Last night I received a DVD in the mail that I recently ordered, "Marsalis and Clapton Play the Blues", a live concert taped at Carnegie Hall this past April. With great anticpation, I put it on, and was transported to New Orleans, to Bourbon Street in all its glory. From snappy, light-hearted tunes to those soul-wrenching funeral dirges that break into the sunlight with horns and strings taking their turns at brilliant solos, I enjoyed every minute. See link for a taste: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwz8kVO3i34
I just love Eric Clapton! He is a consummate professional, who doesn't compromise, who is constantly learning and growing, and who is genuinely grateful for each opportunity to play with the greats of the craft, whether they be from the rock, blues or jazz genre. Eric has always been brilliant as a cover artist; he has composed some very good tunes, but he shines as an interpreter of the music he loves, respectfully bringing new life to old standards, and always faithful to their origin. He is keeping traditional blues alive, but he is now taking the time to look into jazz as well, and the results are "good fun" as he would put it.
Eric has come a long way since his days with John Mayall, Cream, Delany and Bonnie, and from his own solo career that was for the most part popular and commercially viable, a good deal of it produced in a drug haze. However, he could always play.....even in that state, his fingers never failed him.
But, now he plays, sober and clear-headed, what he loves. I think he has earned the right. A good lesson in there for us all, once we have paid our dues. There is always learning to achieve and practice to attend to, but in the end, there is, or should be, a letting go, and a running with it. Freedom to be who we really are. That comes with age perhaps. Eric will be 67 in March of 2012. Though you don't see much of him around the Top 40 pseudo-society, he is working as much as ever, and his music is fresh, and as I said before, joyful. He is enjoying his time around the "glitterati" of timeless music.
So, how now, do I connect Eric with the Enlightenment? Hmmmm. Well, just like Mozart, he has always been a clothes-horse, displaying a fashion-forward statement. In the 60's he was very bohemian, in the 80's, elegant and bold in big-shouldered, shawl-collared jackets. Today, he plays the blues in a conservative Bond Street suit and tie. He has worn many different specs, from horn-rims to wire-rims, to rimless, and I think these days, back to horn-rims. His hair has been long, or frizzed, or short; brown and now very grey! He has played a myriad of guitars, some hand painted, some created specifically for him by Fender, or Gibson. 
Mozart had his favorite instruments and his favorite suits, too, one in particular, a red coat that he yearned for. He describes it in a letter to Baroness Von Waldstatten (1781), " I must really have a coat like that, as it's worth it just for the buttons that I've been hankering after for some time.....They're mother of pearl with some white stones around the edge and a beautiful yellow stone in the center". The Baroness had the coat made for him as a thank you for his concert!
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