Blue Like Jazz

I just got back from a concert featuring the Nashville Jazz Orchestra and the Blair Big Band. The NJO played their first annual “Writers Night”, featuring arrangements and compositions written by Nashville writers. I was reminded again why I love big band music.

As I was listening to the concert, I was reminded of the forward to Donald Miller’s second book, Blue Like Jazz – Nonreligious thoughts on Christian Spirituality:

I never liked Jazz music because Jazz music doesn’t resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes.
After that I liked jazz music.
Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself. It is as if they are showing you the way.

I used to not like God because God didn’t resolve. But that was before any of this happened.

I first saw a copy of this book in late 2003, a couple months after it had been published. I was at a friend’s birthday party and saw someone take this book out of their briefcase while they tried to locate something. When I saw the title, I picked it up, read the forward, and then proceeded to read as much as I could before the party was over.

I now have all of Don’s books (Prayer and the Art of Volkswagon Maintenance, Blue Like Jazz, Searching for God Knows What, Through Painted Deserts (new edition of his first book), and To Own a Dragon), and like his writing more with each book.

His newest book, To Own a Dragon: Reflections On Growing Up Without A Father, is based partly upon the premise that good fathers are sighted about as frequently as fire breathing dragons, a fact to which I can attest.
The book reads a little like a series of essays, covering a wide variety of topics. If you haven’t had the chance to pick it up yet, I recommend doing so. It is a fairly quick read, one I’m sure I’ll be going back to periodically.