Looking at the Wind: A Music Video for a Friend

My favorite sculpture in all of West Virginia sits outside the Huntington Museum of Art up in the hills of Huntington, W.Va. The slightest breath of wind sends this exquisitely balanced sculpture by George Rickey  moving in all manner of directions, reversing itself, twisting and torquing in surprising ways. My writing professor at Miami University, Milton White, once wrote a novel whose first line was, if I recall correctly: “Look, Ma, the wind!” Rickey’s sculpture titled, ”Four Lines Oblique – Gyratory Square 1,” is a way of looking at the wind.

One recent Sunday afternoon, I was hiking the Huntington Museum trails and ended up in front of Dickey’s gyratory square, pointing my iPhone 4 up at it. A few weeks before that, I’d used the same phone to record an impromptu piano riff while playing the electric piano at The Room Upstairs in Princeton, W.Va. I join these gifts of the iPhone in an homage to a friend who departed recently, most unexpectedly. It’s titled “Song for the Wind” by The Silent Gondoliers.

Jerry Chambers (1955-2011) was a Cincinnati-based craftsman, artist and musician active in the early punk rock and new wave scene in Cincinnati, which was when I first met him. He was involved in such bands as the Voodoo Kings, West Davis Force, Digbees, Tramps Next Door, the Nervous Pioneers, Dennis the Menace, Kursk and Madras Lounge.

As his obituary noted: “Jerry’s master artistry was exemplified not only in his music, but also through the medium of Fresco, trompe l’oeil design, cartooning, cooking, and painting. His unique vision allowed him to travel nationally and internationally. Jerry was most proud of his journey to the US Embassy in Portugal, where he was selected to refurbish old world pieces of history. ”

Didn’t think I’d not get to talk to him again. So this is for him.

(Screen capture images below from video ~ click to enlarge.)