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RE: Haley and Harry Connick Jr...
Hmmm…. It seems as though the Buzz isn’t the only person who’s been misunderstood. I suppose I brought it on myself, but my use of the word “useful” was never intended towards the negative, much less “usurous.” That was strictly the interpretation of some of you, dear readers.
It’s true. I don’t believe that Mayfield was so overwhelmed by Haley’s performance in his club that night, that he immediately decided he wanted to invite her to perform at Carnegie with him. That would require a suspension of what I consider rational thought – otherwise known as “magical thinking” -- that simply doesn’t work for me.
So I thought things through to find an explanation that did make sense to me. I don’t know whether I remember all of the possibilities that occurred to me, and it probably doesn’t matter that I do. However, as I worked through the various aspects here are a few things that kept coming back to me: performing at Carnegie had probably been a dream of Mayfield’s since he was in high school, maybe younger. Something that seems to be very important to him is his role as an “ambassador” of jazz, and hand in hand with that, his role as a music educator. (And I can't emphasize the importance of that last sentence enough.)
So he had an upcoming concert to fill out a complete program with the opportunity to show that jazz isn’t just for people above the age of—I don’t know 35. He’s recently had a couple of talented kids in his club “show their stuff;” there’s a video on youtube of one of those performances (as poor a recording as it was) that was garnering some attention. Voila – he can invite the subject of that video and fulfill that desire of his to reach out to the younger generation with his jazz message plus provide an opportunity for that young person. To me, it seemed like a win-win situation.
Is it conjecture as Tusk pointed out? Yes, I suppose it is. But again, it makes more sense to me than "magical thinking."
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