Allusions

One thing I’ve always loved doing live is tagging other songs during my piano instrumentals. For instance – a couple years ago, I went to a Luther College Nordic Choir concert, and their final piece really hit me hard. So for the next few performances, I tagged it at the end of Speak. No one really noticed, but every now and then a couple people would, and that made it worthwhile.

That being said, I encountered this in mainstream music recently, and I wanted to share it with you. I’ve been listening to Coldplay’s new record, “Mylo Xyloto,” on which they have an incredible track called Charlie Brown. There are a handful of YouTube videos of them performing it live, and at the end of each performance, Chris Martin ditches his acoustic guitar and sits down at the piano to play what seems like a simple outro. But I knew I recognized it from somewhere… then it hit me, he’s tagging the main theme from the song Christmas Time Is Here, which is fittingly off of the Vince Guaraldi Trio’s beloved “A Charlie Brown Christmas” album – in my opinion, the best Christmas jazz record of all time. You’ll probably recognize the pattern:

Now watch Coldplay perform Charlie Brown, paying particular attention to 4:13, when he starts tagging the Vince Guaraldi Trio. He voices the chords differently to make it fit, and I hope you appreciate the allusion as much as I do.