Frank Sinatra famously sang

Frank Sinatra famously sang of New York that it's the city that never sleeps. The other night I was reminded of those nocturnal whirrings that prove Old Blue Eyes true. Walking the streets of a quiet Chinatown, Sunday nearing midnight, I noted a well-dressed family trailing strings of gold balloons; wooden packing crates broken down and stacked, the cooling asphalt releases scents of tar, fish, dirt. Across the street from Fire Department Engine Company 9, the oldest in New York and home of the Dragon Fighters, is Wing KEI Noodle Inc. Through doors open wide to the night I could see a world in miniature all in white: walls, uniforms, lights, ceiling, flour, floors, paper hats, thin rolled noodles.

I remembered that the composer Nico Muhly lives nearby; perhaps he buys Wing KEI noodles or maybe bobbins from the sewing store or fried chicken from Popeye's on the corner (whose signs are all in English and Chinese). I do know that he is merely 26 and composes pieces for quartets, orchestras, choirs. After reading this article, I know that Muhly draws on numerous and disparate sources for inspiration: medieval cosmologies, David Bowie, Egyptian archaeology, Italian Fascist architecture, the history of the novel, Balinese gamelan music – a frenetic, omnivorous taste.

On Easter Sunday last month, my family and I had the pleasure of attending services with my friend Gabrielle at Middle Church in the East Village. In addition to a pair of choirs (one of which showed in rocking form that "gospel" is a state of mind that can leapfrog matters of heritage), the services featured a jazz quintet, a "maverick organist," and a parade of children in silly hats. The musicians and the traditional choir premiered Muhly's Christ and the Whale. The soloist sang in a spirit from beyond the church, a clarion bell. And they rolled the rock away and there was... music? Light?

After prodding from the musical director and his mother seated beside him, Muhly stood briefly to accept our applause. He waved once, bent fractionally at the waist in partial bow, and sat. Sitting directly behind him, I had the chance to be the first to shake his hand. A unique, intoxicating experience – melting the late winter blues away among human nightingales, bald dynamo choir directors, rainbows and sermons on looking for love in all the wrong places, congratulating an avant-garde composer on the occasion of the world premiere of one of his works.

Muhly is one of les enfant terribles. Which also happens to be the name of a café around the corner from Wing KEI. Ah, New York.

Exit music for a film, with leather and stone

On today's trip through memories of Florence we visit Santa Croce. This piazza has retained a smaller, older feel than her more famous Fiorentine sisters. Last Sunday's marathon finished there, a thought to keep you going during 42 kilometers of hills and gasping questions. Inside the church are buried a cadre of famous Italians, including giants of literature, art, science, and politics: Dante, Machiavelli, Galileo, Michelangelo... The central door is massive but it was not enough to hold out the flood of 1966 – a plaque on the wall marks the water's high line.

Exploring the church, through the carefully lit scriptorium, out past the stained-glass transept, a visitor can wander into the Leather School and watch masters craft leather into bags, purses, wallets. The reflections from angled mirrors and the orderly collections of worn tools could have kept me mesmerized for hours.

Tucked into a dark cellar just off a spacious courtyard we found a small exhibit dedicated to the printwork of native son Pietro Parigi. Anyone who has read the Catholic Worker will recognize his simple, rustic style. I am fascinated by this art form; some favorites include the California artist Tom Killion and the book The Man Who Planted Trees by Jean Giono.

During two visits to the neighborhood around the church, we heard great street musicians – a trio named Grupo Romm Dracula's that is comprised of stand-up bass, djembe (or its cousin), and a hammered dulcimer, a stringed instrument resting on a stand that is played with small mallets. The members are Romani, or gypsy, and perhaps have brought strains of the Middle East, even India with them to Florence. [On a side note, this minority is currently much maligned here in Italy, as so often in the past in so many places – e.g. the word “gyp,” as in “That market vendor gypped me.” Xenophobia: a topic for another day...]

The music was new yet somehow familiar, like a bite of some untried sweet that carries remembered tastes, spices. Novel madeleines. Watching people walk away down a narrow Fiorentina street, with the lyrical skipping music playing behind me, I felt like a camera recording the closing scene of a movie. I was reminded of the ending of The Third Man; I later confirmed, through conversations with my classic-movie-knowing family and a bit of Internet research, that the score of that great film noir featured a zither, a close relative of the dulcimer. Romani music – yet another rabbit hole to wander down some other day.

Dancing in the dark

Last night I went to church. There were over 11,000 congregants, eight deacons, and one high priest. By the end of the service, I could have spoken in tongues. If I still had my voice. Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band tore through Milan’s Datch Forum like a steam train running full-head downhill and I willingly went along for the ride.

[photo source: popmatters]

Until last night, I had never seen Bruce Springsteen live. When the show went on sale back in September, my friend David and I tried in vain to buy tickets. Hope does spring eternal - through a series of fortuitous turns, we found ourselves grinning like fools walking onto the floor of the Datch Forum for last night’s show.

I have heard from friends and read reviews of Springsteen's legendary energy. Backed by a drummer, two keyboardists, a violin/fiddle/guitarist/vocalist, a bassist, two vocalists/guitarists, and one mean saxophone player, Bruce lived up to his reputation. Most of the songs were from their new album, Magic, which I have not yet heard. I could not sing along, but as with attending mass in Latin or other unknown languages, I could still participate in the rites and rituals, feel the reverence. The concert was 2 ½ hours of chanting and shaking and hand waving and singing. Without rest, even between songs – a quick drum change from cymbal and high hat to kick bass snare overdrive – in the few moments of transition while the band wrapped up the previous song, Bruce would douse himself with a carwash sponge soaking in a bucket by the drummer’s feet, shake his head snorting like a horse at the gate, and charge 1 2 3 4 into the next song’s beat over the decrescendo of force. Centrifugal and centripetal.

Some will scoff and say dismissive things of Bruce. Others will bristle at the comparison of a rock concert to a religious experience. What I know is this: never have I seen a band and crowd so earnestly, unselfconsciously in sync about the joy of music. I have drunk the Kool-Aid.