After tragedy strikes, a father-son duo finds solace in music.

Pam Marino here, excited for tomorrow night’s opening of the 68th Monterey Jazz Festival at the historic Monterey County Fairgrounds, which has become an annual tradition for me and members of my family.

The Weekly’s cover package out today shares some stories of the people who will be performing at the festival, as well as the festival’s mission of educating the next generation of jazz artists and a full page of performances worth checking out.

One of those performances features Gerald and John Clayton at 4pm Friday, Sept. 26 inside Dizzy’s Den. I’ve long been a fan of Gerald Clayton, who leads the festival’s Next Generation Orchestra, made up of very talented high school musicians, and who is an accomplished pianist and composer. He’s been coming to the festival since he was a talented young musician in high school.

I was less knowledgeable about his father John, a celebrated bass player, arranger and composer. He’s won a Grammy and has nine other nominations. He’s written and recorded with jazz greats as well as performers such as Paul McCartney, Queen Latifah and Yo-Yo Ma. 

Sadly, John, 73, lost the Altadena home that he and his wife shared for 40 years in the Eaton Fire in early January. John was in New York accepting the prestigious Jazz Visionary Award from the Jazz Congress when he learned his home was burned.

I spoke to Gerald this week, who says “everybody is doing good, moving forward as best you can.” His parents found a new house they were able to purchase and move into, but everything was lost, including precious instruments, compositions, awards and other items from his long career.

“From the beginning, as soon as it happened, the outpouring of support from the community was above and beyond what any of us could have expected,” Gerald says. “We’re so grateful for all the love and support from our friends and our community.

“For me, that’s kind of the big perspective thing from all of this. In life, all we really have is the connections that we make and everything else can be burned and turned to dust,” he continues. “To actually lean in on that and feel the true value and how blessed we are and how rich we are in that way, that’s been the big takeaway for me in all this.”

He says playing with his dad is always special, but when going through what he calls “heavy life experiences,” it’s moments of gathering and catharsis that make opportunities like playing together tomorrow night just that more precious.

As to the role of music in helping us through those heavy experiences, Gerald says music is always a force of healing.

“It’s an outlet, a way to try to get at the feelings and thoughts and emotions that words can’t even quite get to the nuance of, so it's very therapeutic and healing,” he says. “I acknowledge the power that music has to change the world and that it can cut straight to the heart of a human and change hearts and minds. It’s a magical, beautiful, powerful thing.”

Whether you appreciate jazz or not, I think we can agree music has the power to heal, if we will take the time to listen. Here’s to a weekend of healing.