The Indigo Girls
For my birthday this year my sister in-law offered to buy me and my wife tickets to a number of shows. The offer came with a a free night of baby-sitting, so last night my wife and I kissed the kids goodnight and hoped on a train into the city to see the Indigo Girls and their opening act Kaki King, a freakishly gifted guitar player who appears destined to make endless Oscars creating sound tracks for movies. I chose the Indigo Girls because they have been teachers and role models for me and my wife for the last twenty years. Their music has reflected the joys and sorrows of my adult life. Here are five reasons I love the Indigo Girls:
1) They are unambivalently committed to being good at what they do.
2) They wear their hearts on their sleeves
3) They are able to both challenge us to wake up and hold us in their hearts
with great love at the same time.
4) They have stood the test of time. Despite all of the ups and downs of the last
couple of decades they have continued to show up and burn brightly.
5) They are able to give voice to the sadness and fear in the human heart and in
so doing make clear that it is in our connection to our darkness, not
repression or denial, that our capacity for light is realized.
The night was full of tears, singing and laughter. Amy and Emily played without a band behind them. Two women on a stage playing their guitars and singing the songs they wrote to express how they feel.
1) They are unambivalently committed to being good at what they do.
2) They wear their hearts on their sleeves
3) They are able to both challenge us to wake up and hold us in their hearts
with great love at the same time.
4) They have stood the test of time. Despite all of the ups and downs of the last
couple of decades they have continued to show up and burn brightly.
5) They are able to give voice to the sadness and fear in the human heart and in
so doing make clear that it is in our connection to our darkness, not
repression or denial, that our capacity for light is realized.
The night was full of tears, singing and laughter. Amy and Emily played without a band behind them. Two women on a stage playing their guitars and singing the songs they wrote to express how they feel.
2 Comments:
Hi Rolf,
So glad to see you have a blog! I just discovered it today (Caroline forwarded me the link) I look forward to checking in on it.
I am proud to say that I went to Emory University where the Indigo Girls met and started their band. I heard them play live at Emory in 94 (they came back for a tour while I was attending) and I had the honor to be invited to a private show in a small night club in Boston about 10 years ago where they played for only a few hundred people. Each time I have heard them live it was a powerful experience. Their passion for the music they produce inspires me to connect to my spirit. Thanks for reminding me!
Nice post.
Their music has been at various times in my life: a bed I could lie down on, a way of seeing through darkness, a springboard as I dived, a union of hearts.
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