I remember Joe and Autumn Leaves.

I wrote a post this morning about Autumn Leaves. Driving through downtown Renton yesterday near the end of a busy day I had to stop behind a school bus and was delighted to see these kids pile off and play in the leaves on the sidewalk.

It brought back a flood of childhood memories and I felt more connected somehow than I have for several days just knowing kids still do that. They still like to play and be goofballs, they’re still attracted to kicking fall leaves around and scooping them up to do a major leaf dump over a friend’s head. It was timeless, I needed that, if only just for a moment.

I was a little over 15 when I fell in love with the guitar. Probably my first real love. My dad, a brilliant accordionist, had very high hopes that at least one of his sons would follow in his foot steps, but I couldn’t. The 1960’s English invasion was happening and my heart had no choice, I had to follow.

Yet, dad gave me an appreciation for all kinds of music and we spent hours together working out chord voicings and progressions to popular songs. Many of my early guitar heroes weren’t just rock and roll, they were wonderful jazz artists like Joe Pass.

I haven't thought about Joe Pass for awhile but seeing these kids kicking leaves and knowing it’s autumn and a beautiful day my mind made the jump. This is Joe Pass playing Autumn Leaves solo. I love the purity of hearing someone play the guitar all by itself. No band, no big orchestration, just a gifted artist caress those 6 strings with love and affection.



My original blog post this morning was on the Activerain.com network...
Autumn Leaves