Backstage in Eternity
Jazz in the Afterlife with Bird, Trane and Michael Brecker
Note: This an excerpt from my new book, John Coltrane’s Spiritual Journey Through Jazz, A Multimedia Biography, available September 23rd on the 99th anniversary of Trane’s birth on Amazon Kindle and Print on Demand, in Spanish and English, and Audible as a audiobook.
SCENE
Lights rise on a surreal garden of humming color and vibration. MICHAEL BRECKER sits center stage, alone, horn across his lap. He breathes deeply. The silence hums like the tail of a last note. His body is still, but his soul is wide awake.
JOHN COLTRANE sits beside him—serene, barefoot, robed. A calm presence. He watches, listens.
From stage right, Charlie Parker, BIRD appears—grinning, humming, suit sharp, fedora tilted. He flicks a cosmic cigarette to life. The smoke curls into the shape of an eighth note and dissolves.
BIRD
Damn. I step out for a few decades and come back to all this enlightenment. Trane, you’re still talking in galaxies and metaphors?
COLTRANE
Only when silence won’t carry the message.
BIRD
(to BRECKER)
And who are you? You look like you just woke up from a long solo.
BRECKER
(still grounding himself)
Michael Brecker. I was…I guess. I was chasing you. Both of you.
BIRD
(chuckles)
Brother, we were running in circles.
BRECKER
I spent my whole life wondering if I was good enough. If I had any right to even breathe in your direction.
COLTRANE
You were breathing through the same horn. Same truth. Same ache.
BIRD
Look, Mike—music ain’t a contest. It’s a language for what can’t be said. When we play, we ain’t comparing notes. We’re building bridges.
COLTRANE
Bridges made of breath and prayer. Every note’s a fingerprint of the soul.
BRECKER
Then why did I feel so far away? Like I was just fast fingers and technique. Like the sound was just outside my reach.
BIRD
Because you were listening with your ears. You gotta hear with your scars.
COLTRANE
The horn is a mirror. It doesn’t lie. You think you’re just making music,
but really, you’re revealing yourself.
BRECKER
I wanted what you had. The spirit. The depth. A Love Supreme—it cracked me open.
COLTRANE
It cracked me open too. I didn’t write it to show people the truth. I wrote it so I could survive mine.
BIRD
Man, don’t let the records fool you. None of us were prophets. We were sinners who found a new way to confess.
BRECKER
So the music… it was the temple?
COLTRANE
No. You were the temple. The music just lit the candles.
BIRD
That’s why when you really blow, you feel like you’re levitating. Because you are.
BRECKER
I think I started understanding that… right before I died. When I made Pilgrimage, I wasn’t just recording an album. I was trying to become sound. Disappear into it.
COLTRANE
And you did.
BIRD
You crossed over in the melody, man. That’s the cleanest way to go.
BRECKER
But the fear never left. Even in the last sessions, it was there. What if it wasn’t enough? What if I never truly meant it?
COLTRANE
Fear is part of the melody. It gives the rest something to rise above.
BIRD
Besides, no note you ever played was wasted. Not one.
COLTRANE
You brought people to the altar. Even when you didn’t think you were holy enough.
BRECKER
I never felt holy.
BIRD
Holiness ain’t a feeling. It’s what shows up when you stop trying to prove anything.
COLTRANE
Mike, you made machines sing. You bent electricity into soul.
BRECKER
I used to worry the EWI wasn’t spiritual enough.
BIRD
Nothing’s spiritual until you feel it. Then it all is.
COLTRANE
You made air, and wires, and fear sound like truth. That’s jazz.
(The air changes—flute multiphonics drift in: DOLPHY. A low laugh—MILES. MINGUS thunders. SUN RA mutters through reverb offstage.)
COLTRANE
McCoy’s got something in 17/8. Wants to stretch the time until it bends into no-time.
BIRD
I told that man to stick to 5/4, but he never listens. I’m in. You in, Mike?
BRECKER
(standing, horn in hand)
I think I finally am.
COLTRANE
You still afraid?
BRECKER
Yeah. But I think I get it now. Fear’s just a grace note.
BIRD
Damn right.
COLTRANE
Come on, brother. Let’s blow one for eternity.
They walk off together. Music swells—not in volume, but in meaning. The garden breathes. A shimmer. A pulse. A note held just past its breaking point.
BLACKOUT
[CURTAIN]
❤️
This is very, very good.