My Pops and Music

It's been three years to the day since my dad died. I miss him a lot and think of him every day. Every time I listen to some good jazz or blues I think of him. He played a good amount of music when I was younger and it's there that I first heard Miles Davis and Thelonius Monk. He would play Coltrane Live at Birdland or Ray Charles Live and at the time I didn't think anything of it. I didn't get those records out and play them when I was young but I think being exposed to that music left an indelible mark on my view of music. It influences all the music I listen to now.
When my dad was younger he would go to all black record stores because the stores by him didn't carry jazz or blues. He saw all the blues and jazz greats at clubs around Chicago.
He would take us to Chicago Fest, Jazz Fest and Blues Fest as well as The Taste of Chicago to see music legends there.
Pops gave me his record collection a couple of years before he died. My wife and I listen to the records from time to time. Our favorite is the Ray Charles Live album, still my favorite live album to this day. I also grew an affinity for Thelonius Monk and his disparate chords from those records. Coltrane, Sam and Dave, Mowtown, Mingus were all introduced to me on those records.
I also burned him my Ray Charles Box Set and let him listen to that on his portable cd player. His records and my cd's, 40 years difference in age and seemingly different, with the common connection of the great music held on them.
He was a great Dad and loved being a Grandpa. So I have put together a play list of some of his favorite songs and that's what I'll listen to as I remember him now.