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Language Requirement
In college, he elected jazz
as a language,
dropped French so he could learn
that chops meant
playing the sax like Paul Desmond,
creating a sound
resembling a golden hue
that only the angels
might duplicate,
carried so high
it might be heaven,
though he could sense
Desmond's fingers
moving with elegance,
ballroom dancing on the keys.
He later learned
that Desmond played
in various modes.
They were not clubs
or bars he could frequent,
though the modes
were most often located in bars.
He found out
that Mel Torme had pipes,
beyond a collection of meerschaum,
an ability to sing songs
and scat like no one heard before
without ever leaving the stage.
Could say he also had chops,
but with singers it was different
because with one set of pipes
he created a timbre all by himself,
a degree of contrast as varied
as timber in the forest.
Jazz Face
There's not just one, it depends on the style
,
the performer and his instrument.
Like the one that's the favorite
of trumpet players, you know,
the one with the crumpled face
and the pained look of focus
just before he blasts high C.
Every note in the upper range
becomes a new source of agony.
Then there's the face
of philosophical perplexity,
the one used by trombone players
when they reach higher than they should,
eyebrows lifted against the hairline,
chin extended and tucked into the throat,
usually during a technical lick in numerous positions.
Of course, there's the sax players
and their ballads, eyelids nearly closed,
head in a languorous droop
that sometimes lolls back
and swivels side to side
to help kick in an arousing vibrato.
And then the drummer
with his classic wild man look,
crazy faced with the fixed grin
and scary stare, like he's about
to lurch off his seat, unlike
the piano player, the aristocrat
with his proud, confident posture,
convinced that for the next few hours
he and his ensemble own your soul,
how he notices you've immersed yourself
in the excitement and emotion of the music,
with your intense squint and locked grin,
that empathetic grimace
especially obvious when your head bobs feverishly
in a contagious yet effusive sign of approval.
Dixieland Man
His fingers blur
grenedilla wood
and improvises
the ebony with silver
as the sweet colors
of a clarion call
pulsate the room
with a staggered step
and the rhythm
gets your body swaying
and fingers tapping
to the incantations
from his black magic wand
pointed skyward
like a unicorn's horn
even the dim lights bop
to the two beat bounce
on the dark dance floor
while the Dixieland man
lost in his world
excites your soul.
Michael Keshigian is a performing musician and collegiate music educator in Boston.
His poems and short stories have appeared in numerous print and online journals.
To date, has had 5 chapbooks of poetry published and is a multiple Pushcart Prize nominee.
His latest book, Warm Summer Memories was published this summer by Maverick Duck Press.
His most recent publications include Mannequin Envy, Ibbetson Street, Fairfield Review, Red River Review,
and Sierra Nevada College Review.
Email: Michael Keshigian
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