Rhumba Man

by Jesse Winchester

from the album Buffet Hotel

Jimmy’s Note:

I do believe there is order in the universe. All you have to do is occasionally put your eye to the lens of a telescope and peer out into the night sky. My first feeling, when I look out the window past our world, is wonder at how it all works. The second is humility. I can’t help but feel how absurdly our self-importance is blown out of proportion on this planet. The third thing I think about is that gin clear line from Charles Lindbergh about who we are and where we come from, that I have quoted before and will again: “We are of the stars”.

Well, since we are all stars made from the same molecules in some form or another, one of the great things about being a star is that other heavenly bodies seem to like to orbit around them. There are moons and meteors, but comets are my favorite. They are the rock stars of the universe residing outside the orbit of Neptune in the Kuiper Belt until they decide to put on their flashy shows.

In my little corner of the universe, I am blessed with many wonderful comets which pass through my orbit. When it comes to songs and songwriters, it seems the region from which my melodic meteors arrive is just across the border in Canada, where when album creation time comes due, the words and melodies of Jesse Winchester and Bruce Cockburn come flashing my way.

Rhumba Man, like several other “song comets” from Jesse Winchester orbited around me for a long time, since I first heard it on his “Nothing But A Breeze” album. If a song can make you dance and have you singing the chorus half way through the first time you hear it, then you have a pretty damn good song and that is what Rhumba Man does for me and I hope will do for you.