Coltrane’s Musical Mastership: ‘On Green Dolphin Street’
Although there’s no official phrase that I am aware of, ‘taking a walk on Green Dolphin Street’ has become a saying in my mind that is synonymous with being prosperous and awfully proud of it.As it turns out, ‘On Green Dolphin Street’ began as (a rather obscure) Hollywood film, the brainchild music of Bronislaw Kaper and Ned Washington as music accompanying the historic drama film. There’s something about the title and the lyrics, in my mind at least, make me think of glamour and city chic, guided by one’s own sense of personal confidence and musical talent. I heard this song for the very first time on a passing, and determined to track down the face behind the music by keeping the melody in my mind for the better part of two years. We’re talking two years ago – we didn’t have Shazam or the iTunes Store to identify and even provide a link to a downloadable copy of the content.
What makes the song so appealing rests in more than just the melody. Who wouldn’t want to get hitched on Green Dolphin Street, or perform a glamorous gig, go on a successful first date or a shopping spree? When I think of green dolphins, I think of something out of the ordinary, something sophisticated and suave. If this is a first time listening to this wonderful song, you’re in for a treat and a paradigm shift, compliments of one of the greatest jazz musicians of our time.
Looking into John Coltrane in his pinnacle years is an exercise in peering into the web of silkworms and drawing out the resemblances and nuances of our soul – from sublime simplicity to great profundity, where it starts and where it ends is anybody’s guess. But that’s the intense fun of it all – it’s the art form of those who enjoy the element of fantasy, crave the avant garde and hold an inner child waiting to come out.
In Coltrane’s rendition of ‘On Green Dolphin Street’, we luckily witness the typical style of one of the great jazz masters brought into the limelight. Our introduction to the classic two-verse song is sublime: well-timed and paced by a sensation of sobriety, characterising the spirit of free jazz and softly exposing the core of bepop soon giving way to the rhythm of the rising passion in the saxophone, the heaving sigh before the bellowing blow of breath and the free-spirited improvisation without a single note amiss.
When listening attentively we let ourselves drift into the craft, into the mastery of the music carried on impulse and whim of consciousness. The emotion arrives so quintessentially that we needn’t a notepad and pen to ponder it later; we live in the moment of the movement and comprehend its universal language. Meanwhile the surface simplicity, with its infinite variety, probes us, programs us with its basic code. We know in the moment of the music – when snares fall, when the smoke rises into the air, when the whiskey swirls over ice-cubes, we imagine a bitterly cold evening where rain sweeps on sidestreets. In our minds’ eye, we imagine the scales yielding rapture, the hammering of ivory keys indenting notes in our hearts, bass lines tugging at time, reminding us, pleasantly, of the passing moment. Class, creed, race are suspended in an ectoplasm, replaced by the dissonant hum, lost in the rift of the sonorous song.
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