Nantucket coffee, Bach brings back a memory of my brother, more coffee and boats on the water
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 at 8:54AM ;)
This is Danny, at Nantucket Book Works, where she works. She said she likes the coffee not only because it tastes good, but because she can wrap her hands around the hot mug and it warms them up.
;)
I stopped in a local drug store, where I saw a flier that said they would be celebrating the 325th birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach at Nantucket's Congregational Church Vestry, a week later than the actual birthdate of March 21, so I decided to go.
;)
The concert began with a performance of the Chello Prelude from Suite 1 in G Major, performed by Jacob Butler. I used to play this piece on my guitar, way back when I still thought I could be a photographer, writer, publications producer and a classical guitarist.
I was wrong about that and, as I have noted before, it was the guitar I let go, rather than the camera or the keyboard.
I enjoyed Butler's rendition and hope he keeps at it.
Barbara Elder conducted the chorus.
;)
James Sulzer performed the prelude from Suite III in C Major, another piece that was once part of my repertoire. I enjoyed every note.
The women's side of the chorus. They sang works both by Bach and by other's, including Peter, Paul and Mary, done in the style of Bach.
Mary died recently and when she did, I felt that I had died in part myself, because I could remember so well when she was young and beautiful and passionate.
;)
Mollie Glazer performed Courante and Sarabande from Suite II in D Minor. By my reckoning, she did a pretty damned good job.
;)
The final Bach choral piece was Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring and it was a bit of a hard experience for me. I had once set out to learn it on my guitar and for all its smooth, flowing, motion it falls difficult on the guitar and I never quite got a handle on it. If anybody present noticed how I had to fight the tears as it was being sung, here is why:
My brother, Ron, loved that piece and after he broke his neck and wound up in his wheelchair, he wanted me to play it for him, but I couldn't, because I didn't have it down well enough. I promised him that I would get it together and that one day I would show up at his house in Riverside, California and play it for him.
Given the distance between Wasilla and Riverside and the expense, those visits were sometimes years apart, and each time he would ask me to play it, but I couldn't.
Then early on a summer solstice morning, right after I returned from a midnight flight over the edge of the lead in the ice off Barrow, where scores of white beluga whales had rolled out of cystral clear, green waters directly beneath my wings, my mother called to tell me that Ron had died.
Shortly thereafter, I stepped alone into a room in a Mormon chapel in Riverside, where my brother lay. I walked up to his coffin and looked and it was just he and I in that room.
At that moment, in the chapel, unseen but so close that the sound carried clearly into the viewing room, the organist began to play Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.
;)
After the final note of Jesu, the page was turned. No more actual Bach was played. The concert continued, but the beam of sunlight coming through the window fell away.
The sunbeam fell this way on the choir only for Jesu and once that piece ended, it was gone.
It is my intent and desire to yet tell the story of my brother as I witnessed it in greater depth, for it is not as simple as it sounds. No one should draw any conclusions from the fact that I found him lying inside a Mormon chapel.
;)
Mormons don't drink coffee, and once I didn't but now I do. So here I am, at the Bean, an excellent coffee house right here in Nantucket.
If I lived here, this is probably where I would wind up every day, just like I now wind up at Metro Cafe every afternoon that I spend in Wasilla. That's Zac on the left, Spencer on the right.
On this day, I sat down alone in The Bean, but soon a family came in and a chess game began. That's nine-year-old Addie, about to make a move against his seven year old sister, Gabrielle. Two-year old Alexander studies the man with the little pocket camera.
;)
Now Gabrielle makes her move. "Do you play chess often?" I asked.
"Yes," they both answered.
"Who usually wins?" I asked.
"I do," they both answered.
;)
"Do you know why the football coach went into the bank?" six-year old Sally asked me.
I tried to think of an illogical, yet obvious, answer, but my mind went completely blank.
"No," I said. "I don't. Please tell me."
"Because he wanted to get his quarterback," Sally said.
;)
I am in Nantucket because it is the place where the American commercial whaling industry was born and now they have a whaling museum where my pictures have been hung.
I haven't said much in this blog about the now defunct Yankee whaling industry that built this place and moved the Wampanoag out, but people who have studied that history in depth and who have collected its implements and art works have been showing me things, and teaching me about it.
This will be the subject of my next post.
Reader Comments (10)
I love this post. The world through the eyes of Bill Hess is a magical sort of a place. Good people wherever you are.
Again a beautiful post. Thank you Bill.
great blog...i cried a little for your brother, i also have siblings that are much to far away. The big Atlantic separates us, also one of my sisters in now in a wheelchair after a back operation to fix a slipped disc went wrong. But i definitely don't have your musical talents, she just wishes i would visit more.
The lighting in the photos of the concert are wonderful. Wish I could have been there.
My sympathies in regards to your brother.
Life is like that, isn't it? Full of beauty, full of sorrow; both of which are often stirred together in a mix that we cannot (and should not) avoid.
This is my America.
Beautiful children. Happy people.
Beautiful post.
I recommended you be hired by TLC to do a series on Alaska, Not that they will pay any attention to me.
Lovely post.
Look forward to you sharing more of your history with us. You are a very interesting guy.
Thank you, Bill -- you often bring me a quiet awareness of peace and serenity, and the understanding that there are wonderful people and beautiful places everywhere -- if we only take the time to appreciate them. Thank you also for letting me (and a lot of others) know that there is also love, kindness, beauty, truth, and caring emanating from Wasilla.
my gosh what a beautiful place and a beautiful post you made today.
This post made my day. You are so subtle yet spot on in your ruminations.
Thank you! Thank you for lifting my spirits. You brought tears to
my eyes. JESU, JOY OF MAN'S DESIRING - what a loving good-bye
between two brothers. I wish you peace!