Music Man

I'm a musical person. Always have been, always will be. Music was my first love; I was playing piano before I could read anything much beyond my own name, or even write that name properly. I wrote my first piece at five, a little ditty I called "A Trip Down Main Street" after, of all things, one of the common showcases on The Price Is Right.
As with pretty much everything else in my life, I approached the discipline of music with next-to-no discipline of my own. I probably could have been a prodigal pianist if being one hadn't entailed so much gosh-darned work. Practicing anything that wasn't mine own rapidly robbed the melody of any charm it had. Being forced to play music as it was written (the horror!) just peeved me off.
Enrolled in lessons as soon as my mom could afford it, I detested them right from the get-go. By then, the teacher had to try and undo about four years of bad habits. I had no concept of correct fingering: if the note came out, that was good enough for me. Heck, I had trouble even remembering how to hold my hands above the keys. Anyone who's taken piano lessons knows the first thing you do--before you ever get to find middle C--is learn how to hold your hands, like you're cradling an egg. My egg had long since broken.
The only reason I stuck with lessons as long as I did (up to grade six, Western Conservatory) was a concession I forced out of my teacher from very early on. I got five minutes at the end of each session to showcase whatever I was working on myself. More often than not, I'd use that time to noodle around, free-thinking, grabbing snippets of melody and grafting them on to not-quite-random chords. More than a few compositions were birthed this way.
Improvise--it might as well be my middle name. In 1988, I got to supply music for a school production of Charlotte's Web. There were two showings, a morning and an afternoon, and the music that came later bore only the slightest resemblance to what I'd done before. I wasn't above stealing other people's stuff--there was a girl in the audience, no mean composer herself, and I'd had designs on her for, oh, months at that point; she was a little surprised to hear her own latest tune referenced and expanded upon...then melded to one I'd written for her. (Incurable romanticism doesn't mesh well with incurable show-offism.)
Don't ask me how I do it, how I write stuff, or how my pieces fall together out of the sky. I'm convinced just about everybody has some talent they can't explain. How do you do it? You just do. I've written about twenty full songs, and there are dozens of fragments out there, and I haven't written a damn thing since my threnody for the victims of 9/11.
I haven't played much since about then, actually. I can't explain why, other than to say words have largely replaced musical notes as my stress release of choice.
I fire up my keyboard every so often, just to make sure I can still play it. What would get me back to it in short order, what would chain me to it, in fact, is even the slightest clue of what to do with the music I have written or could still write. They don't teach you how to market yourself in school, and I think it's a lesson everyone should learn, because, again, everybody's got something. Joeli paints--how can she be noticed by People Who Matter? Jim writes--can he get tips on how and where to publish? Jen taught herself how to do professional quality cross-stitching--where can she show her stuff?
Do I bother writing out the notation? (Hope not: it takes many hours just to transcribe a three minute song). I've got software that will notate for me, as long as my pieces aren't too complicated (and I fear they are); alas, I don't have the requisite sound card for the computer, or the MIDI interface, or any number of other things, and don't know if I need any of it anyway. Because even with a pile of perfectly polished sheet music in my hands, I wouldn't have the first idea where to send it. Thanks a buttload, education system.

Seems easier to edit up my short stories and send them out into the storm. Which is what I'm intending to do...as soon as I have some free time that doesn't insist on being filled up with all the stuff I fill free time with. Call my undisciplined, lazy, and a procrastinator and I'll call you thrice right.

Meanwhile, there's music to listen to. You know, I used to think I'd like to die before I got bored. As I age, I realize I'll never get bored...there are always more books to read and songs to hear.

My musical tastes have broadened and diverged widely over the years...though not as widely as my wife's: Eva thinks nothing of following up Vivaldi with Metallica. I'll grant you I can appreciate both, but hearing them in quick succession is a bit jarring. I go through phases, and tend to get a bit obsessed when I'm in the middle of one. Right now I'm digging New Country (which I hasten to admit I've never outright hated, but neither have I sought it out). I especially enjoy upbeat stuff, kind of country-rock, or alt-country, or something like that. My favourite song this month is called "Ticks", by Brad Paisley.
It's funny: name an artist I hate and chances are I can find at least one song of theirs I like. Name a genre I can't stand--rap, for instance--and right away I can tell you I really enjoy early Eminem. Just another complexity, I guess.

Right now the bed is beckoning with its own sweet music. See you later, dear readers.