Van the Man and the Burning Ground

The Burning Ground: From an esoteric point of view the burning ground would be a purification of the spirit. When a developing entity, be it a person or a nation, reaches a certain level of spiritual development, a time comes for the lower habits. old patterns, illusions etc. to be purified so as to better allow further development.  

	The man stands in the blue-white spotlight, a wireless microphone in his left hand, a microphone stand with base hoisted on his right shoulder. His sunglasses sparkle occasionally and his wide brimmed white Stetson stays firmly on his head. The band is playing a repetitive riff rising now from the steady simmer it has been at to a bubbling boil of musical tension. The man is narrating a poem, not singing, and his voice cuts through the darkness like a sonic laser.

"And you fall and pray, when you hear that sound, as we're walking back to the burial mound..."

	Van Morrison, Van the Man, live in Derry, Northern Ireland, the concert I had traveled across the Atlantic to attend, the reason for my wonderful Irish odyssey.

	It had started as a joke, an undreamed of granting of a Christmas wish. My dearest friend, Joy, had learned of the joke entry on my annual Christmas email to my grown children of "what to get or not get Dad for Christmas". The final item was always a highly desirable but highly unrealistic item. This particular year instead of “World Peace" or a "35 foot sailboat" or "a grand piano", I put "2 tickets to see Van Morrison in the UK and I'd come up with the airfare." My favorite artist seldom toured stateside anymore, and when he did it was usually at larger, less than intimate arenas, and even then tickets were hard to get. 

	Come Christmas Eve, we were exchanging gifts and I found myself opening a new Van CD (one that I didn't already have, hard to find!) and a tour guide to Ireland. Very cute, I thought, and then I found the email printout confirming two tickets to see Van Morrison in Derry, April 28th. Yes, for real. It was the best Christmas surprise of my life.

"And you shake your head and you turn it around..."

	After four months of planning a trip around the Concert, on the seventh day of our quest, we found Van in the ancient walled city of Derry, actually within those walls, in the new Millennium Forum, seating only 1,000 lucky fans. It starts with a shared cab ride from our hotel with a couple from Switzerland who had come to see him, sporting Van Morrison buttons. Once inside the hall, we picked up our complimentary drinks and ran into the two young American girls we had met at a restaurant in Dublin 5 days earlier. We had told them about the concert and they had managed to get 2 tickets and had taken the bus from Dublin. Van had since sold out a second show.

	The cozy hall is opera house style with perfect acoustics, not a bad seat in the place. We were seated in the balcony, next to a couple from town near Belfast. He had seen Van 8 times. My friend Joy had never seen him, in fact until knowing me, had known little about Van Morrison other than she liked his version of "Shenandoah" done with the Chieftains.

	Why Van Morrison? That is best answered with "Why not?" I really didn't need any reason to go to Ireland; I have some heritage, I like my local Irish pub, I love the music and dance, the history and the poets. My cousin had been several times and my oldest daughter went with some of her college class. 

	But why Van has remained important to me after most of my musical icons have faded away, that's easy: he sees me through. No matter what was going on in the music "industry" or my life, I could always turn to a Van album, past or current, for a real spiritual boost. He has continued to make soulful, uncompromising art when so many others had died or sold out, come and gone from rehab, or just become rich and famous, no longer inspirational. I don't ask anyone to be a role model, just do their job the best they can, and that's what Van does. I had no idea what kind of band he had together for this show or even that he had a new CD coming out, but it hardly mattered - I knew Van would be singing the only way he knows how: not holding anything back, from the bottom of his Gypsy soul.    

	"And you see the flames from the burning ground, and you get down on your knees and pray..."

	His show was the opening of a four day jazz and Big Band festival in Derry and he starts with some numbers of his then forthcoming CD, Magic Time. He looks good, like he has lost some weight and feels fit, he is blowing harmonica and sax, playing some guitar, directing his band, admonishing the drummer for not getting as soft as Van wanted (Van very much runs his bands), and of course the unmistakable voice is in fine form.

	He slips in a couple oldies, even waaaay back to the British Invasion days, "Here Comes the Night", it sounds new now, the crowd responds and he even does "Brown-Eyed Girl", something rarely heard live anymore. There is the big band Vegas version of his ballad, "Have I Told You Lately", proving he doesn't take himself near as seriously as some music critics take themselves. Every song is a gem, the phrasing, the dynamics, the solos, and then the "psychodrama" recitation/acting out of "The Burning Ground"    

	"And I take the Jute “- at this point he lifts the mic stand and base over his head - “and I throw the motherfucker down”-he slams it to the floor- "on the Burning Ground, on the Burning Ground."

 	He turns and exits to the rear of the stage as the transfixed audience erupts in applause and the band leader leans into his microphone and proclaims, "Mr. Van Morrison! Van the Man!”

	He returned to do some more songs after a short break, but that was for me the climax of the evening. It's as as though he did some more tunes because it would have been too intense to leave us all with that number.  

	Great musical performances always leave me inspired, glad to be alive, excited to tell others about it, eager to find more about what I can do and what others can create. Occasionally, concerts have profoundly affected my life and,in some sense, acted as a Burning Ground for old habits and ways, leaving me with a fresh viewpoint on life and a revitalized outlook on living. Our entire Irish odyssey was like one wonderful concert, a symphony of friendly people, breathtaking countryside and a sense of ancient connection to the poetry that is Irish history. From the first cab ride from the airport until the Irish whiskey samples in the duty free shop before our departing flight, we felt completely included in Ireland and the Irish culture. There was a feeling  of healing from something you didn't even realize was wrong. Joy and I had learned this much from Van the Man and nine too short days in Ireland: life is grand, definitely worth living, people are wonderful and definitely worth talking, laughing and dancing with and well worth getting to know. Add a healthy dose of a sense of wonder and this is what it means to be on the Celtic Ray.