Just getting back into doing some blog writing.  Don’t worry, I will do something serious very soon.  But for today, maybe not.  It is the end of the day.  I am finishing off a bottle of Merlot that has been open for a week or so (capped and chilled) and listening to a Barry Manilow album. 

Did I really write that  Me, cynical Dave, listening to Manilow?  But it’s true.  His ‘Sings with the Big Bands’ album.  Truly great.  The music of Miller, Dorsey (both of them), Ellington, and others, and Manilows voice.    Sentimental Journey, I’m Sentimental About You, Don’t Get Around Much Anymore, I Can’t Get Started, Moonlight Seranade – sheer poetry. 

What was it about WWII?  Was there every a darker time in American history.  Maybe 1777.  Maybe 1863.  Maybe 1930.  but not many.  And yet what wonderful music the 40′s produced.    It was optismistic while staying grounded in the fact that people were saying goodby and I may never see you again.  It was alive and sexy without being crude.  It was slow and fast, soft and rough.  It was demure and yet more real than anything before it.  

Was that the greatest generation?  I don’t know.  In some ways every generation is different and in some ways every generation is the same.   But you have to love the music.  Lyrics that speak of innocense mingled with desire.  Music that swells and pulls us along with the beat and the blare of trumpets.  

Times today seem dark, but maybe they are mostly just grey.  We are threatened.  And we are safer than we have ever been.   We live in a Gardol cocoon that keeps us protected unless it is ruptured by some catostrophic event.  And what kind of music do you make with that sort of a muddy mixture?   My guess is nothing that will be remembered like what Glenn and Duke and the Count produced.

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