The Music In My Head

Notes from Saturday

Today it is Paul Winter, Winterland. Light, airy, rhythmic, delicious. It seems like there is always music playing there, lifting me up or soothing me down, carrying me along through my day. And I wonder, is this a common experience for all? For a few?

Music has always been a part of my life, and usually the tracks playing in my head are familiar because of they were listened to over and over again at one point in time or another. The Paul Winter music is particularly well suited to my first class seat above the clouds, drifting toward Minneapolis on my return to Duluth. The plane floats, carried along on the flowing melody, sweeping us along on a jet stream. Not the jet stream, of course, that shoots west-to-east, but we’re being briskly buffeted by currents and waves as we bobble along, smooth then not so smooth, but hardly tempest-tossed.

Often it is Dylan. Desolation Row has a lyrical quality with a rhythmic strum that hankers along with the pace of a typical day. Visions of Johanna can have the same effect, the mournful mouth harp embellishing the easy pace.

Procol Harem's White Shade of Pale is another smooth soother of a tune, the organ transporting you on a wave of ethereal internal ecstasy as you do your chores, process paperwork, disappearing into your day. Need to slow even further? Go with Who Knows Where the Time Goes? by either Judy Collins of Sandy Denny. This song will take you there....

On the other hand, if you're getting ready for the gridiron, need a boost, the Stones can get you ignited. There's a reason Microsoft chose Start Me Up as its anthem going into the Internet age. One of my favorites is Can't You Hear Me Knockin' when its time to pick up the pace. Then again, Dylan is no slouch when it comes to energizing, either. Take hold of the opening notes of Highway 61 Revisited off his Live album and hold on.

Then again, you don't always need contemporary music to give you that joltin' jazzed jivestep. Duke Ellington and even Ludwig van B can both put spring in your step when you need it.

What's the music in your head today?