God I love this CD
If Meryl Streep movies bore you, then please skip this particular drama.
It's bright, it's nearly warm, I could almost love living in this area if the winter weren't so awful, dark, and long.
And if I weren't a student of this sort.
I ran an experiment earlier this evening. After senior wine and cheese I snuck down into the basement with the violin to guage the changes in my playing. Conclusion, I am much better when slightly inebriated, there is only the music and then the music and then there is no separation between the music and I. This happens on occasion anyhow, when I play flute and get carried away, depending on my mood. But this is the long ride back to playing an instrument that I hadn't picked up for exactly a decade since I had to put it to rest. Did I mention this? I can't remember. When very young I played the violin for a few years, and never once did I appreciate or understand what I was doing. I could be good without thinking about it particularly, so I never bothered to get under the skin of the music, hell, it was just technique to me anyway. I cannot remember bothering to practice on a single occasion, indeed I had very little interest in doing so. I loved music, but in a rather dim, undeveloped sense. Music was pure, but not alive. And then we moved, I had to trade the instrument in for one which was taught at my middle school in Florida. And I remember looking toward the flute, which was odd since I despised how nearly everyone played it, their style, their lack of mournfulness, but I wanted to try it nonetheless. I was discouraged strongly from it, told that braces made it too hard to play, and besides, everyone had a zillion flute players who had already started. Why not pick an instrument that was in need of more players? Telling me no is like saying yes to me and then giving me adrenaline shots, and for the first time I thought of music as something that must be chased, sought after. Hah, the competitive years. Those first few weeks seem almost mythical now, I remember trying to learn my first note, I hated how I could read the music, recall the experience of being able to play any tune I wanted on my violin, and now I could play nothing at all. What I heard in my head CERTAINLY did not conform to what came out of my instrument. But that frustration, that crazy obsession with removing the barrier between what I imagined and what I heard, I can't even remember the period between bad and good. As so often happens, I tend to stomp my feet tending to the basis for ages, before suddenly making the leap to where I want to be. The middle is besides the point, I cannot fathom the space between the two extremes in this regard. But the horrendous struggle to catch up, to fit myself into a new box was something I remember with pleasure and frustration. When I think on the first few days bring renewed levels of infuriation I always have to pick up the flute to make things clear, pure again, even living again.
I am getting carried away here, but I'm not stopping yet.
Anyhow, for some time (about a decade) the sound of the solo violin produced a very volatile response in me. Absolutely aware that I had lost the ability to play the intrument, for ten years I came to adore and despise hearing its music. Live performances absolutely killed and delighted me, since I mentally recalled how to play the notes, which string is which, know the music in detail, but could not actually translate any of this rusty knowledge into actual music anymore. And so I might follow up a concert by playing the flute for hours, even playing the piano, to smash down the barrier between performer and listener. I hate, absolutely DESPISE that I cannot play it anymore.
Recently, I acquired a violin. At first I was too horrified by the sounds that arrived when I played, an infuriating experience that I can assure you was one of the most exquisite tortures ever devised. However, in the ever growing list of things which have changed since break, this also appears to be no exception. I am suddenly incapable of doing those things which are truly distractions, and those beautiful things which formerly were postponed to the background seem infinitely more pressing. I can't work at all, I think only of these few things which I normally relegate to my rather non-existant blocks of free time. And so I have been sneaking continually down into the basement to wring out some more screeching on my own. And it has been fantastic. I think my fingertips are going to bleed, if my wrist doesn't first develop permanent muscle paralysis from non-stop playing. And the music is so bad, it shrieks and slides in pitch, but it is going to get somewhere, I will be able to play again, and the music that I hear will be brought into focus correctly this time. In a way, it's almost like I never played the instrument at all, I had no love for it until I gave it up, I never deserved it. So la dee dah, I am enjoying every torpid moment of it, and I promise you that there is no one in the world who is loving every ridiculous second of it as much as I do.
There you go. Why am I sharing this? What the hell, why not?
It's bright, it's nearly warm, I could almost love living in this area if the winter weren't so awful, dark, and long.
And if I weren't a student of this sort.
I ran an experiment earlier this evening. After senior wine and cheese I snuck down into the basement with the violin to guage the changes in my playing. Conclusion, I am much better when slightly inebriated, there is only the music and then the music and then there is no separation between the music and I. This happens on occasion anyhow, when I play flute and get carried away, depending on my mood. But this is the long ride back to playing an instrument that I hadn't picked up for exactly a decade since I had to put it to rest. Did I mention this? I can't remember. When very young I played the violin for a few years, and never once did I appreciate or understand what I was doing. I could be good without thinking about it particularly, so I never bothered to get under the skin of the music, hell, it was just technique to me anyway. I cannot remember bothering to practice on a single occasion, indeed I had very little interest in doing so. I loved music, but in a rather dim, undeveloped sense. Music was pure, but not alive. And then we moved, I had to trade the instrument in for one which was taught at my middle school in Florida. And I remember looking toward the flute, which was odd since I despised how nearly everyone played it, their style, their lack of mournfulness, but I wanted to try it nonetheless. I was discouraged strongly from it, told that braces made it too hard to play, and besides, everyone had a zillion flute players who had already started. Why not pick an instrument that was in need of more players? Telling me no is like saying yes to me and then giving me adrenaline shots, and for the first time I thought of music as something that must be chased, sought after. Hah, the competitive years. Those first few weeks seem almost mythical now, I remember trying to learn my first note, I hated how I could read the music, recall the experience of being able to play any tune I wanted on my violin, and now I could play nothing at all. What I heard in my head CERTAINLY did not conform to what came out of my instrument. But that frustration, that crazy obsession with removing the barrier between what I imagined and what I heard, I can't even remember the period between bad and good. As so often happens, I tend to stomp my feet tending to the basis for ages, before suddenly making the leap to where I want to be. The middle is besides the point, I cannot fathom the space between the two extremes in this regard. But the horrendous struggle to catch up, to fit myself into a new box was something I remember with pleasure and frustration. When I think on the first few days bring renewed levels of infuriation I always have to pick up the flute to make things clear, pure again, even living again.
I am getting carried away here, but I'm not stopping yet.
Anyhow, for some time (about a decade) the sound of the solo violin produced a very volatile response in me. Absolutely aware that I had lost the ability to play the intrument, for ten years I came to adore and despise hearing its music. Live performances absolutely killed and delighted me, since I mentally recalled how to play the notes, which string is which, know the music in detail, but could not actually translate any of this rusty knowledge into actual music anymore. And so I might follow up a concert by playing the flute for hours, even playing the piano, to smash down the barrier between performer and listener. I hate, absolutely DESPISE that I cannot play it anymore.
Recently, I acquired a violin. At first I was too horrified by the sounds that arrived when I played, an infuriating experience that I can assure you was one of the most exquisite tortures ever devised. However, in the ever growing list of things which have changed since break, this also appears to be no exception. I am suddenly incapable of doing those things which are truly distractions, and those beautiful things which formerly were postponed to the background seem infinitely more pressing. I can't work at all, I think only of these few things which I normally relegate to my rather non-existant blocks of free time. And so I have been sneaking continually down into the basement to wring out some more screeching on my own. And it has been fantastic. I think my fingertips are going to bleed, if my wrist doesn't first develop permanent muscle paralysis from non-stop playing. And the music is so bad, it shrieks and slides in pitch, but it is going to get somewhere, I will be able to play again, and the music that I hear will be brought into focus correctly this time. In a way, it's almost like I never played the instrument at all, I had no love for it until I gave it up, I never deserved it. So la dee dah, I am enjoying every torpid moment of it, and I promise you that there is no one in the world who is loving every ridiculous second of it as much as I do.
There you go. Why am I sharing this? What the hell, why not?