This video slideshow goes with the blog

It is Thanksgiving 2023 and my heart is full of gratitude. The holiday snuck up on me, as I just returned a week ago from a month in Europe. It had been a full ten years since I had performed in Paris, and eight years since I had seen the friends and colleagues I was able to visit.

My self-appointed cultural diplomacy history began about forty years ago. While working for a Swiss charter airline company, right near Macy’s Herald Square in New York City, I was sent to the headquarters in Zurich to change return tickets for passengers flying in the pre-internet age. That month of European life made its mark, and each time I have returned to Europe since, I have felt more at home than at home.

It was in both 2018 and 2019 that I realized that life in Portugal happily resembled the simple life I led in Italy, when I lived there for five years during the 1980’s, as part of a theatre company.

So our long-awaited return to post-pandemic Europe started with the friends we made in Portugal before life shut down in 2020. An important additional pull was the triumphant transfer of pianist Sheldon Forrest and his mother to residency in Lisbon.

Three of our four nights in Lisbon were spent in music clubs. At our favorite Fado Bar, Duque da Rua, in the Chiado area, we were greeted like long-lost cousins by the owner-bartender and his Fado-singing partner and emcee. We were so happy to introduce the new Lisboetas (Sheldon and mom) to this authentic music environment, that is to Fado singers in Lisbon what Martuni’s is to singers in San Francisco.

We were then introduced to two more music clubs in Lisbon by Sheldon; one happily resembling my favorite Marie’s Crisis in New York, and the other beautifully unlike any other club. At the Tejo Bar, a tiny room in the oldest Alfama section of the city, music is curated and performers venerated. Sheldon and I received an extremely warm reception from the staff and audience when we were given the opportunity to perform a couple of tunes. 

Our remaining time in Portugal included a visit to a Jewish enclave in the mountains closer to Spain and a stay in a medieval castle, as we continued to explore Portugal’s art, language and history. 

We boarded a plane for Rome, where we were hosted in the Air B&B unit of our friend’s house. Sunday brought a delicious lunch served at her table, and a music jam including our mutual friend, the former Italian Ambassador to Chile. (If that’s not cultural diplomacy, I thought, then what is?)

After another day of discovery in Rome, my partner flew back to San Francisco, and I took the train to Venice, for another reunion with the past. 

I lived in Mestre  (right outside of Venice) and gave English lessons for a bit less than a year, before I moved to Verona to work and tour with a theatre company for four years at the end of the 1980’s. 

I was hosted for four nights in the Mestre apartment where I met my late great ex Italian husband. My host, a tour guide specializing in the art and architecture of Venice, and a friend of four decades, had a birthday; we improvised a birthday pizza reunion of friends within hours, one of the great cultural feats of Italians in general, and on Halloween, no less.

The following day, November 1,  included an outdoor mass at a visually beautiful cemetery, a day of remembrance of those who have gone from our daily lives. Followed by a home-cooked meal by my host’s mother, whom I now address by her first name, as opposed to “Signora.” My Italian was really warming up by now, including a conversation with my knowledgeable host about the history of fires at Venice’s historic opera house, Teatro La Fenice.

After the “saudade” experience revisiting my favorite spots in Venice, I treated myself to some chichetti, the local tapas that are the Venetian’s great gift to culinary culture, with a nice Pinot Grigio. And just like that, I’m in an EasyJet to Paris.

A night of solitude was just the ticket by the time I reached my Paris hotel, in the beating heart of Montparnasse, surrounded by brasseries, the best kind of French restaurant in my opinion, because they are always open and open late, with a large affordable menu. I was so happy I almost cried into my Omelette au Jambon. The next day, my French “nephew” drove hours up to Paris to have lunch with me at the famous Art Deco brasserie, La Coupole.

It had been ten years since I last sang in Paris, my voice has lowered, and so much has happened to us all. Another dear friend from Italy came up to Paris to stay with me and lend support. We walked through the Luxembourg Gardens and the Cemetery of Montparnasse, to Nôtre Dame and to St. Germain, to the Pompidou and Les Halles. We also visited the family-run world music club Chez Georges, having a fond reunion with the host, who put my albums in his playlist since we met him in 2008, and who has shared so much with us of his stories and thoughts.

The show was November 7 at the Osmoz Cafe Montparnasse, with Sheldon Forrest at the piano. I met every member of the audience, many of them singers who would perform in the third hour of the evening, an open mic. Brilliant idea to get a simpatico audience in the room and we all had a blast, the expats and locals often joining with me on the chorus of the standards we performed, including in French. Both sets went well and I felt like myself again, walking into the audience with a cordless mic, like I used to see the singers do in black and white movies.

On to Lille, France, with a 1 hour ride on the fast TGV train, to visit my friend and brother, a bassist and composer who grew up in a theatre company, Les Chantiers de L’Inédit. The family-based company has worked for decades with the community to develop original material with a theme of Equality, often using ironic songs and presentational style theatre. I was lucky that my stay included one of their community rehearsal sessions, first with a group of children and youth, then with a group of adults with speech disorders. I was impressed by the dignity and inclusiveness of the warm up and improvisational work led by master teachers, and I was happy – honored – to participate. 

A fun duo session of voice and bass was a special treat, along with the home-cooked meals and deep conversations that brought French back to my brain.

Seeing retrospective footage of Les Chantiers de L’Inédit (literally, the Singers of the Unedited, not yet finished) helped me to understand what it has been like for them to produce both their lives and their company from the same location, the ripple effects being felt all the way to San Francisco.

My final stop on the tour brought me full circle to my first influence, that month in Zurich. My hosts, friends of 40 years, wise and experienced in the world through years in the travel business and life, always the gracious sounding board for my quest. The days of rain brought us closer with stories and updates, remembering the time we almost crashed Tina Turner’s wedding on the Lake of Zurich, visiting the old town haunts, and eating nirvana bratwurst.

My heart is full of thanks.

San Francisco
November 23, 2023