This series of personal sketches was drawn from the ‘hometown memories’ of students in response to watching Lowell Blues, a short film by Henry Ferrini based on readings from Jack Kerouac’s written recollections of growing up in Lowell, MA.

– Fred Bouchard, Associate Professor of Liberal Arts

The tenor player flew elegantly through the changes. A short melodic phrase. Then a long run, down the bop scale. It was late October and the jazz festival had changed my hometown into a totally different place. Usually I would do the same stuff every week; saxophone lesson, marching band, and maybe some sports from time to time, but once a year the festival happened. Me and my friend Andreas had signed up for a seminar; young musicians would get to study with jazz students, and play together in combos. And now our mentors were playing a short concert for us. The saxophonist left me speechless. He went outside the chords, all the way up in altissimo, then back inside the changes, leaving me with an eager to get my own horn out and figure out what he just played.

When the first day of lessons came to an end, Andreas and me were ready to hit up the jazz clubs and hear some live music. We decided we should try and make all the important shows, beginning with Dave Liebman. I could hear him warming up from outside as we approached the club. The quiet tones of his saxophone could barely be heard from the doorway, but as we walked closer to the stage they filled me up with joy. We occupied a table all the way in the front, only inches from the bell of his saxophone. I was caught in Liebman’s mellow tones on the soprano. With no introduction they started blowing on a tune I’d never heard before. The melody was over before I could even wrap my head around what was going on, and they went into the solo section and beyond. As the concert progressed they went places I never tough to be possible, changes were no longer present, and everything was about the moment. The guitar player laid out, and as Liebman screamed in the high register, the drummer responded with an intensity I had never heard before.

But it was time to go. The next show started in five, and we rushed out through the door: sad that we had to leave, but happy that the night was far from over.

We ran through the street, passing drunks and occasionally some famous musician. The city we knew so well had turned into a beautiful playground for us to explore. We took a shortcut through an alley, and ended up at the next concert just seconds before it was supposed to start. The line was huge, and we were prepared to wait for at least another ten minutes. We waited. Ten minutes, still a long line of people outside. Fifteen, and they closed the doors. People were still trying to buy tickets, but it was all sold out. I cursed myself for leaving Dave Liebman and walked back outside. We looked at each other, Andreas sighed, and we got ready to go back and catch five more minutes of Liebman.

Suddenly, I got an idea.

“Come!” I yelled to my friend, and rushed back inside. He seemed confused, but decided to follow. As I entered the main door of the building, I turned the opposite way of where the line was, and headed for backstage.

“I play here every week, and if we could sneak in backstage, we might be able to hear something,” I explained, running trough corridors that were so familiar. Surprisingly there were no one trying to stop us, and suddenly we were right behind the stage. I looked around and found a door that I knew lead to where they kept the grand piano when it wasn’t in use. We could hear music now, and before we realized it, we were directly underneath the stage.

This music was calmer, as the musicians were signed with ECM. I could see the pianist’s silhouette through the gaps between the wooden planks that made up the stage. He hummed along as he played the most wonderful melodies. The elements of folk music painted me a picture of sounds, and as I closed my eyes the music took me to another world.

The musicians played a wonderful set, and as they finished the last tune, I woke up from my trance in a hurry to get out before someone noticed us. We passed a couple of people, but they made no attempt to stop us, and again we found ourselves running down the poorly lit streets while the clock was ticking towards midnight.

“One, two, three, four!” The band started playing ridiculously fast, and I smiled at my buddy. We got to the jam about 15 minutes early, I picked up my horn on the way, and if an opportunity presented itself I had decided to play. The band was unknown, but they all sounded really great. The tunes lasted longer now, lots of soloist. They were all much older than me, would they let me sit in on a tune?

The band finished of their opening set with ‘Autumn Leaves’ and opened up the jam session. The first person to go up there was an older guitar player. He sounded great on some standard I just couldn’t recall the name of, and even better on ‘All of You’.

The crowd clapped their hands for the guy, and he took a seat again.

“Any horn player’s out there?” The leader of the band looked around the room and his eyes met mine.

“What about you, young man? You wanna bring that tenor up and play?”

I froze. This was my chance, but what should I call? Would they be mad if I called the wrong tune? Could I hang? Andreas gave me a friendly punch on the shoulder, and I stood up. The crowd clapped, and I stumbled up on the stage, my tenor case in my hands. The spotlights were warm, and I felt a drop of sweat running down my forehead.

“So What?” I mumbled with the reed in my mouth. No one heard me. I put the reed on the mouthpiece and said it again.

“So What?” They all nodded this time, thank God! I blew some air trough the horn, and then we started. I came in a little late on the first hits in the horns, but I got it together and the next time I was right on. People smiled when they heard the tune, some even said ‘yeah.’ I took the first solo, starting of just like Miles did, and I got a friendly laugh from the piano player. I played one more ‘safe’ lick, then I was all calmed down, taking nice and deep breaths. I think I played three or four choruses, I can’t even recall, time just went by in a totally different way when I played with these people. As I took the horn out of my mouth, the crowd gave me a nice applause, and I stepped aside for the rest of the group to solo. They all sounded great! I played the head out, and as we landed on the last chord, I saw my dad clapping in the back of the club. My night was over, but the festival had just begun.