'He is terrible, as you can see, and one cannot deal with him." So said Pope Julius II of Michelangelo.
Which brings me to Garth Hudson.
This is a little counterintuitive, I know. But I often think that's the charm of an arts section, don't you?
There are other parts of the newspaper where associations are a little more direct, and, if I may say, a little more dull. On other pages -- let's take the business section as an example -- if someone says "really, really hard work" it follows, as night the day, that someone else will say "money." Or, should the word "dedication" pop into view, you can safely bet that the word "success" will not be far behind. Here, however, we dwell in the realm of the cultural community, and things are not nearly so humdrum. Here, should mention be made of a concept such as "excellent Canadian film," the refreshingly unpredictable rejoinder might be "lack of funds," or "one-week theatrical release." We don't expect things to be obvious in this part of the paper. In fact, a distinct absence of the obvious is what we're known for. I mean, if we've been able to connect Liberal MP Dennis Mills to the Rolling Stones without collapsing the universe, creating a black hole of infinite proportions, and ending time as we know it, we can manage getting from Michelangelo to Garth Hudson as easily as falling off a log.
I'll assume the general public knows who Michelangelo is. Although when I look at the crowd of X-Men enthusiasts lining up in the lobby of the Paramount Theatre, I sometimes have my doubts. However, Garth Hudson may not be quite so familiar to some readers.
For those of you who were not born into the generation that dare not speak its name more than once or twice a sentence, Hudson was a brilliant member of a brilliant band called the Band. He played keyboards -- a big, churchy Lowrey organ, mostly -- but he was just as gifted on piano, accordion and synthesizer. He even picked up a saxophone on occasion, most notably on the Band's version of Tears of Rage. He was also an endless musical innovator. On Up on Cripple Creek he played a clavinet through a wah-wah pedal and got a sound that most people assume is the twang-twang of a jaw-harp. Hudson played with John Hammond Jr., and Ronnie Hawkins and with Bob Dylan before becoming truly famous, not as an exceptionally talented sideman, but as a member of the Band.
But even being truly famous is not what it used to be. As I found out recently in a music store.
"I'm trying to find Moondog Matinee," I told the young shop attendant. I had the impression she had more piercings than years under her belt.
"Who by?"
"The Band."
"What band?"
"The Band."
"Yes sir," she said, thinking that I looked a little young for senile dementia to be settling in quite so severely. "But everything's filed by the band's name."
"It's the Band."
You catch my drift. And if you haven't, there could be an opening for you at HMV.
And if you've lost the counter-intuitive thread that runs through all this, let me remind you. What Pope Julius II had to say about the difficult fellow he would eventually hire to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was running through my mind during Hudson's rambling and eccentric first set at Toronto's Top o' the Senator the other night.
Of course, what the Pope meant by terrible is not at all what we mean by terrible today. The adjective that describes the sequel to The Matrix or the chances that the Ontario Conservatives have of getting re-elected was the furthest thing from his mind. What Pope Julius II meant when he described Michelangelo as terrible was that Michelangelo was fierce, and unpredictable, and uncompromising, and eccentric, and obsessed, and uncontrollable.
Which pretty well captures the general tenor of Hudson's first set the other night. He was not, shall we say, an entertainment machine. The between-song patter was not what you might call honed. One didn't get the impression that he'd spent a whole lot of time in makeup and wardrobe. Possibly, he'd been drinking all day. Possibly, he hasn't touched a drop in years and that's just the way he is. It's hard to know. It wasn't entirely clear that he had a firm grasp on where he was. But then, to be fair, who does?
The thing is, once Hudson started to play, and once he made it to the second set joined by his wife, the singer Maud Hudson, on a song as lovely as Robbie Robertson's It Makes No Difference, none of his terribleness mattered in the least. Everything was in his playing. Sometimes, it sounded like the entire history of American popular song: blues, country, jazz, Tin Pan Alley, rock 'n' roll, gospel was passing through his fingers to the keys of his grand piano.
Pope Julius II knew the score. He was a direct, intuitive kind of guy. And he knew what was what with the talent. He knew there was no reason to expect any connection between being accommodating and being a genius.