, Carter was asked about drugs and how he steered clear. Carter answered, “Well I was a very good athlete in my youth, even played one year of college basketball at a pretty decent skill level, so that helped. And for me, music was so important. It was such a focus for me that drugs never entered into my point of view at all.”
RON CARTER FUN FACTS
Carter was born in 1937 in Michigan and grew up in Detroit, where he started on the cello and switched to the bass when a spot opened up for that instrument in the school orchestra. He has won awards on both instruments. Carter has lived a long life, starting in 1937, which puts him at 87 years old.
He lugged his instrument home from school every day to practice, which wouldn’t have been so bad, except that there was a white neighborhood through which the black kids could not walk, so he had to detour around that neighborhood.
He was a “sideman,” for Freddie Hubbard, Jefferson Airplane and many, many others, for a total (so far) of 2221 appearances on different recordings.
THE BASS, THE BASS—IT’S ALL ABOUT THE BASS
Some of you may remember a Godot piece on Charles Mingus, another great double bass player, seen here in these very pages. Well, my love affair with the bass begat another love affair with another bassist, Ron Carter. Prime Video happens to have the PBS documentary on Carter called, “Find the Right Notes,” which gives those of us who don’t play an instrument an insight into how jazz works.
https://www.pbs.org/show/ron-carter-finding-right-notes
AUGUST 9, 2024
There we were on August 9, this very summer, waiting for the Ron Carter trio to come on stage. Two very talkative and dramatic Rochesterians introduced him. They reminded us that Carter had gotten his BA at Eastman School of Music, right here in Rochester. As a classical music student, he also ventured off to local jazz bar, the Pythodd Room, (pronounced Pith-ODD) on Clarissa St. in segregated Rochester to play the bass. Well, the two presenters informed us, the mayor had proclaimed August 9, 2024, as Ron Carter Day. The introducers used all the flourishes at their command. “Whereas Ron Carter did this, and whereas Ron Carter did that.” We, in the audience, endured.
When the trio finally walked on stage, you could see Ron Carter was touched. He was given his proclamation. The next thing you know we were all on our feet, giving him a standing ovation before he had played a note. His pianist, Donald Vega, and guitarist, Russell Malone, were amazing. When the guitarist played a solo, Ron Carter stood up to applaud, as did we. Then the pianist played a solo and the guitarist stood up to applaud, as did we. Of course, when Carter played a solo, up we got. Aerobics at the Hochstein.
HOCHSTEIN SCHOOL
We were in an intimate concert hall, named for David Hochstein, a brilliant violinist killed in World War I. An ideal venue. Ron Carter? Really. He hadn’t been to Rochester in 40 years. It was as if Godot himself had kept a rendezvous.
Here’s a clip from his CD Golden Striker, which is what they played that night.
GODOT
This appearance of Ron Carter, out of the blue, and after having been absent from Rochester for 40 years, was so satisfying. And I got to thinking. People don’t make enough of the fact that Godot’s representative appears in his play, Waiting for Godot. Otherwise, I’d wonder if our vagrants had invented the whole Godot idea. It’s intriguing that his representative is a boy. He doesn’t have fond tales to tell of Godot, which leavens difficulty into the play even there, getting rid of any sentimentality. But youth naturally reparents something fresh. Godot, after all, is going to save the vagrants, maybe. Maybe.
There’s a story about a righteous creep and a criminal. The creep goes up to heaven early to see if he is assured entry, unlike that guy, the criminal, down there. “That criminal?” the good lord says, “you mean your neighbor?” When the righteous creepy guy goes back to the neighborhood, he relates what happened. The criminal is overcome that the good lord mentioned him, thought of him. Even for a moment. At least Godot knows the vagrants are on the radar when he sends the boy. So rather than a nihilistic play as the Nobel academy originally thought, could we say it has life-affirming moments in a minor scale kind of way?
Why not ponder this question in New York City, where Ron Carter will be appearing at Birdland in the month of October? See you there!
