There are 3 creative icons who sustain and keep me company when the days are humid and long: Billie Holiday, Buster Keaton and Chet Baker.
An unrelenting strain of sensual, disheveled, sorrowful elegance spools from each one. This is why I love them. This is why, when my own powers falter, confronted with the incongruity of existence, the tediousness of flat minds, or the torment of an unexpected pothole, I consider not the Lillies of the field, though they are my namesake and beguiling, but the beautifully strange uncertainty in Miss Holiday’s I’ll Be Seeing You, Mr. Keaton’s panicked purposeful calm through the stampede in Go West, Mr. Baker’s peculiar rendition of My Funny Valentine, slowed to a thuggish purr, and I am restored.
“Heart’s Afire” is a song I wrote, in part as an homage to that vintage sound and feel: the chanteuse/crooner who sings their way through heartbreak and desire. Lyrically, humor aligns with desire “Summer came like a Sun god, and so did you, making love in a ’59 Chevy, a backseat built for two” and what is true is given the wry acknowledgment of experience “You never promised me anything, that much is true”. The vocals are meant to float and sway, to remain seemingly calm throughout (with the exception of one outburst towards the end), all the while longing for a love lost and unrequited. The visual artist, Robert Edridge-Waks, who understands the forever story of love, created a mesmerizing video for Heart’s Afire. Below is a short clip; watch the full video on YouTube here.
So, here’s a playlist of sorts, recommendations for these languid, last days of Summer: a selection of works from three icons I am particularly fond of and who, in ways some more obvious than others, inspire my own work.
Billie Holiday:
I’ll Be Seeing You (Billie Holiday, 1947)
Autumn In New York (Recital, 1952)
Good Morning, Heartache (Gold, 1946)
Buster Keaton:
Go West (1925)
The Cameraman (1928)
The Electric House (1922)
Chet Baker: (Chet Baker Sings,1956):
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