Can't you just feel the moon shine?

All right, this will (really) not be a surprise to anyone who knows me well, or even a little. I kind of have a thing for Carole King. Not really a small thing either. Kind of a big thing. I mean, I flew with my best friend to Tokyo earlier this month just to see her perform.

So last week, you can only imagine my state of alt when I saw Carole King perform with James Taylor in a venue the size of a shoebox. As my friend Melani put it – a Gillian-dream-come-true night. And it was.

The joke has always been “I want to be Carole when I grow up” – not that I wanted to be a songwriter or singer (a good thing, considering I can’t carry a note in bucket) – what I wanted to be was as thoroughly immersed in my talent, as astoundingly generous with it, and having as much fun as she always seems to be. And did she, and he, ever have fun back where they’d performed together 30 some odd years before (“evidently,” quipped JT, claiming not to remember much of that time period at all). 

Did you know that James calls Carole “baby grand?” Or that he heard, and remembers hearing despite earlier confessions, Carole sing “You’ve Got a Friend” right there in the Troubadour and asking her if he could put it on his album? “You did a good job with it,” she told him last week with a wink, RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME. 

In my mind, I’m going to Carole King – can’t you just see the sunshine?