"Art is a Pain"

I've been thinking… about our need for pain.  Shall I explain?

The expression of pain through musical or visual or literary art is a great example of how misery loves company.  Relating to the minor cadences of a haunting piece of music, or the prose of a suicidal poem which cascades through every veiny patch of memories we can't stanch but masochistically tap into on repeat-- these things are created to elicit an emotional, visceral reaction, and likely, they are only successful in doing so because they were created by a wounded vessel.  It's strange to look at it so analytically… so devoid of passion… but, I am stimulated by the fact that human beings, in their most desolate states have the succinct capacity to generate empathy for hundreds of years past their momentary expression of need.  

Art is a need before it is a comfort.  It is an obsession before it is a solution.  One artist's pain is the medicine or the lesson for a human being oceans away, decades to come.  Art therapy has been implemented in child psychology for decades and has entered rehabilitation centers such as prisons and hospitals-- as a useful step toward healing.  Music has long been found to activate babies' brains, Alzheimer patients' memories and assisted in mental illness studies.  

The human experience in every way begins with pain and survives pain and often relinquishes to pain in the end of our lives.  And we can be united or divided because of pain… But the art of pain is something that hypnotizes us into a state of collective understanding.  As much as we need affection, love, nurturing and forgiveness in life, we, also, need pain.  Pain protects us, informs us and delivers us from bad situations as we self-preserve in both healthy and unhealthy adaptive manners.  The music we turn to is an equalizer in feeling, at least in part, that we are not alone.  Books are life-savers in that regard many times.  Poems are meditations for us.  Photographs are inspirations… Art is the mirror of life when it is authentic.  It is also our glimpse of fantasy and escape.  Art is necessary.  And so is the pain that it comes from.

That's all for now.  

"Home" is where the HEART is; Chicago headliners, Miss McDougald & Ms Jordan Tackle NYC

"I'm going to be making records anyway, even if I have to sell 'em out of the trunk of my car.  I'm that kind of a musician" ~Dolly Parton

The first time I met Diva Lynne Jordan was 2005 at Green Dolphin Street.  She perched herself at the corner of the bar, in front of the "substitute stage" where my little trio was positioned.  The room, thankfully, was packed; unfortunately, the main stage and large room was occupied for a private event, so I was forced to sing in the bar area where the club's shrill doorbell diiiiiiiiiiiiing noise would pierce through every few bars of acoustic music as the front door opened with new patrons, looking for a seat.   This wore on my nerves like a fly buzzing in the ear of an insomniac.  The deftly out of tune upright piano literally had FORKS inside of it-- I'm not kidding, lost silverware was heaped inside a wooden piano!  I still shutter.  But people clamored to hear us, many nights (some, it was a graveyard, truth be known)... People stayed until the last set, if not the last note.  Ms. Jordan did not.  If memory serves, I think she was there to pick up money owed to her from a previous engagement as she too was a regular performer in the notorious, seedy-run, well-attended, over-the-top nightclub-- the owners had a habit of "forgetting" to pay the musicians now and then.  When I introduced myself to her and thanked her for coming, she was pleasant but her demeanor conveyed she was not at all impressed by me. I became immediately that much more insecure.  Singers.  [Sigh]. I had known who she was for years, but it was apparent she had only heard of me through the staff at the club. I smile as I write this because she is a very dear, inspiring friend now.  

Fast forward to 2009.  I am the esteemed headliner at the famous Allerton on Michigan Avenue 

and I look out into the audience on a Wednesday night (not well attended, but a great night musically, that showcased the wonderful Kimberly Gordon as my featured guest), and I see THE Lynne Jordan, in a sexy booth, by herself, sipping a Manhattan, if I'm not mistaken, and smiling with this look of... well... approval?!  On my break, I go to her and in the absence of self-restraint, I throw my arms around her and say "I cannot believe it's you!  Thank you SO MUCH for being here to hear me!".  She was immediately amused by this.  Perhaps it was the fact that I snuggled into her booth and up against her like I was her long lost baby sister and just... stayed there... as I asked how she was... as if we were... well, sisters.  She had never heard of our sister-singer Kimberly Gordon.  I was shocked.  She enjoyed her.  I was thrilled.  From that day forward, a friendship and a sisterhood of song forged between Ms Jordan and this Flapper Girl.  She may or may not recall these details.  She has many admirers. I am but  one of them.

Why am I taking you down memory lane?  Over the years, I have found solace in the support --REAL SUPPORT-- I have received from the artist I am writing about.  She has shown me kindness and loving compassion during times of personal crisis, and she has made me feel lucky to be alive any time I have attended one of her shows.  She sings with her WHOLE heart.  She gives her WHOLE entity.  She reveals her vulnerability and her -I'm sorry- HYSTERICAL awkwardness as in the time at City Winery Chicago in April of this year when a full house is screaming as she enters the stage in a 1920's feathered hat, and her first words were "Thank fucking god you people showed up".  I love her for her honesty, her bravery and her ruby voice of fire.  I love the way she looks out for her band members, before herself-- always... as if she almost thinks she is lucky they work with her, when the truth is, as talented as they are, she has afforded them unique, musically (and monetarily) rewarding opportunities for which they should be forever grateful.  I love the way  she understands people-- her audience, her employers and herself.  She knows how to promote herself without sacrificing her character.  She knows how to sing a Rolling Stones song ("Sympathy for the Devil"-- her version gives me chills!) without apprehension.  She is an entertainer.  But she is also a very complete, sincere and aphoristic individual that can both dominate and captivate an interaction from the stage or in conversation.  She has talents beyond her admission.  And I am so grateful she is my friend and proud she is someone that believes in me and my dreams to be a singer of "substance" to the world.  

The first week of July, two Chicago name-singers are appearing in Manhattan as headliners.  Tuesday July 2nd, Lynne Jordan will be unveiling her Chicago-praised Nina Simone concert at City Winery of NYC and four nights later, yours truly will be headlining the well-known Metropolitan Room of NYC on Saturday, July 6th at 9:30pm.  Our shows, though very divergent in material and style, have something of a commonality: it is Independence Day between both of our debuts at these venues... Lynne Jordan, gloriously interpreting the music of a HIGHLY independent American icon (I saw her show in Chicago- it is FABULOUS), Nina Simone, and Erin McDougald, the once-ballerina-turned-serious-jazz-artist, performing original jazz compositions and -challenging- obscure songs by jazz greats with some of New York City's most respected luminaries in a show called DON'T WAIT UP FOR ME... has bridged the gap of dreamer-divas and song-sisters and carried the thoroughfare of Chicago's talent into an east coast niche.  We are both independent women who live our lives through and for music.  We have both sacrificed a lot to be able to live this life of low-acknowledgment, dodgy pay, and self-doubt.  But we belong to no one.  We sing what we love and we say why we love it and we garnish the songs an audience may or may not know with our individuality-- an ingredient so many in the commercialized world of entertainment have forsaken.  We pay our own way across country and persuade musicians to be gracious with what we can afford to pay them while we work for the door, and we feel... lucky... that we have people who will pay $10, $15, $20, $30... $100 for a show to see us for 70 minutes while, all the while, we intrinsically think "I hope I am making them happy".  Whereas artists have crystalized the definition of narcissism in some ways, we paradoxically define the ultimate desire to make others happy.  It's sick, I know.  And I am constantly shamed by understanding this about myself -ha- but... no great artist ever existed without (secretly or not), vying for the approval, if not desire to alleviate the sadness of others through his or her art.  I realize the porn industry brings instant gratification and the music industry brings long lines of waiting (if we are lucky!) for clothed "entertainment", but nonetheless, there is a basic human connection that music engenders between strangers.

Here is my proposal [Bribe]:  If 70 people -anywhere- rsvp tickets to both LYNNE JORDAN AT CITY WINERY IN NYC JULY 2nd and ERIN MCDOUGALD AT METROPOLITAN ROOM NYC JULY 6th and send THIS BLOG your confirmation info before July 1st, you will be invited to a -highly secret- VIP party in CHICAGO with high-end catered food, champagne, wine, spirits galore and award-winning R&B and grammy-winning jazz with both Lynne and Erin singing for 3 hours before 2013 ends.  

This will be a VERY posh, very envious event.  So, if you are a music lover, a Lynne plus Erin supporter and an adventurous spirit [in the name of live music, that is] kind of a person, I think this offer is for YOU.  Come to NYC.  See two great, divergent shows of exquisite live entertainment.  Get rewarded for your loving support by attending a KICK ASS private party, 

later, in Chicago, that will include... well... a lot of awesomeness, 

least of which is two of your favorite Chicago singers performing a relatively private concert of your

 requests while you are wined and dined in spitting distance with complimentary press photos of the night.  Just sayin'.

Erin McDougald Jazz Quartet Just In Time

The seduction of a live jazz club... Adjusting one's eyes to a cimmerian womb of shadowed profiles, the familiar ring of clinking glasses and an ambient hush of shaken cubes of ice amid a vespertine sensuality of various perfumes, which weave oblivious threads inside the flickering candlelight.    The stage.  There it is. A makeshift bandstand with curious Tudor-like paintings and blood-red drapes of velvet that swallow up the wood-and-silvery instruments awaiting their masters.  It glows in the pinkish, hot wash of spotlights.  There's a man with the smell of cigarettes and cold air circling his head as he pours through his book in a corner, biding time until he returns to his other persona-- saved for the strings of a vintage guitar.  Two well-dressed musicians huddle at the bar in casual conversation, scoping the elements of the night as they unfold.  And then the woman that doesn't exactly float between admirers as much as she imposes her burnished, unabashedly open charm to soften their presumptions of her interior as she dons a decadently exposing cocktail dress and stilettos.  As the awkwardly comedic bartender takes to the stage to introduce the band (and himself, reminding people to tip heavily), the smoker, the bar-squatters and the animated vocalist scurry into position, sifting through charts and whispering the plan for the song ahead.  You smirk, unaware of yourself in her line of sight, holding your heavy-handed pour of Oban and thinking "Where are the women in this place?", you also prepare yourself for another standard of Sinatra or Lady Day, watching this singer saunter up to her microphone, fidgeting with her velvet wrap.  And then it happens.  The drums are blistering and the guitarist (who also plays keys) is just sitting, without intent to play.  The bass player has his hands rested on the nape of his instrument's neck, casually just... watching.  Drums and voice play tag with recognizable lyrics but inspired delivery. She cues the others and bam, the dynamics explode into a song of spontaneity.  Chorus after chorus of... pontifications and revered remarks to and from the members of the unified group.  The solos are like gregarious accounts of a party or re-invented folklore.  And the singer.  That velvet-wearing, figure-flaunting flirt... well, she SINGS.  She has something to say.  And she ever so subtly nods your way as if in full cognizance of your cynicism, and winks with a coy but tender "See?" and "Thank You" at the same flash of her smile.  It's jazz.  And this moment, it will never repeat itself.  You were there when her strap broke in the middle of her 2 minute scat.  You were there when the drummer took the room into his hands.  And you were there when the guitar spilled his guts and wept, cradled in the arms of a man that was not to be bothered just moments ago.  The bass player literally pulled each person closer by their chins with his tender bowing in a nameless ballad.  And the singer, well, she kept saying "thank you for being here with us" and you thought, "thank you".

And THAT is why jazz venues need to be supported: these experiences only happen when you are a part of them.   The music is alive and pulsating but it only truly thrives when it touches the hearts of others... strangers, like you once were.