The first time I heard Horace Silver‘s “Song for My Father,” it was in Finney Chapel at Oberlin College. Wendell Logan, the jazz professor of a renegade jazz studies program at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, assigned it to my BFF Dawn E. Robinson to sing as a duet with our fellow Duke Ellington School of the Arts alumni Rhett Lucas. I was blown away. I have never been able to get the song out of my head. But there’s more to the story than just fabulous music. For Dawn it was an “illegal” performance for a Conservatory vocal performance major. Only Classical performances were allowed. But she took Wendell’s offer after the death of her own father from cancer. More about this in the upcoming “Eclectique Interview.”
Fathers Day brings mixed emotions for me. It was just before Fathers Day that my father passed away. This week Wendell Logan (founder and chair, of the Oberlin Conservatory’s jazz studies department) passed away. And Ahmed Shallal, father of Busboys and Poets and Eatonville Restaurant owner Andy Shallal, joined the ancestors on Friday.
But as I listen to Horace Silver’s song I can’t help but remember Wendell Logan, a man who gave me fathering words of advice that saved me — a life raft — at a time when I felt myself sinking fast. The jazz ensemble family at Oberlin was the place where who you are was “good enuf.” How many fathering words have helped you along the way from men who weren’t your biological father? Uncles, older cousins, family friends.
I’m encouraged by the men who carry their children on their shoulders, hold their daughter’s hands and push baby carriages up the hill. Proud of their bond between parent and child.
Horace Silver composed “Song for My Father” in 1964 for his own father who was from the Cape Verde Islands. I dedicate this to all fathers on this Fathers Day.
lyrics – “Song for My Father”
If there was ever a man
Who was generous, gracious and good
That was my dad
The man
A human being so true
He could live like a king
‘Cause he knew
The real pleasure in life
To be devoted to
And always stand by me
So I’d be unafraid and free
If there was ever a man
Who was generous, gracious and good
That was my dad
The man
A human being so true
He could live like a king
‘Cause he knew
The real pleasure in life
To be devoted to
And always stand by me
So I’d be unafraid and free
If there was ever a man
Who was generous, gracious and good
That was my dad
The man, The man
by Horace Silver
Update: Sorry everyone. I was banging this out so I wouldn’t be late for church and made some oops on the the title of the song. Special apology to Horace Silver. Everything’s cool now. Enjoy the music 🙂