[Image: Album art by James Gulliver Hancock, for Joey Alexander’s debut, My Favorite Things (2015).]
One of the most famous descriptions of some unlikely cultural phenomenon or another goes like this, taking various specific forms depending on the phenomenon in question:Sir, [phenomenon] is like a dog’s walking on his hinder legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.
The original comes from James Boswell’s Life of Samuel Johnson, quoting SJ himself. There, the phenomenon is “a woman’s preaching.” But it’s hard for me not to think of the quip in connection with Joey Alexander’s jazz piano work. Because — beautifully fluid, virtuosic, inspired, inspiring though it may be — at the time he recorded and released this debut album a few months ago, he was all of eleven years old. The photo at right (click it to enlarge) is one of my favorites from the little booklet enclosed with the album — it should give you some idea of the marvel of the cultural phenomenon of the moment.
I don’t want to make too much of this as a novelty. (In writing about Alexander, one New York Times observer said, “The acclamation given to musical prodigies usually involves some mix of circus-act astonishment and commodity futures trading.”) No, really — all I wanted to do was to offer you a solid hour of nice, not-at-all challenging weekend listening.
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