I went to the hospital to say goodbye to Jeff Burke. It was after nine pm. His daughter gave me the password and the nurse directed me to his room. She said there would be another nurse inside. There was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He was a man in his late thirties who didn\u2019t speak English very well. He was adjusting the fluids feeding Jeff through the tube in his mouth. Jeff was unconscious. Near the bed, a cellphone was playing bad modern pop music. Brittle drum machines, synthetic strings, a sound that keeps insisting on itself. In the elevator a few minutes earlier, it occurred to me if Jeff was unconscious, which I assumed he was, I would play some Keith Jarrett. We shared that love. Now the idea was ruined by the cruel cell phone pretending badly to be music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I touched his wrist, told him who I was, how much I admired him, that I would check in on Julie-Ann and Seren. I was about to leave when I thought I could do more. Pressed the side of the cellphone. The screen lit up. A pause button! I pressed it. Silence. A man admired for his classical music, his jazz, his free improvisations, his penny whistles and theremin solos set against bassoon loops, should not spend final times listening to the loud and meaningless. Another layer of cruelty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I held my phone near his ear and played the K\u00f6ln Concert, all of side one. If, in the scheme of things, he could hear any of it, this was fitting. If his mind still received sound with any degree of consciousness, it might register familiarity, coherence, maybe even a sense of peace which music offers differently than spoken words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The nurse returned. I felt obliged to explain why I seem to be doing yoga with phone near the friend\u2019s ear. He seemed surprised to learn Jeff was a great musician. I hope that alters something small but important like how he is held, how he is spoken to, how he is treated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So long. I hope the coda bearable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"