Mercedes Benz

When I was a teenager, one of my favorite class of vehicles had been the SL-class of Mercedes Benz, as several of my classmates from high school had parents who owned them. And while I knew very little about cars, and how to differentiate the relative value of one from another, I always had a sense that there was something special about a Mercedes that made it stand out from the rest. And just like playing within a Jazz ensemble when the musical and technical competencies of each member is firing on all cylinders, I always assumed that to get behind the wheel of a Mercedes would give me that same exhilarating sensation of flying that always attracted me to the best kind of Jazz music.

     As an adult I’m obviously now aware of the full fleet of vehicles that Mercedes makes. And the more I learn about their history, and how they articulate the value of their design processes, the more excited I get, as I see so many uncanny resemblances between it and my beliefs about my own developmental processes behind performance and composition. For one, both Mercedes and Jazz are trailblazers within their respective field, as while the first vehicle created was by Karl Benz, the first form of popular music throughout the world after the turn of the 20th century was Jazz. Also, like Jazz, Mercedes is a luxury brand that remains relatable to people throughout the entire social stratosphere. Also, they both possess a sense of uncompromising integrity that’s related to the excellence of the past, while maintaining a strong interest in pushing the limits for what excellence can look like in the future. However, if I had to sum up Mercedes in the fewest words possible, they would be that they’re the kind of adult that we all aspire to, in that it marries a certain type of well-seasoned maturity with the youthful exuberance of a young professional who’s eager to make their mark in the world. And what more encouragement could we want about our collective future than that.