Every morning I drink water, I drink espresso, I take my pills. I drink another espresso, I read the news, I eat a handful of nuts and berries, maybe an egg, maybe a little yogurt, and then I dress and head out the door.
And shortly after, typically in the car, I say, “Hey Siri, play John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme.”
Listening to a single album every day, the same album, is a different experience each time. Sometimes I tune into a single instrument, just the piano. Sometimes I don’t hear the tracks at all, I experience something more like familiarity, always knowing what sounds are around the bend. There are mornings when the music feeds a mood, and some mornings when it counters it.
It feels like I don a uniform, a helmet, and step into the cockpit of the day—a route I’ve flown before, but today the sky is so gorgeous and different.
What is the album about? It’s up to the listener, probably. Coltrane recorded it in a single session (!) in 1964 with McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison, and Elvin Jones. Four parts: “Acknowledgement,” “Resolution,” “Pursuance,” and “Psalm.” I used to imagine it’s about the birth of the universe, but recently, for me, it’s more about a normal human day—get up, accept you’re here, decide to get on with it anyway, at some point close your eyes again and sleep.
I’ve written previously about my therapist equating the word “god” with “love.” (And my liking that idea, too.) According to the album’s liner notes, Love Supreme’s final movement has Coltrane performing a poem, through saxophone, that ends with “Elation. Elegance. Exaltation. All from God. Thank you God. Amen.” For me, to substitute love for god there works very well.
Monday night, I caught up with a friend from childhood, we’re in the habit of talking every couple months. I’m thinking about him now, typing this, because I listen to new music practically all day long—I’ve got a playlist of music recorded in 2024 that I restrict to 20 songs, trimming older things as new stuff accrues—but I’ve been listening to A Love Supreme since high school, on and off, and I’m still able to find it fresh. Maybe it speaks to the moment I’m in, where I value an old companion, like the friend on the phone, who meets me now, having known me then.
An album can be a crystal. It can be a void. An album can be a memory, a person with rainy eyes. An album can be a partner, alive only in the listener’s seance.
“My music is the spiritual expression of what I am—my faith, my knowledge, my being,” Coltrane said. I don’t know if I’m there completely with my writing, but I try.
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Meditations in an Emergency is a weekly mini-essay from Rosecrans Baldwin about something beautiful. Paying subscribers receive a Sunday supplement with 3+ ideas of things to love, plus a monthly dispatch from the road, for some inbox wanderlust ⛰️
Rosecrans is the bestselling author of Everything Now, winner of the California Book Award. His most recent novel, The Last Kid Left, was one of NPR’s Best Books of the Year. Titles mentioned in this newsletter are stored on a Bookshop list, which pays a small commission. For more—books, articles, etc—check out rosecransbaldwin.com