I can't really hear music; at least not in any kind of meaningful way. I have heard music explained on the radio, on TV, and in person. Someone will say, it used to be played like this. They will play it. Then say, and then this is how it changed and play it again. And to me, it always sounded the same. The point trying to be made is always lost on me.

I understood that they were trying to relate something significant, but I just couldn't hear it. This inability to distinguish, I assume, goes a long way to explain why I can't play an instrument or sing. A total lack of rhythm doesn't help either.

There is a lot of music that I like. And a lot of the performers I like are generally regarded as great artists, as masters, as geniuses. It's just that when people try to explain what makes their singing or playing so exceptional, it is totally lost on me.

I have come to believe that I don't hear music as much as I feel it. That is to say, the music does something to me. And this may well be the way it is with everyone, I don't know. I do know that I have no idea of why or how it does what it does. I do know that there are reasons and others do know what they are.

Maybe there is something to be said for not knowing how the magician does what he does. Maybe understanding the trick takes the magic away. Maybe if I understood how the music works, it might lose some of its magic. Indeed, why care how the magic is done? Why not be just be amazed and enjoy? Why care how the music works? Enjoy the music. This seems a good philosophy, especially given my stated inability to understand it anyway.

There are three singers I have rated among my favorites. What sets these singers apart from all others is that I can't listen to them often. I can't listen to them without a reason. And certain songs I can't listen to without both good reason and preparation. These singers tend to reach out, grab me by the heart and beat on my very soul. They can make shiver and shake and often reduce me to tears.

They are, in no significant order, Billie Holiday, Judy Garland, and Jimmy Scott. I do not know how I came to know of any of them. I do know that I knew of them in some way when I was young, but it wasn't until I lived a while that they were more fully appreciated.

I saw a Bravo TV special on Jimmy Scott and was somehow reassured to see Joel Dorn mention these three being able to take people to the same scary place they had taken me. Or Ray Charles talking about Jimmy Scott making one cry.

That special mentioned two Jimmy Scott albums that most people never got to hear Falling in Love is Wonderful and The Source. They were pulled from the market shortly after release because of contract disputes.

Dorn somehow got The Source re-released. So I bought it, I wanted to hear it. I thought it was good, very good indeed. Perhaps partly because of that special, Jimmy is finally getting some belated following. I am happy for him. I thought he was dead.

That special made me want to hear the album Falling in Love was Wonderful. Jimmy thought it was the best work he ever did. It was on Ray Charles' label and Ray worked on it. I wanted to hear it. I am not a collector, I just wanted to hear it.

I found it hard to believe that in this day and age there would be something one was forbidden from hearing. But such is the case. It has not been re-released. I have since found two movies I would like to see again that I can't. The Snow Goose and From Time to Timbuktu. But that's for another time.

Research had showed Falling in Love is Wonderful to be one of most sought after albums. According to the information I was able to get, it often went for $300.00. A lot of money just to hear the music from an album made in 1963. A lot of money for someone with no money and who couldn't appreciate the music as music.

But what the hell, off I went to E-bay, I bailed out at $400.00. The final price, as well as I can recall, was $612.76. Communication with the seller has suggested the possibility that the record could be at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

If you should ever visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the album Falling in Love is Wonderful is on display somewhere, please wave at it for me. Please tell it that though I never heard or saw it, I miss it greatly and am sincerely happy it has a good home. And if there is a button you can push to listen, please do so. You have been afforded an opportunity to hear something that most have been denied. It is a choice very few have had. It is a choice, I tried to buy and wish I had.

And if you don't know who Jimmy Scott is, that fact in itself, is possibly worthy of Falling in Love is Wonderful being on display, if it isn't.

Anyway, if you should ever visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame . . . .