Here's my homework assignment for Music Literature:
| Find a statement on music by a philosopher (or a philosophical statement by a musician about music), and share it with the class. Try to use a reliable source, remember that Wikipedia and other websites often contain mistakes and misattributions. Quote the statement, list who said it, and then respond to it. Do you agree or disagree? Or does it make utterly no sense to you? |
This quote really resonates with me. I have only recently 'owned' being a musician. I had very concrete ideas of what a musician was and since I had no formal training, didn't read music, didn't write music, couldn't play songs on the guitar by ear and didn't 'jam', I concluded I couldn't possibly be one. And yet I loved to sing. Sang in church as a kid in the choir with my grandmother on visits, sang in the hallways of Weis Middle School in Galveston, in the shower and in choir. When I got to high school, the counselors advised me to drop choir so that I could fit in another computer class. And so it went.
I studied science in college. While there, I tried to join the choir and was told I couldn't because I didn't read music. On Friday nights, I'd gather with friends from the environmental group I was in. We'd cook a vegetarian meal and then sing songs while some played the guitar. I ran out of money, dropped out of school, went home, got a job and bought a guitar on layaway. I also bought some songbooks (Indigo Girls, Eagles, John Denver, Traci Chapman, the Police and the Beatles). When the guitar was paid off, it was sent to me in Yellowstone National Park where I was working for the summer. I sat by the Firehole River and learned to play some songs on the guitar so I could back myself up singing. After that and other adventures (long story), I went back to school. One of the highlights was working at a restaurant and bar across from campus and singing kareoke on thursday nights when it was dead. That was also where I met my ex-husband to be. I finally graduated on the 7 1/2 year plan (Gig 'em Aggies! Whoop!).
I got married, became a science and math teacher and my guitar began to gather dust. Long story short, I burnt out of teaching, my marriage fell apart and I ended up in the desert keeping myself busier than busy so I wouldn't feel a thing. When that stopped working, I sat in the silence, started to feel and dusted off my guitar. I wrote my first song - I had to - and started to perform. I always thought I'd go back to grad school and study science, do research, and teach. Interestingly, instead, after some very windy roads, I find myself here (at College of the Mainland in the petrochemical mecca of Texas City) studying music without really a clue as to where I'm headed. I've just noticed that when I am writing a new song, time stops, all doubts drop away and I know I am exactly where I am supposed to be doing what I am supposed to be doing. No regrets.
(The concluding thoughts might be best expressed in a song - see my newest one, Here and Now, above.)
