My deep-felt love for listeners prevails
Dispatch #46: On the anniversary of Gentle, Everybody
Hi friend,
This morning I woke up to a text from my brother:
The summer I turned 22 I was in a band called The Tiny Tornadoes. I was in it with my brother & two other pairs of siblings – a true family affair! Comprised of guitars, saxophone, xylophone, violin, cello, & flute, we called ourselves “orchestral campfire sing-along.”
We recorded Gentle Everybody today, almost two decades ago, in my brother’s childhood bedroom in a single day, almost entirely in single takes. It was hot. I didn’t feel well. But as soon as we started playing together, I felt better.
Who here has been in a band before? What is it about it that just makes everything better? The camaraderie, the (literal) harmony, the intense joy, all of the above? Those of us that know, know. Making music together changes us.
If you want to join my brother & I in celebration, you can listen to Gentle, Everybody for free. Sing alongside us. Right now, Angel & I are working at a big wooden table across from each other in my studio. She blasts Gentle, Everybody from her computer speakers, swaying her arms in the air.
Happy anniversary to an album born out of summer sweat, a sense of freedom & spiritual awakening, kinship, improvisation, sibling-hood, experimentation, saying yes to each fresh new sound & to each other, & to feeling as dizzyingly powerful as the tiniest tornado.
If you want a little peak into a live show recording pre-TikTok, pre-Instagram, pre-everyone’s-on-the-internet-all-of-the-time, here’s a sweet little clip of us playing a living room show on tour. We slept on that same living room floor hours later. We were in our twenties. Home from college for the summer. No record label. Weeks on the road in a small car. With just an obsession for music & a deep love for each other. Some of the most meaningful moments of my life have been with a guitar in hand, my brother nearby, & a room of strangers singing along.
But, hold up. Is there a better word for this particular role than ‘strangers’? What do you call people you don’t know but that help you shepherd an expansive intimacy? Certainly not ‘sheep’? It’s not ‘audience.’ That doesn’t quite do it justice. When the English language’s limits fail me (which is often) I head over to Positive Lexicography Project, one of my favorite places on the world wild web. Today I click on “Communality” hoping to find this missing word I’m seeking...
I love these so much. & Still…
I wish for a word that honors the exact role of a live show’s individual listener. For the generous intimacy that person provides to the performers. For this special role that elegantly transforms a stranger into a not-quite-stranger.
It’s palpable & touching that simple listening holds such immense power to forge closeness.
What could that word be? Please invent one for me.
My twenties in The Tiny Tornadoes were riddled with such intimacy. Living room show after living room show, I found my people. These were people who loved playing music, yes, but also people who loved listening to music; embodying a resonating space where the music could happen.
My life now as a poet & teacher prioritizes this sacred space, this sobornost, this convivencia, this sangha. I’m proud that no matter what comes or goes in my life (money, opportunities, bummers, yays, sickness, health, etc.) my deep-felt love for listeners prevails, ever-strengthened by the ones I have met & keep meeting.
I meet you here, too.
Some prompts for you in the spirit of Gentle, Everybody:
Who is the best human listener in your life? Have you ever told them? What if you told them today?
Who is the best non-human listener in your life? What does it feel like to be with them? How do they show you they are listening? (I’m thinking of Odyssey wagging his tail, tongue out, giving me his bum for scratchings: a type of full-body listening.)
How can you honor the kaleidoscope-like nature of your life? How can you honor what’s constantly shifting, changing, & casting new colors?
What small step can you take to stop holding back (on whatever it is you’re holding back) today? In what ways can you give yourself away a little bit more? Your you-ness, without fear, for free, generously, without attachment? Let us in.
What does it mean to return to the mantra “Gentle, everybody” throughout your day? How might you use it in the grocery line? In an argument? With your own breathing? (I can imagine you saying to your “community” of breaths, one breath after the next, “Gentle, everybody.”)
When I texted my friend Ethan that a friend of mine had died, one of the first things he texted back was, “Are you singing?” It stunned me awake. The next time you’re feeling sad or bereft, sing. I did. It moves the grief, or whatever needs to be moved.
What might singing solve that talking can’t?
Speaking of deep listening, there’s only two days until Asiyah House’s $10k fundraiser to purchase a housing unit that would allow them to safely & efficiently serve all of their clientele as well as allowing for one floor to be explicitly dedicated for refugees from Gaza. Whether you are able to attend the reading or not, you can donate here!
Also…the readers are wildly amazing. I mean?! Geesh?!
As a sneak peak: I’ll be sharing a poem about a time in my life where deep listening fundamentally changed me. It happened in Boston in my twenties in a scummy, beautiful, overflowing three-story house in Jamaica Plain called The Whitehaus, an artist collective.
I can’t wait to be in community with you all. We are steadily raising funds. I wonder if today’s donations could bring us closer to the halfway mark. Will you donate today?
Some offerings of places where I’ve been listening lately:
Remi Wolf’s recent free song clip on Instagram really moved me – both the gesture & the song. There’s generosity & realness here.
Fred again’s Tiny Desk is immersive & experimental & yummy. I let it wash over me & change the room/mood I was in.
Amy Poehler’s interview with Abbi Jacobson & Ilana Glazer had me in my feels because of the way these three just couldn’t stop crying. As I take stock of an experience that moved me 19 years ago, it’s sweet to be with the thee of them as they take stock of Broad City. So sweet!
True kismet is that this very week & anniversary of Gentle, Everybody, my darling musician friend Leah happened to send me this stunning footage of her discovering she could film through her kaleidoscope.
I hope that you remember that your life is a kaleidoscope. The most simple, small gesture could change everything. You can even play with this idea right now: inhale, hold it, then exhale slow. You are different. Own it, my friend. Then go out & sing.
With maple syrup,
I start year 40 of being a university choir conductor. In my program conductor’s notes, I thank my audiences for being open to the magical and special one-night community formed during our concerts! I passionately believe that is what happens.
Thank you for this, and reminding me of that question I asked you. I think about this language for collective awe and connection through music so often. One of the most recent words that came to me was 'awesong'. Maybe that resonates a lil. The elevator man keeps going up from here.