Time to Revive this thing

Not wanting to let this thing go to the wayside, but coming up dry on what to write about, I'll start this post with a clip of some incredibly powerful music-- as all things should.



Mumford and Sons blew the doors off the Grammys this year, playing with raw power and emotion. This is a band with nothing to hide, made evident by the way in which they put their all into their performances. You can read every emotion in their faces, their voices, and their instruments. Its passionate, exciting, and empowering. I feel alive every time I watch this video. A lot of bands perform with high emotion-- and its great. But here there's a moment of sheer bliss as the band ignites with the horn section behind them (see 1:50) and the singer Marcus Mumford looks up with a face exuding what it means to be truly alive...

My band, Parple, has started playing shows in New York City and we know that the only way to get anywhere in this is if we put all of our energy into every show we play. But beyond leaping around the stage and jumping and screaming to catch an audience's attention, putting everything you have into playing music is, to me, the most pure form of happiness. When I truly get into the music I am playing, its the rare moment seldom experienced otherwise where I am truly living absolutely and singularly in the moment, feeling truly happy, truly passionate, and, when with other musicians, truly in solidarity with those around me. There is no cynicism in those moments, no doubts, no despair. Its a transcendent moment of absolute bliss.

How then can this translate into our daily lives? How can this emotion-- this wonderful, freeing, whole feeling-- last beyond the three and a half minutes of the song? I don't yet know the answer, but I do not that it can happen, and its a beautiful thing to work towards.

Here's another clip of musicians living passionately in the moment-- Billy Preston, George Harrison, and others at The Concert for Bangla Desh playing "That's The Way God Planned It." (See 3:20- Billy leaps off the organ, dancing in ecstasy as George looks in with a smile of absolute delight.) Enjoy!