They say “look at your own city as if you are a tourist.” I think about that as I see the tourist buses drive down Melrose. I took a tourist bus in Barcelona. Sites and streets, monuments and buildings, marketplaces and parks were pointed out to me. I didn’t know the city, it was a great introduction. So, I was thinking today, “what if I looked at my city as if it were the first time.”
As I drove down streets that I’ve driven down a hundred times in the eight years that I’ve lived in the Larchmont area of Hancock Park (Hollywood adjacent for those who don’t know Los Angeles. Actually I didn’t know of this neighborhood until I moved into a 1930’s historic apartment building, and I had lived in L.A. for almost forty years.)
I saw trees that were different from each other; bushes and bougainvilleas, brick, stucco and cement buildings. I noticed the different window panes: black metal vs. painted wood. I saw sidewalks lined with tents vs. streets with no tents. “For lease” signs and business marquees. My favorite sightings are the automated delivery robots. I especially like the ones whose headlights blink like eyelids. I acknowledged the hills behind the Scientology church and the tourists at the crosswalks going to Madam Tussaud’s Wax Museum.
Sometimes when I’m improvising all the intervals or chord progressions or melodies remind me of something that I’ve heard before. The challenge for me is to hear the sounds as if it were the first time, and yet still retain the skill to execute what I’m hearing. I don’t like hearing be-bop players run through patterns that are just under their fingers and fit over the chord progressions. To me that is no better than being AI. Often, slowing down enough to hear the quality of the note against the chord stimulates the next sound impulse. Granted when you are in the zone, this listening can happen at light speed.
For me the challenge is to let myself listen as well as let go. Playing a good solo is like being in a wonderful sexual experience: staying with the sensation while allowing that sensation to blossom into the next wave. Holding onto the feeling or striving towards the climax limits the organic development. The challenge is to have pointed attention to the present and diffuse attention to possibilities at the same time.