There are moments in life that remind us what perseverance really means.

One of those moments came not long ago at a New York Islanders hockey game. The crowd was buzzing. Cameras rolling. Then, from the tunnel, came 104-year-old World War II veteran Dominick Critelli.

He lifted his soprano saxophone and began to play the national anthem.

Critelli shows us how perseverance works.

I love jazz in the holidays because it soothes suffering while lighting a path to joy.

And yet, the music was born out of sorrow in slavery.

Listening to jazz with slavery in mind recalls the pain of our African American sisters and brothers.

“The foundation of the United States rests on the sweat of my people.” Duke Ellington

But, good jazz makes its way to deliverance.

Five claps take us there.