Zaza Burchuladze

My Song. A romance.

Narrative non-fiction. Bakur Sulakauri Publishing. Tbilisi 2023. 206 pages

«My Song» is a “romance”, an ode to the sacred relationship between an artist and a listener. And to Music itself — the sole form of art that gives meaning to our Life, and more importantly, to our Death as Burchuladze puts it.

He explores his personal relationship with Keith Jarrett’s music. This text speaks of the power of music, that could forever change the perspective of a 10-year-old boy growing up behind the Iron Curtain of the Soviet Union. Overhearing Keith Jarrett’s piece on his father’s record player would become his gateway to creativity, defining his perception of this world, and his longing for cognition.

Burchuladze does not invent anything in this book, but he does not write a biography of Keith Jarret either. He explores the recordings – well known and the unknown nes – track by track, to the exact date and sometimes to the minute, and links them to his personal listening time. So he lets the music take him back to historical moments and down into his own life:

Giving away his only Keith Jarret pirated copy to someone he loves as a token and the girl dissappears with it forever. Being kidnapped by a Chechen drug smuggler at the customs station who does no harm and instead leaves a walkman with the Cologne Concert behind. A police checkpoint wants to be bribed, hears My Song from Burchuladze‘s car audio player and gives free travel.

The book is filled with the sound of music. The act of reading is like listening “novelized music” switching on the famous soundtracks in our own memory. This book is the search for peace and a piece of homeland that can never be taken away from you.