Depending on the Night Before

By Rafi Mercer

What does a Sunday morning sound like? Well, that depends on the night before.

Some Sundays arrive quietly, like silk curtains moving in a faint breeze. The kettle whispers, the needle lowers onto something slow, maybe Bill Evans, maybe Terry Callier. The air is tender. You let the record play without agenda. This is the Sunday that forgives the week, that asks nothing more of you than to sit, sip, and listen.

Other Sundays come heavy. A long night, a late whisky, a record that spun until the label blurred. Those mornings arrive with thuds — footsteps, doors, the shuffle of newspapers outside. The head carries its own reverb, and sound feels thick, weighty. This is when you need Nina Simone or Donny Hathaway, voices strong enough to hold you together until coffee clears the fog.

And then there are the in-between Sundays, the ones that hover between stillness and pulse. The city hums softly in the distance, the rain adds its rhythm on glass, and your mind drifts back to whatever you heard last night. Maybe a jazz quartet in a small room, maybe a DJ’s set where repetition blurred into trance. The body remembers even as the room is quiet. The echo becomes part of the morning’s soundtrack.

For me, Sunday mornings often return me to listening itself. A reminder that music is not only for movement but for reflection. That the way a piano note decays, or the way a bassline carries into silence, can shape the day more than any plan. It’s not about volume but presence. The Sunday morning record is rarely the loudest one you own, but it might be the truest.

Perhaps that’s why listening bars feel like Sunday, no matter what day it is. They hold that same duality: the possibility of intensity, but also the gift of calm. You walk in on a Friday night and hear a Coltrane side that makes you lean forward as though the world depends on it. You walk in on a Sunday afternoon and hear a Brazilian pressing that makes you exhale. The listening bar doesn’t dictate how you feel. It reflects it back, lets the night before decide the morning after.

So what does a Sunday morning sound like? Sometimes it’s quiet rain. Sometimes it’s the hangover hum. Sometimes it’s the voice of Nina telling you the world is hard but you’ll find your way. Sometimes it’s Donny lifting you with warmth you didn’t know you needed. It is always a mirror, tuned by memory, shaped by choice.

Today, for me, it’s a gentle record — Miles Davis’s In a Silent Way. It feels like light across a floor, like time itself has agreed to slow. By the end of the side, the morning will have become the day, and the rhythm of the week will start again. But for now, the sound of Sunday is enough.

Rafi Mercer writes about the spaces where music matters. For more stories from Tracks & Tales, subscribe here, or click here to read more.