Note by Note

2-27-09

Music is meditating; music is healing; music is magic.  I’ve played several instruments among the years- flute, viola, tuba, and guitar.  I’ve even played around with clarinets, trumpets, harmonicas, even recorders.  It doesn’t matter what I make music with, as long as I’m making music.  Of course, my singing doesn’t count because I sound like a dying moose as many of my friends would be glad to tell you.

I use music to communicate.  Anytime I’m having a bad day I’ll go and pick up one of my guitars and let the notes express the thoughts in my head and the feelings in my heart.  With each note I travel into a trance where it seems as if the whole outside world has disappeared and there’s only me, my guitar, and the music.  After I’m done playing, I sort of feel disconnected form the universe, but more in tune with myself.  I even go into the trance when I’m swinging a sousaphone around to the cheers of "Hey!  Go Sioux!" at the hockey games.

One thing I like is that music is universal.  All countries, all races, all cultures have some form of music in their lives.  There’s so many different genres of music.  A common ice breaking question at parties is "What kind of music do you listen to?"  How many people would answer "I don’t listen to anything."  Not very many that’s for sure.

My favorite feeling in the world is when I play a song perfectly- or rather without error- for the first time.  I don’t think there is such thing as perfection in music, even if the musician is flawless.  It’s hard to explain.  Anyway, putting in so much work into a new piece, once it’s mastered and my fingers know what to do, my lips know how to tighten, and my heart knows the rhythm, it’s magic.  Especially if the song’s memorized.

I can’t imagine a world without music, without me making music, sharing music.  I’d explode probably from an overwhelming feeling of stress.  I’d have no release and no world of my own.  I’d be empty.  There’d be no songs, no angry artists who seem to share my pain, and no musicals.  Think how boring movies would be without the dramatic music placed just at the right part in the plot.  All in all, the world be just a little bit sadder.