‘Beauty shall save the world‘ wrote the great Russian author Dostoevsky. Beauty also is, in essence, the same thing as Truth, Goodness and, of course, Love said another great Russian, the philosopher and priest Father Pavel Florensky (murdered by the Bolsheviks in 1937).

I will spare you all a boring lecture in Russian philosophy, but I do want to share with you a little bit of joy and beauty, in particular for those of you who, unlike me, do celebrate the New Year today.

So rather than post something depressing about all the ugly news in the world, I will post a video: two versions of the truly fantastic composition “Aspan” by my favorite guitarist, John McLaughlin. In these two versions he interprets “Aspan” with French pianist Katia Labeque; these are, I think, his best interpretations of this piece (although the one with fellow guitarists Al DiMeola and Paco de Lucia is also very good).

I will be traveling for the next 10-12 days and while I will check my emails on a daily basis, I will not be posting here until my return. Please stay in touch, dear friends, keep en eye on the RSS newsfeeds on the left side of this page (they are automatically updated), and keep sending me anything of interest.

I leave you with with the joy-filled music of John McLaughlin. Enjoy and many blessings for 2008!

The Saker