What was your first music memory? I don’t remember. I wish at least my parents did. I am not talking about the school or teenage years when discovering a song or musician can be truly transformative and can change your perspective and view on life. I am talking about the very early stages of childhood, when children do not even understand the words or the meaning of the words, yet they feel a connection with music through rhythm and tone alone.
My two year old son is a music lover. We’ve been playing him music since he was born. But even though he has had certain preferences so far (one particular lullaby, Bruce Springsteen, Josh Stone, Christmas carols, not to mention The Wonderful Thing About Tiggers from “Winnie the Pooh”), lately we’ve been listening to a lot of jazz and blues and he seems to be into music even more than before. And when he hears Ike and Tina Turner’s Nutbush City Limits he drops everything he’s doing and starts his own performance. He is completely transformed. The way he feels the rhythm and lives the music, the pure abandon to dancing, to singing and screaming in tune, to having fun, to happiness is something that I want to keep forever. Where does this childhood exuberance and innocence go when you grow up? “If we could only find the courage to leave our destiny to chance, to accept the fundamental mystery of our lives, then we might be closer to the sort of happiness that comes with innocence.” Luis Buñuel
photo: Getty Images | Tina Turner during her Foreign Affair tour, 1990
