Metro Concerto

The Wash­ing­ton Metro (Under­ground to those not in the know) is begin­ning to show its age. It’s just a little faded, a little scuffed, a little down at heel. But still roomy, and clean, and not often uncom­fort­ably overcrowded.

But there’s a little musical gem not many folk appre­ci­ate. Out in the NW sub­urbs, right on the edge of the Dis­trict, nearly into Mary­land, there’s a sta­tion called Friend­ship Heights (might be inter­est­ing to know why, one day). Now, as you go down the first escal­ator, there’s the first hints of some­thing unusual — a little rising run of notes, fol­lowed maybe by a deeper tone, or a sop­rano twirl. Once you start down the next escal­ator, a long one, the metro is deep, deep, you catch the full band, bass, tenor, sop­rano sax, whoop­ing and whis­per­ing, circ­ling each other, call­ing and answer­ing. It’s so con­tem­por­ary ! No long-haired blonde cas­ual Scand­inavi­ans could make more up to date sounds.

Metro, stay faded, leave those escal­at­ors alone, leave the oil can on the shelf.