Autumn Leaves

28 weeks left
25 weeks completed
3ish weeks left until mid-tour leave
0 pound lost
27 pounds total
1 year from now, I will be married.

As a student of jazz, one of the first skills you learn is how to read chord progressions. That’s the first necessary step in playing jazz and more importantly the skill set you need to be a really good instrumental improviser and sight reader. I’ll not bore you with the details of this skill, as quite frankly, I was exceedingly bad at it. My jazz skills were in singing and performance style, and not so much in the reading-of-music-and-transposing-chord progressions on the piano (it’s important to note that the latter is what makes a really skilled jazz musician. Alas, perhaps this is why I am now a teacher of something completely unrelated.)

One of the first and easiest songs that they teach you in jazz school when you’re learning how to read and transpose chord progressions is a song called “Autumn Leaves” a French tune (ah, the French) originally recorded in the mid-1940’s. It’s interesting—I would have assumed it was also on the top ten list of most recorded jazz standards of all times, because if you’re a jazz musician you hear the song ALL-THE-TIME (literally, all the time.) According to Wikipedia (the source of all things true and comprehensive on the interweb) it is not a top 10. But I’ve got money on it being in the top twenty.

Because I was not good at “comping” or transposing chords, I grew to *hate* “Autumn Leaves.” I would sit there at the piano, thinking a lot about offing myself, basically failing out of jazz piano class, trying not to let my quivering lip revel the fact that I was on the verge of tears every single day. Plus, because it is the beginner jazz tune (like, teaching “Row Row Row Your Boat” to kindergartners to explain what a musical round is….or, you know, like page 1 in a Jamey Aebersold book) you sorta grow to roll your eyes at it as a jazz musician. “Oh, I can play THAT song. ANYONE can play that song. It’s time to move on to something much harder!” Except that I couldn’t master it, and it made me insane and feel completely worthless as a jazz musician.

(P.S. There are six whole people on the entire planet who just laughed at my Jamey Aebersold joke.)

“Autumn Leaves” is a jazz musician’s bread and butter, because it’s how you learn the ii-V-I turn around (for those who know or care about the mechanics of performing jazz music.) Now, I was a really good jazz singer. I understood the style and feel, adored the genre and people in the business; was obsessed with manipulating my voice to sound just like my idols. I could stand on a stage in a smoky bar for hours and sing myself hoarse. I was just really bad at reading music. I could do it, for sure, but it was harder for me than for my classmates. I felt like I was in these classes by accident- like on the first day of school when you walk into Spanish 400 instead of Spanish 101. I knew all the words and things sounded familiar, but I didn’t know how to use any of them or to communicate in that language.

Near the end of my jazz music career I became obsessed with a jazz musician named Bill Evans. If you have ever had the inclination to become familiar with jazz piano, there is no other better place to start your schooling. I could wax philosophical for hours on end about how he changed jazz as a genre and definitely changed many of my feelings about jazz performance generally, but we don’t have that kind of time here today. Suffice it to say, he was a game changer for me.

On one of his many brilliant albums Bill Evans performed a version of “Autumn Leaves” that straight knocked my socks off. First, because he played it in an upbeat fashion. I was used to hearing the song played in a slow and longing way (because come on, it IS from the French, the original title of which was actually “The Dead Leaves.” How perfectly morose.) This moderately slow tempo that I had heretofore always heard it performed in reminded me of the unbelievably tedious and laborious way in which I had to perform it because I wasn’t good enough at it to play it fast. This association was like all of jazz laughing at my ineptitude.

So first off, Bill was rocking it out at a speed I had never heard before. And I liked it! But second, this was Bill Evans playing “Autumn Leaves.” Bill Evans. Greatest jazz musician ever, playing the easiest song in recorded jazz history (besides “Heart and Soul.”) It would be like, Sinatra recording “Mary Had a Little Lamb” or Nat King Cole stopping by for a rousing rendition of “B-I-N-G-O.” I remember being blown away by this concept. That someone soo good had stooped to not just perform, but RECORD, a song like “Autumn Leaves.” And man was it good. I remember thinking at the time-- I guess you’re never too good for anything. But what I realized was that it wasn’t that he was too good…it was that he was SOO good, he could take the exceedingly simple and make it amazing.

Shortly after that day, “Autumn Leaves” made its way into my jazz singing repertoire as a sort of parable. The words were (thanks French!) pretty sad, and dealt with love and longing. And yes, they were much more appropriately sung in a slow and melancholy fashion. But I always (thanks Bill Evans) sang the song a little faster than the average performer.

This string of events came to me at several different times this week for a couple of different reasons. First, it has become autumn here. The crispness of the fall days, bright and blue-skied during the day, sweatshirt weather with the windows open at night, has arrived. I adore this time of year. And to ice that cake, yesterday, college football began in earnest ( a bit of a religious experience for me.) When my team ran on the field for the first time, I actually choked up a little bit (this is what happens when you grow up in Big Ten football country.) And to put the finishing touches on this portrait of a fall day, yesterday as I was walking around outside in the glorious weather, I saw the very first-of-the-season red fallen leaf float by on the breeze in front of me. Autumn leaves, indeed.

Second, I have been profoundly missing J this week. Perhaps it’s because his leave is so close (Autumn LEAVE?) and I will be seeing him soon. Perhaps it is because we are now, *officially* inside the Less Than One Year Until The Wedding mark. As I wandered around outside in the Autumn weather, with the Autumn leaves all around me, the words to the song began running through my head. “But I miss you most of all, my darling, when autumn leaves, start to fall…” Leave it to the French to sing a tragic love song.

As I was out walking in the wonder of fall, thinking of J, and singing these lyrics, I started thinking about the effect the song had had on me so many years ago. I have been spending a lot of time recently feeling a little bit, well, for lack of a better word, superior. “I’m better than this. I don’t deserve this. I can do something more important than this!” These have been my mantras for the last few weeks as I have gone out and applied to new jobs across a seriously wide spectrum.

But you know what? Bill Evans recorded “Autumn Leaves.” He took something beautiful and simple, turned it on its head, made it his own, and by doing so, changed a little piece of my life.

I will continue to search for ways to use my talents and skills in places that I feel will need and want me there. And I do (like everyone in the world) deserve goodness. But until then, I think I need to remember to do what I’m doing here and now, and to do it with conviction. And I can make it outstanding. And special. And possibly change someone’s life in the process. I might not ever know that it’s happened, but there’s no way there’s anything more important than being able to do that.

Originally, I was going to end this entry by posting the lyrics to “Autumn Leaves” for you to read. You can look those up for yourself if you’d like. I thought about posting a link to hear someone like Eva Cassidy sing the tune (she’s amazing at it, by the way, if you’re in the mood for a good cry), but that seems too sad for me today. Too much dwelling on the ugh part of life and not enough on the beauty. Instead, if you click below you’ll be taken to my boy Bill Evans and the upbeat version of the tune that I fell in love with so many years ago. This will always be the version I hear in my head this time of year- the version that gives me hope and reminds me that anyone can do anything.

Bill Evans Plays "Autumn Leaves"