Smatter
On the record “Gnu High,” Kenny Wheeler plays this piece called Smatter.
When I was a little girl and we were cleaning the kitchen after supper (the person who cooked doesn’t have to clean - that’s the rule at least in our house), my da, who had usually cooked, would sit down at the piano in the living room and play this piece. When I went home for holidays he would play it still.
My da sits at the piano with his head tipped back, playing this piece, this brilliant jazz concoction of weeknights and scrubbing the garlic out of the cast-iron pans, this piece that signals homework to come and the loneliness of the kitchen after supper, the dishwasher running, the table wiped clean, this piece that my da plays, long fingers stretched out over the keys, eyes closed, the music running through him.
My da taught me how to play the piano. He sat me on his lap at the age of four and played this piece and I stared at his hands moving over the piano, entranced, enchanted at a young age with an instrument that would later mean the world to me.
But anyways, this piece reminds me of my childhood, that’s all.
