32. Jazz Samba by Stan Getz (1962)

Jazz Samba was something of a lifesaver. In fact, if it wasn’t for Jazz Samba I believe I would be in a very different place today.

Why is that?

Well, my mother had become rather worked up after discovering the truth of what I did for a living and had decided to take drastic action. She had consulted the family solicitors with a view to getting me declared mentally unstable. In my family simply choosing not to work in the financial sector was reason enough to suspect you’d gone completely around the twist. Voluntarily performing domestic duties was conclusive proof that the mental faculties were permanently impaired and choosing to mix with people of colour was an indication that the afflicted and become a tangible danger to polite society. So she planned to acquire a legal injunction of some kind in order to have me forcibly returned to the family seat and locked in a padded room while they could determine how my life had blown so dramatically off course.

So how did Jazz Samba help?

Well, it was recorded in a church. They established recording facilities in a very nice Unitarian place of worship and recorded the entire thing in one day. And I ensured the building was left as spotless as possible. All of which meant I could tell my mother that I was working in a church.

Was she very religious?

Well yes and no. She was Church of England so she was only ever religious for 90 minutes on a Sunday morning and even then not to the point where her faith became in any way demonstrative. But the crucial consideration is that the church was long regarded as a perfectly acceptable venue to work through one’s mental instabilities. For generations, children who were incapable of performing any useful function in society entered the priesthood. Employment in a church was seen as a logical step for someone still working through the trauma of the death of a parent, which was obviously not desirable, and the loss of a family-owned financial institution, which was definitely a tragedy.

So she thought you were working in a church?

She did. And I was. It was raining out so I was mopping up muddy footprints in the hallway. I told her it was only temporary which was also true because the session was only due to last a day. I didn’t feel the need to tell her that there was no actual religious observance involved and my lone day working in a church was spent with a mop and a bossa nova rhythm. The important thing is that it kept the lawyers at bay.