TONY BENNETT & THE GOLDEN HOUR

I feel I'm experienced enough as a music lover to have observed the atmospheric conditions in which one should enjoy certain albums and specific compositions. So if you'll permit me.

Frank Sinatra's 'In The Wee Small Hours' should always be played at the end of September headed into early October as the light transitions from summer to winter and enjoyed as the title describes 'In The Wee Small Hours', preferably with a tumbler glass filled with whiskey.

'Charlie Parker with Strings' should always be put on in late February/early March, just on the cusp of Spring and Ry Cooder's 'Chavez Ravine' at the height of summer with just the right amount of sweat induced by the heat so you feel an affinity with the uprooted Mexican Americans of that valley in Los Angeles.

It is my belief that if you are able to identify the perfect time of day with the appropriate season for listening to a great piece of music or classic album then it enhances the experience tenfold as if listening to it in 3D but without the silly glasses.

Recently, I've returned to some of Tony Bennett's back catalogue, specifically 'Songs For The Jet Set', 'The Movie Song Album', 'I Left My Heart In San Francisco' and 'Here's To The Ladies'. It has got me thinking that there's a sweet spot for listening to this particular music around 3:30 to 5:30 in the winter afternoons as the light fades and the smoke from wood fire chimneys drifts across the frosty skies over my leafless valley. It would work just as well in a Manhattan apartment at the exact same time too. There's a kind of Zen-like contemplative level of equanimity to Tony Bennett that feels as useful to me as any transcendental meditation, to be perfectly honest.

I remember when first getting serious about Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and Ella Fitzgerald and how so often my youthful devouring of their classic records coincided with the colder months of autumn and winter. Ella's Rodgers and Hart songbook series on Verve were made for early autumn and so many of Sinatra's torch song albums such as 'Where Are You', Only The Lonely' and 'Point Of No Return' on Capitol felt as if they were made for the deep despair of winter without the one you love.

I could be accused of over fetishising my listening experiences here but I don't really care. I'm interested in achieving the maxmimum effect of these albums so they are perfectly co-ordinated with my mind and surrounding environment(s).

Classical music hasn't even got a look in today but it goes without saying that Mozart operas tend to work at the height of summer ('Le Nozze Di Figaro' and 'Cosi Fan Tutte' especially), Wagner's 'Die Meistersinger' is spring into mid-summer and 'La Boheme' (as I mentioned the other day) perfect for late autumn through winter months.

But right now, here in this moment, I'm sticking with Tony B and finding a certain bliss in the satsifying realisation that I know exactly when and where to listen to this stuff in order to achieve ultimate satori.