It's been a good Thanksgiving holiday. Last night, we stopped at Wal-Mart for some groceries and I made the most incredible buy on a boxed set of the Charlie Brown Christmas Collection, a three cd collection with everything not just the soundtrack from the original TV show, but also a CD with the soundtracks from other Charlie Brown specials and a tribute CD of the same music done by other Artists.
To those of you that may not know, the Vince Guaraldi Trio is responsible for the incredible music on the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. Probably their best known piece is "Linus and Lucy" with that incredibly catchy piano riff we all love so well.
I never really never listened to Jazz as a kid. My dad and I would listen to country music most of the time in the truck. My father didn't sing much in the truck, but the times I do remember him singing, he was partial to Hank Williams Sr., who I still like.
We also listened to the other popular country artists, like George Jones, Merle Haggard, Red Sovine and the like. Since we went to CB Jamborees and worked in construction, country music was everywhere around me. At one point I remember owning a silver belt buckle, cowboy hat and boots-but I never really liked horses. I remember every Saturday Night, we would watch Hee Haw, which was torture to me except after the age of 12. At that time, I started appreciating the girls in the Daisy Duke shorts, but I decided it was best not to point that out to my folks. My mother liked Gospel, especially Nancy Harmon, and the Gaithers.
Around thirteen or fourteen I started becoming interested in Rock and Roll. It was the 80's and New Wave was really popular. I started off listening to Blondie, with such greats song as "One Way or Another" and "Atomic Love", and sadly, the disco hit, "Heart of Glass", (I'm not proud of that last one).
Then I remembered hearing the Talking Heads, and I knew I would probably never wear my silver belt buckle again. When I heard "Burning Down the House" and "Once in a Lifetime", I felt like every kid, in every generation, when they finally discover their music, their voice, their symbol for their time--the soundtrack for their time that will always be playing in their memories when they remember being young.
Sure, I rejected Country Music and most forms of Southern Gospel for Rock and Roll, but, I had never been introduced to Jazz. My parents didn't listen to it. No one I knew in my hometown of Bend, Oregon listened to it. The only time I ever really remember hearing it was at Christmas time, when the Charlie Brown Christmas Special came on. But there was something about it that went beyond the simple labels we give music. It was beyond genre and beat and lyrics, and was simply good. It was good the same way that no matter how educated your palate may become to truffles, fois gras and fine wines, you can always appreciate a hot brownie with vanilla ice cream. When I listened to that music as a kid, I didn't know how to express it in words, but I knew there was more to music than top 40 and MTV. I just didn't know where to look.
What I'm getting at is that there is something special about Vince Guaraldi's music that goes beyond image. Look at this picture:
Vince may be one of the least cool-looking guys ever, with his bandido mustache, flat top and nerd glasses. I mean compare him to my earlier pop heroes. He didn't have spinning, fluffy guitars, classic hot rods, and the type of girls that my mother would have never approved of hanging all over them.
He didn't have the kind of ultra, ironic, tongue-in-cheek humor of Devo-not to mention those cool hats!
Vince Guaraldi never had that permanent, hip sneer that the Police had. He never had songs like Synchronicity I where he explored Jungian philosophy.
But you know, Guaraldi's music has the kind of coolness that transcends what I thought was cool just because it was different from my parent's music. Maybe I just don't have the same attention span I did then. Maybe I'm just getting older. I still own CD's from all those bands, and even some new rock from today. I still listen to the music from my generation, but I always seem to go back to Jazz, especially the small combo stuff like the Vince Guaraldi Trio.
If you dropped Vince Guaraldi and any of the musicians I worshipped as a teenager in the middle of a tribe of people who knew nothing about modern music and had them play their best song for them, I would bet real money that Linus and Lucy would be the most popular song.
For me, Jazz speaks a language that is more essential, more complete. The vagaries of lyrics, marketing and trying to outdo the other band, are stripped away. The musicians use a framework of sheet music as a starting point and then seek where the groove will take them, starting with notes on paper and ending with the notes in the spirit.
Have yourself a Jazzy little Christmas...
-Juanito
