Songs For My Father 2

I just spent a 7 day revival with Rochester Washington, my father. I say revival because we have been separated most of our lives and over a long period I have been trying to find a way of reviving the lost history between father and son.

My father has been living in Germany for most of my formative and adult years and we have not had the convenience of communicating on an emotional and more importantly, an impulsive basis. What I mean is that I have never had the inclination to pick up the phone to say "hey dad I have a free weekend and I wanted to pop over to see how you are doing". But as the quote goes 'anywhere is walking distance if you have the time', and for my father and I, the desire was never clear and we seem to be constantly out of time. So the distance remained. Now, I am trying to walk a path of union form father to son.

I invited my father to visit me on March 15th until 22nd March 2011. I wanted to explore and share some of my father’s memories of his early formative years in the UK (the haunts, the people and experiences that engaged him in his time in 60's London). During the years of my father’s exile, I had not had the opportunity to share his history with the place that I now live and work. In some way this trip gave me a real insight into a Caribbean man; his dreams, aspirations and failures.

I am revisiting this family theme as previously I walked this path with my father in less familiar surroundings. In 1998 I had spent two weeks in my fathers homeland of Guyana but due to youth and insecurity, I had not gained enough experience and knowledge of his life in his home country to reconcile my own life with his. So the chance to meet again and continue the journey was an opportunity never to be ignored.

The trip had begun with the ceremonious collection from the airport and as we met after his 45 minute delayed arrival at London Heathrow, we hugged and took a brief respite at the smoking area outside the arrivals area of Terminal 5. We started talking, small talk, and whilst we both took in the nicotine infused air I stole a few secret glances at my father; hands – lighting cigarette, feet – two feet from my own, lips – hesitant but pronounced with every translated word. I, in turn was trying to translate the physical form of dad with my emotional sense of belonging to him. In this short re-introduction we started to explore the common themes of discourse that was to guide our relationship building for the next 7 days, Food, Music and Family.

Verse 1 - Food

My father is a foodie and consistent with this love, his welcome gift for my wife and I was a sting of Wiesswurst. He immediately place some reverence for this offering by stating that our casual catch up must be cut short to enable him to get this gift refrigerate as soon as possible as to be fully appreciated we must eat this fresh. I have since discovered that Wiesswurst, a German sausages made from veal and pork and is a local Bavarian delicacy. This anaemic looking dish is blanched in hot water and once cooked, is served with a German sweet mustard Wiesswurstsenf. Once consumed it becomes apparent that this is indeed a delicacy to be appreciated. We ate in a silence that gave this dish a reverence that seemed a little too formal for what was a noticeably humble fare. It was obvious that we were digesting more than the food; we had to digest the unspoken, the unexplored, the unexplainable a gift, a gesture from a stranger – my father.

Verse 1 – Is That Jazz?

On the second day of fathers stay we made our first trip was to Ronnie Scotts to hear Dee Dee Bridgewater in a tribute to Billie Holiday. Dee was not blowin’ on this night and neither were father and son. Perhaps a portent of future sessions? I felt that Dee’s lack of performance somehow mirrored the discordant nature of our clumsy communications. Hey, this performance stuff is difficulty for Dee Dee to get the audience on side and for me to get it together with my father; a great ensemble takes amazing finesse. More rehearsal I think on both sides.

Chorus

On the following day we visited a family relative who set my father on another foodie mission. He wanted to buy some Roti for his trip back to germany and we explored the backstreets of Hackney until we discovered a rare gem of culinary delight that was Horizon Foods on Broadway Market (http://www.caribbeanfoodemporium.co.uk/manus2.htm). With mission accomplished we set off with our silent guest of over 20 Guyanese Roti that will accompany us on our four-day excursion.

Off we went to the meeting place in the Suffolk countryside; one father, one son, one map.

I decided to book a country retreat with the Landmark Trust in the New Inn in Peasenhall Suffolk a medieval coaching inn built in 1478 where the weary traveller could eat and gather. I thought this would be a fitting venue for two travelers finding a common theme to their two stories.

Verse 2 – Is That Jazz (Part 2)

It has been said that every person has a story to tell and each story has a song that make that story easier on the ear.

I wanted to explore the common music reference points that supported our mutual cultural pleasures. A chance to exchange what I think is a fortunate shared appreciation of a music form that is losing its provenance in cultural arts. To do this I had hired a car with an iPod music link that enabled me to plug in my latest sync from my carefully curated iPod play list selections. I had a considered but random choice of tracks that I wanted to share with my father and by pushing play on my selection I wanted to stimulate some reaction from him on what I presumed was commonly held cultural connections between us.

I regard my father as a Jazz man and as this is my first love of music I looked forward to sharing the cool and the hot of the sounds of jazz. My father is essentially a Jazz man and this understood cultural position lead me to theme our re-unification by presenting a playlist of perceived commonly held milestones of classic soul-jazz music.

I prepared a playlist on the iPod that would take us on our five day journey of discovery with selections from the following albums:

Freddie Hubbard - Keep your Soul Together

Horace Silver - Songs For My Father

Lee Morgan - The Sidewinder

Duke Ellington and John Coltrane

Bill Withers - Live at Carnegie Hall

Curtis Mayfield – Curtis

Donny Hathaway – Everything is Everything

Oliver Nelson – Trane Whistle

From the above play list I discovered that my father had a love of Shirley Scott which was a little strange as I had not included any of my fairly extensive Jazz Organist recordings (Jimmy Smith, Charles Earland, Big John Hammond, etc). Another missed opportunity for the re-union?

Solo

Left alone with my father in this isolated venuewe started to open the genetic Pandora’s box. The first night was spent building fires opening vintage bottles of wine and beginning to talk about the thinks that I could find the words for. Suffice to say this evening was spent with little words but with a comfortable sense of being. I cooked and felt disappointed at the dish prepared, as I wanted to impress. The reason is still not clear but I know that the first offering was intended to establish myself as significant with the values that I felt to be true. Meaning that if he could taste my food he could understand me as a person. After that disappointing meal I felt alone and the solo continued.

Verse 3

Today we took to trip to visit my sister in Boston. The day passed without much incident apart form a short interaction between my mother and father. I agreed for mum to take dad to my sisters so he could visit his grandchildren. With initial greetings between this two significant people in my life they then conducted a short conversation as the strangers that they had become in each other’s life.