Hornsby and the NYC Marathon

November 3 - 5, 2002

How could (or why would) I compare these two disparate events? It comes down to the overarching concept of passion as defined as an intense, driving, or overmastering feeling or conviction.

First, I need to write about the Bruce Hornsby concert that David and I went to last night at The Birchmere in Alexandria, Virginia. I am a Hornsby fan. A few years ago, I saw him 2 nights in a row at the Mountain Winery in Saratoga, CA and I saw him last year in Berkeley with his full band. I not only like his music, but I also deeply admire his musical abilities. Therefore, on this trip, I have been keeping an eye on his web site for concert dates (I keep an eye on the Indigo Girls too). When I saw that he was going to be performing near Washington, D.C. when we were going to be there, I jumped on two tickets (even though they were a bit steep at nearly 60 bucks a pop). I figured I could fit it into the budget because we had seen The Blue Man Group for free in New York by volunteer ushering.

The venue: The Birchmere is not a concert hall! It is just a large room set with dinner tables. There are no reserved seats; everybody in the joint has paid the same price for their tickets. At 5 PM, the ticket office issues sequential numbers to all those in line. You then go inside for an hour, at 6 PM, they call the numbers one by one and you go in and choose your seat. At 7:30, the show starts. It is all quite civilized. Well, if there was ever an advantage to being unemployed and having time, this looked like it. David and I took our left over New York Times and some books and got to the Birchmere at 4:20. We were 6th in line (but the person who was first was saving room for 10 people). Although multiple people had told us that there were no bad seats at The Birchmere, we scored with seats in the first row, with full view of the piano keyboard, about 8 feet from Mr. Hornsby. Life was good. We then enjoyed our little Birchmere dinner and awaited the show.

The show: The stage was just a grand piano, an electronic keyboard, and a piano bench. For an hour, audience members filed by our seat to drop little slips of paper giving all their musical requests for songs onto the piano bench. This follows the Hornsby tradition - he usually doesn't come out with a set list, he just reads the requests and decides what he wants to play. He is known for allowing the audience to shout out suggestions and just playing whatever he feels like. About 10 minutes before the show, a man came out and gathered the little slips up to take back stage for Mr. Hornsby's review.

When Hornsby came out (without an introduction, he just came out and started playing), he performed for about an hour and a half, took a 10 minute break, and then came back for another hour and a half. He did a haunting encore and then it was over. Oh, and he shook my hand before leaving. (Yeah, I was star-struck.)

The set list: Hah! I could listen to a tape of this show 20 times and not be able to come up with the set-list. He performed some of his standards: China Doll, Talk of the Town, Rainbow's Cadillac, and Wharf Rat. He also performed Happy Birthday, Blue Ronda a la Turk, Stairway to Freebird (an impromptu combination of the two most requested bar songs), some Samuel Barber, and I think a bit of Queen, plus the world premiere of a song he had been working on. He literally stood up, begged our patience while he ran back to the dressing room for the lyrics, and came back to the stage to perform this one. It was a cute "ditty" about the wall of family pictures at his house. He seemed to be in a bit of a subdued mood. He wasn't playing bright and cheery pieces, more thoughtful and heavy renditions of stuff. No complaints, I enjoyed every minute of it…

The Passion: Bruce Hornsby is a world-class musician. He knows the piano and can make it perform any sort of acrobatic feats that he wants. He also knows music. He plays with notes, transitions, and chords in a way that you can not do unless you know your craft. He has passion for his music. Any one who can come out without a set-list, just start taking requests, and actually play them is downright amazing. Hornsby has a passion for music, a passion for performing that one senses when he gets so involved in playing that I think he might forget about the audience. It is that an intense, driving, or overmastering feeling or conviction.

The Transition: OK, so you can see why I enjoyed the concert (he shook my hand). You might even buy the passion bit, but why, oh why, would I now try to work in the NYC Marathon? Well, both impressed me, moved me, and touched me, with the depths of passion that I encountered. They created the same feelings in me - some envy, mostly admiration, and a ton of appreciation for the effort.

NYC Marathon: On Sunday, we were going to have brunch with my old college friend, Steve Monroe. He has now moved up in the world such that he has a cool Upper West Side condo that overlooks Central Park. Before visiting Steve, David and I stopped by Central Park to check out the marathon. We were just 300 yards from the finish line. We watched the wheelchairs go flying by (wow), then we saw the elite runners, females first, then males. They were amazing to watch - long, lean bodies with athletic strides. Most of them looked liked they could run another 26 miles without too much effort. It was bodies in beautiful, almost poetic motion.

We then went off with Steve for brunch (thanks Steve). After brunch, we dropped him off so he could work some more, and we went back to check out the marathon. Those elite runners were already on their planes to the next marathon and now the "folks" were coming in. We were now coming into hour 5 of the marathon. These were your friends who have taken up running in their 30/40/50's. There were young, old, in good and not so good shapes. Many of them wore T-shirts with their names on them to encourage you to yell for them. One T-shirt had "Please Yell 'Go Bob Go', Thanks." No longer was I watching "poetic motion," but rather individual, anguished steps. The majority of people were obviously in pain, but determined to finish. Some runners were being helped by other runners. You just had to yell encouragement. You wanted them to make it. David (who has done some  shorter races) wanted them to look up and appreciate that they were almost done and to savor the moment. I thought that might be asking too much, but there were a few folks seeming to do just that. The determination in the faces was just amazing. Passion for finishing, for achieving something that probably seemed impossible at certain times during the race. It was touching.

Importance of Passion: So both of those episodes make me think about passion and the importance of it in one's life. Last year, I could say that I was passionate about teaching. I had an intense, driving, or overmastering feeling or conviction that I should always try to teach better tomorrow than I did yesterday. However, this year, I'm taking a year off - so that isn't my passion right now.

What is my passion? I have many feelings of passion about my friendship and marriage with my best friend, David. However, I don't have a deep passion about sightseeing (I enjoy it, but can’t say it is a passion). I saw a web site where an ex-teacher was visiting every state capital and sending an electronic postcard about the state. Smelled like passion to me, and I don't have that. My mom thinks I should be contacting every relative within a 100 miles of my travels, but I don't have passion for that. I'm starting too cook more and I really like that. Not sure it could qualify as passion yet, but I do enjoy it. This web site is actually a bit of a passion with me - writing down my thoughts is the main driver though. Therefore, the two events make me appreciate the passion in others. Envy it too. Makes me look around my own life more which is always a healthy thing. No answers yet, but searching is always healthy.