Lokua Kanza - Shadow Dancer

To me, music is all about emotions. When I close my eyes and listen to "Shadow Dancer" by Lokua Kanza I'm carried away to dancing away a warm summer night under a star-lit sky away from the hassle of the city ~ perhaps on a beach or on the shores of a lake (I love open water so, yeah, an ocean, lake or river has to be there) ... 

Of course that's just me and the emotions evoked in somebody else may be completely different :)

Shadow Dancer
(Ray St John/Lokua Kanza)

Angel of the night
Come into my life
Answer every prayer
And stay

Oum - Taragalte (Soul Of Morocco)

It's been quite a while since we visited Morocco. Nonetheless, the memories are never far as the souvenirs included a beautiful rug which graces the floor of the living room and a brass tea table sitting in front of my favorite perch. We roamed the country for three weeks, from Tangier to Casablanca to Marrakesh, along the Atlantic Ocean, across the Atlas Mountains, and into the Moroccan Sahara. Remarkable towns, inviting villages, breathtaking landscapes and people, friendly and happy to invite us to share stories over a glass or two of their traditional peppermint tea. So many things could have gone wrong (miraculously, we managed to outrun a flash flood by a scant hour, we nearly got our car permanently stuck in the soft sands edging a lake, we managed to almost get lost in the desert at night ~ but those are stories for another day ...) and always, when things got dicey, there were people happy to lend a helping hand.

And then there's the music of Oum and the video which gives glimpses of the beauty of the country and its people ~ enjoy ...  

Van Morrison - Into The Mystic

Imagine: Sailing through the night, out in the bay. The sky is clear, sprinkled with stars, the moon is almost full and reflects in the choppy water. The breeze is just enough to keep our sails filled and propel us southward. In the distance the big container ships cling to the shipping channel - lit up like Christmas trees. They are far enough away so the rumble of their enormous engines does not reach us. Only the boat's radio, tuned in to their communication frequency, lets us hear their voices from time to time. It's the wind murmuring in the sails, the creaking of the boat, the water splashing against the hull ~ nothing matters but staying the course and watching the water to avoid any objects floating along with us which could damage the hull ...  and, of course, enjoying the moment!

When I first heard "Into the Mystic" by Sir Van Morrison it brought back the memory of that sailing trip and in particular that night out on the bay. Such a soothing, peaceful night - such a soothing, peaceful song ~