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 I thought you might be amused to see this. The musical in mid-rehearsal, from my point of view.
I remember a few years ago I was in rehearsal for a musical and someone looked over my shoulder and caught sight of my script. I have a tendency to mark a script or a score with indicators that mean nothing to anyone else but mark out my course of action quite clearly to me. It was fairly late in the process so my script and score were quite fully marked, in some places you couldn’t really make out what had originally been scripted. Highlights of all colours, circles and arrows and markings of all shapes and sizes. Pretty intense. Boggled the mind of the person who was looking at it casually in that moment. Hadn’t really thought about it until then. Worked beautifully for me, of course. Oddly, very few of the markings told me what to do, they just indicated that attention needed to be paid here. And funny that when we put the script down and were working ‘off-book’, those indicators were firmly stuck in my mind, making it easier to remember when I was supposed to do something, and what that thing might be. I have no idea where I learned to do that, but it’s a method that’s stuck with me over the years. And at it’s heart is that thought–I don’t remind myself what I need to do, only when I need to do it. And when I get there I usually remember what I was supposed to do. Works the same way for me in musical arrangements, too. Don’t know why, but there it is. Funny, eh?
 I’ve been trying to get a picture of this session for a while. These folks have been exceedingly kind to me over the last year or more, particularly in that they let me thump along on the bass most of the night. They’ve encouraged me to even try some things that were just freshly written, so some of the pieces in the musical were first played for these folks. No big deal, but it’s almost always a really good night, some things people can join in, a few quieter things… Nice to feel welcome. Anyway this is as close as I’ve come to a group portrait. Thanks guys.
And finally, this.
“As artists, when we are sold down the river, we must look to see in what ways we are selling ourselves short. Yes, the others have been bastards–that is real and irrefutable and painful. What is often more painful is seeing our participation, usually the spot where we shrank back from trusting ourselves is the very point that turned the tide against us. This does not make other people’s foul play our fault. It does not mean they shouldn’t have acted differently and better–what it does mean is that we will act differently and better in the future. That is the part we can change.”
Julia Cameron
from “Walking in This World”
The Artists Way website
I’ve been struggling to express it for so long, have said it badly, and at other times have been so misunderstood. Once again someone has been here before. And they have left a sign. I think of them as inukshuk.
With thanks.
Way back in the stone ages I asked a lovely new and growing bunch of presenters to please consider whether they felt they could get into their scene well enough that they didn’t have to choose people primarily from who made the best promo submission, gently pointing out that several prominent performers had discovered that if they didn’t send out a promotional package every year they simply didn’t work that year. No guff. Sadly the possible interesting and potentially positive conversation was hijacked by the person who held the mic so it just didn’t take place. (What can I say, I was asked who I was talking about, these had been very private conversations with people we now think of as icons and I just didn’t feel comfortable saying. End of moment.) I’ve been out of that world for so very long, I wonder two things. I wonder what it’s like now. And I wonder if anything would’ve been different.
Spent a bit of time with some older folks tonight, a bunch of us get together and do that fairly regularly. It’s nice to do for all kinds of reasons. It’s great to hear a room full of people singing. Doesn’t matter how good any one voice is, it’s always a beautiful sound. Reminds me that this music is primarily a social music. Sure, there’s space to just sit and listen to something special now and again, and I’m just as capable of pulling out a party piece as the next person. Okay, maybe more. But the experience doesn’t shine as much for the listener when it’s nothing but that the whole time. And the players know that, too. They’ll feel that it’s not really working, even if they don’t know why. No, it’s a music that we all do together. Sadly the business of music has pushed all that aside in favour of valuing something else. Means we’ve lost something. I used to think it was just me. But the old players would talk about how often they’d play, and the place those various sessions had in the community. The music was an integral part of people’s social life, and the players were valued for their contribution. Now that whole experience is lost to most of us. And apparently we don’t even know we had it.
But you will hear me say this gently. We are missing something.
It is a social music.
I learned how to play the harp many years ago. It was a Troubadour model, made by Lyon & Healy. By the time it fell to me it had been through many hands. It wasn’t in the best of shape, the string band was one long curve upwards and there were several significant cracks in the body. But I played it anyway. And I fell in love with the sound–so much space between the notes. It’s still the thing that I find most compelling about the harp.
I’ve owned a harp for most of the time since then. It’s a wire-strung 36-string that has a lovely bell-like tone, very different from the nylon or gut-strung instruments you tend to see. For quite a few years I only played it when I needed something ‘just so’ for a recording. It would sit for ages in between being used. Then a little while ago I picked it up again for personal reasons. When I did I discovered the most amazing thing–I was able to play the melody to any song I’d ever written. I mean without practice or having to ‘figure it out’. That may not seem like a big deal until I point out that I couldn’t have done any such thing before I took that long break.
I’m still not sure exactly how that all worked out. But I’m enjoying the results. When I get a moment I’ll record a little something for you to hear. It is a pretty sound. In the meantime I’m enjoying playing it. And I’m still looking for an explanation about what happened.
 Hey, friend. Thought you might enjoy this shot. As you know, even when my life was at its toughest I usually managed to play tunes with someone, often several times a week. Funny that although things were pretty hard I was playing better than I ever had. Still working through a bunch of stuff (aren’t we all), but with the changes in my circumstances it’s been a challenge to find people to sit down and play with.
I don’t mean someone to rehearse with. And not for amusement neither. Just a couple of people playing a bunch of songs together while each work separately on whatever is useful to them. And hopefully no one gets in anyone’s way. No gigs in mind, just trying to get in a bit of mileage.
Happily I’m busy enough. (I did I tell you I’m workshopping my first musical, right? Yeah, busy enough.) And I somehow find enough time to keep up my chops on my own. But even more happily I get out once in a while and maybe combine a visit with a bit of playing. Today I dropped into a social event downtown, was great to be there to say hi but the sound was so omigosh not good that I was a little uncomfortable. I’m still reasonably unknown in a crowd of musicians in this town, which I kind of like, especially because it means I’m not likely to get drafted when I’m honestly just looking for a night out, so I was fairly sure no one was going to ask me to fix the sound. Although you can never be certain about these things, so I paid my respects and then went round to a friend’s place where two of us stretched out for a bit, and a third took a couple of shots for fun. I thought this one caught the essence of that kind of session for me. I’ve never had one before. Now I do. And I figured you’d like to see it. So, with thanks to a friend, a picture of one of my favourite kinds of sessions. Two hands working it out.
You know I’m not big on self-help books. But quite a few years ago I stumbled on a copy of “The Artist’s Way” by Julia Cameron. It was quite helpful, enough that I am prone to suggesting it to any artist who’s having a bit of trouble sorting things out. It’s a really solid collection of tools and thoughts designed specifically to help someone dealing with artist’s block, although I know it’s been useful to lots of people in many other ways as well. The one small drawback is that the book is written with someone in mind who is just starting to puzzle out the “am I an artist and what exactly does that mean?” question. I sometimes have to suggest to more experienced artists that they read between the lines and pull from it what’s useful to their situation. Fair enough.
I know that there’s quite the body of work the author has assembled since I started doing morning pages years ago (an exercise central to the book’s approach). I’ve seen more than a few of the other books, but nothing seemed quite as perfectly useful as that first one. However, a little while ago I found a copy of another book, and although I’m nowhere near finished yet it seems to be worth having a good look at. It’s called “Walking in This World”, and it’s geared more for someone who has been an artist for a while. I’m sure it’s been around for ages, and this may be old news for some people. But it’s new to me, and I’m finding it has some solid thoughts and more than a few excellent suggestions.
So, I’m not yet convinced that I’ll recommend it as firmly as the original, but it will probably find it’s way onto that very, very small list of help-me books that I really think do help. If you run across it yourself do check it out, I’d like to know what you think.
I’ve been meaning to get to this, I guess today is the day. I know I may well have shared it with you before, but it’s certainly worth mentioning here–if you’re looking to put any music down on paper I strongly suggest you check out Lilypond. Whether you’re looking to sketch out a fiddle tune so somebody else can read it, or you need to set down a melody and chords so the band can rehearse, I’d really like you to have a look at this tool for making great, clean, readable notation.
What I like about it is it’s really, really simple to use. And once you’ve got the notes all in place (which is so much easier than any of the big programs I’ve used), Lilypond makes output as a .pdf file, which makes it easy to send to any musician and they can print it. And if it turns out you need to make a change like moving the key around from G to B-flat it’s a tiny change. I mean tiny to the point of being trivial.
Oh, and if you’ve ever spent time using the other music programs out there you know you always need to tweak things around, move the sharp because it’s obscuring the note, and do it again and again until you’ve finally got something someone can read without having to bring things to a grinding halt to ask for clarification. That just doesn’t happen in the Lilypond universe. It’s readable right from the beginning.
What else? Well, there are all kinds of people using it, and they form a community so you can always find solutions if you’re doing something a little out of the ordinary. And if you are doing something out of the ordinary it can certainly do the job. All of the scores, parts and lead sheets for my musical are being done using Lilypond.
So, I get nothing for saying this, but I think Lilypond should be part of every musician’s toolkit.
No, really.
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I thought you might be amused to see this. The musical in mid-rehearsal, from my point of view.
