Strangers and Yet Connected

The first drawing I made in my watercolor Moleskine (which is almost full now) was of people lined up at Chipotle Grill. I only just got around to coloring it. I did this at Chipotle looking at another group of people. That way I could observe the light source which made the final project better, I think, than if I had colored it at home using my imagination.

Strangers all, but somehow I can relate to each and every one of them.

My son Ian showed me a video on YouTube of a famous father and son in Afro-Cuban Jazz, a wonderful genre of music that we know very well in South Florida. If you haven't heard this form of music, and are curious, one of our public radio stations, WDNA, plays a lot of it. You can listen to the station here.

Anyway, the father is Bebo Valdes (I am a fan), and the son is Chucho Valdes. Both are pianists. The video is here The pair was estranged for 18 years according to the video, and they still see very little of each other. Even so, the father-son connection when they play together is very strong, and in this video the way they interact with one another through their music is quite moving.

The video was filmed employing very strong lighting, with the two pianists (and pianos) facing one another. So I had to draw them, right?