Although Memorial Day is a somber occasion, the reality is that for most Americans it marks the beginning of summer. It is the main reason why I think that we ought to switch Memorial Day and Veterans Day. Celebrate the living in the onset of summer and mourn the dead with the approach of winter.
With time to myself, I am going to do my best to enjoy my own personal reverie. Mind you, my idea of reverie is probably a little more low-key than for other people. I intend to engage in activities which bring me joy or at least try my best to do so.
My Memorial Day Weekend Reverie began on Friday evening as I ventured to the Mad Monkfish (formerly known as Thelonious Monkfish), a jazz club and Asian restaurant located in Cambridge's Central Square neighborhood on Mass Avenue.
This was my first time at Mad Monkfish. The reason for my decision to patronize the venue was to see and hear the Yoko Miwa Trio. Miwa is a Japanese born pianist who has lived in Boston for more than 25 years and teaches at the Berklee College of Music. However, I was unfamiliar with her music until two nights ago when I saw and heard her at the Museum of Science prior to a screening of my pal Dave Habeeb's film Beautiful Was The Fight. Miwa is also in the film.
Beautiful Was The Fight spotlights the struggles of female musicians in the Boston area although I think it is also a love letter to Boston. During her excerpt in the film, Miwa recounts how she is frequently mistaken for a singer. Even when people learn she is a concert pianist there is still an assumption that she sings.
In this sense, there is still the perception that Miwa and other female musicians in Boston (and undoubtedly beyond) cannot play an instrument. It's the same thing Fanny went through more than 50 years ago. Plus ca change. So perhaps it is fitting that I met Habeeb nearly a year ago when I attended June Millington's gig out in Amherst. If nothing else, Beautiful Was The Fight nudged me into paying more attention to Boston's music scene and thus inspired me to hear more from Miwa.
When I heard her two nights ago on what turned out to be her birthday, I was enthralled with her cover of The Beatles' "Dear Prudence". It is the sort of thing that I could imagine myself hearing at Birdland or the Blue Note in NYC and something my Dad would like a great deal.
Now the Mad Monkfish is no Birdland, Blue Note or, for that matter, Scullers Jazz Club closer to home. Despite the MC imploring the crowd to keep the conversation low, the jazz is very much in the background. People are there to talk loudly and answer the cell phones which have not been put on mute or vibrate. It is a shame because I wish more people could have appreciated her moving rendition of Björk's "I've Seen It All".
But Miwa seems to take it all in stride. After all, her band has a regular Friday night engagement at the Monkfish, so the crowd's behavior is old hat to her and her band as she is ably accompanied by Scott Goulding on drums and Brad Barrett on bass.
I plan on attending more of Miwa's shows. I'm just not sure if I'll do so at the Mad Monkfish.
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