15-12-2003

Jessica Bailiff

"Five digressions"

Last year, we first heard (very much behindhand) Jessica Bailiff as she played Paris with Rivulets and Drekka.
It was quite a pleasure to discover this young lady blending her ethereal voice with layers of guitar.

These are the five words that Jessica Bailiff picked:
La neige
Chocolat
Travel
Silence
Green


La neige
I do love the snow, but to say it in French is so much more beautiful. Two favorite things in winter: when the street lights shine on very, very frozen snow to create a light, silvery sparkle; also - big flakes falling on a sunny, winter day.


Chocolat
Needs no explanation or exaltation...


Travel
This is what I live for: to see new places, meet people, & breathe different air. It doesn't matter where I go - somewhere by the ocean, a metropolis, a small village in the middle of nowhere. Sometimes I think I was a pilot in a past life because I have no fear or dislike of flying; I actually like it. I become very restless if I haven't left the city where I live in a while. If I was told I could never leave home again, I'd wither and die.


Silence
When the television is turned off, when there's no music playing, when there is no one else at home - I can just let my mind run wild (which is sometimes not a good thing!). But also, I can hear the world outside - the neighbors with their children, the distant traffic, the bells from the cathedral across the street. Silence at night, where I live, can be a bit curious - including the occasional "pop" of gunfire.


Green
This is a great word - it can describe so many things. I grew up in green: my eyes, my bedroom walls, one of
the team colors (with yellow) for both the elementary and high school I attended...and now, the car I drive is green, the carpeting in my apartment is green (neither by choice, but by accident), and I'm on a never-ending, very reluctant chase for "the green" (American dollar - money isn't everything!).  Green
means the spring, new things, innocence, youth. Sparkly-green is the color of my electric 12-string Vox Phantom/Fender Shenandoah guitar. Green is what Joni Mitchell calls the child she had to give up for adoption in one of my favorite songs on her album, "Blue."