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Music
2009.07.24
"Days when smoking ban was a dream"
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"Days when smoking ban was a dream"
I had always dreamed to be a musician, like most young people seem to do in this day and age; I always thought that this wish I had, to perform on stage and be watched and clapped at by people was really, because I wanted to be recognized for who I was, and who I was had value. Therefore, an appreciation coming from an audience, a group of people, would provide me with what I was always missing, the feeling of belonging within a community. The knowing my own impact and "importance" as part of a group, which is so absent today in this (my) world.
My mother had always pushed me to do music as a child, and had unfortunately made me believe I was a genius, which is even more damaging as everybody else kept telling me I was worthless; which I realised lately, built me into this very insecure, though somewhere, highly arrogant (because I think I had a "gift") person. Those 2 things don't quite go together! They lead to plain sabotage...
The thing is, yes I did create small piano pieces when I was a child, I used to walk back home from school and hear birds singing in the countryside, I would arrive home and play something I had hummed all the way along, and my mother would say "This just sounds like such and such bird! You are so talented!"
Eek, I would think, I didn't think I was a musical genius at all after I watched a music program on Mozart who was a proper musician and a real genius.
Then, I gave up playing the piano when they were trying to push me to learn difficult and horrible pieces like this ridiculous "Dried embrios" by this picasso of music called Debussy; (apologizes to the ones who like Debussy, I just don't) and learning classical pieces, I thought, was getting rather tedious, I much prefered doing my own music! But other than one teacher who soon left, other teachers weren't interested in what I was producing.
So, I started to believe that my mother was lying to me when she was saying I was "so talented" and she was just saying it to please me...
Though, the dream kept on inside me and England was the right place to make it come true; but joining this band as a keyboard player didn't prove easy. I had no notions of song-writing, didn't understand a thing nor how all those drums and basse and guitar thinggies were all meant to be together, plus, I was into classical music, not rock and really disliked the early song making of artists which I considered "twee" (I won't give any names as many of you are great fans of those bands). I don't know what the hell I was doing in a band! I couldn't play classically(which I didn't believe I could do anyway) in a "middle of the road rock song" . The singer kept telling me I should play hammond, which sound I disliked because it wasn't a proper piano nor strings sounds, and didn't know how to play hammond anyway so he got impatient with me and got a proper hammond player to record on their albums... (And the producer also recorded my bits using MY keyboard which I was extremely upset about, even though I lacked confidence and thought I was a bit shit, they could have left me to do it myself!!!)
It was difficult to be in a rock band, both the drummer and bass player smoked the rehearsal rooms out everytime, which made me think I was at least going to die of lung cancer in the next few months for passive smoking. They were very "English band like" and I was all foreign and awkward with my classical background of farming girl; who didn't drink alcohol and who was very shy.
The manager once hinted that the next "Elvis Presley" would be a woman, and he had many conversations with me about people who have been, and the ones who "Could have been" and did I want to be one of those?
I don't know what he was on about, I always dreamed of being a pop star, like anyone does, though I didn't think I had the capacities for it. This whole period was very frustrating, but mostly because I couldn't manage to feel confident and valued, or myself... I ended up leaving that band, joined another that I then left again (bands are like boyfriends, they don't last with me) and ended up doing some homemade music on my own, which was quite funny as it was a real mess. But I like mess, it is fun.
Never mind the music, what is important in life, really, is that the inner expression comes out.
It can come out in many, many ways.
I wish I was not born an attention seeker. I know we all are attention seekers as we are alive, but to be one who feels he must repress it is not very joyful. I took my revenge on the internet. It is such a great place to express anything.
Never mind what happens to me in this life, whether I have just lived and died without any major achievement.
I will carry on to seek for myself and my own strengh.
Extract from E.
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PS: most of that has been writen about in this blog before, sorry if it soudns like "deja entendu"
According the dictionary proper is:
1 [ attrib. ] truly what something is said or regarded to be :she's never had a proper job | a proper meal.
What does anyone know what the PROPER way to play a piano is. We allow ourselves to be so repressed by convention, right and wrong, good and bad, should and shouldn't, properly and incorrect. Did the likes of Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed etc do things by the book, did they fit in with what was expected of them. Oh no, that they didn't. The trail blazers of the world, great leaders and people like Jesus and even Mozart do not care what people think of them, they transcend what's proper and normal and shine above everyone, carving new pathways through our world and new neural pathways through our brains, inspiring millions but also scaring many others because it shows up their own inadequacies and restrictive limiting beliefs.
I spent years trying to play the piano trying all the teach yourself piano books but they were so boring. I would spend hours every day making terrible noises on this beautiful instrument and eventually give up. I would start learning again every year and give up after a few months. A couple of years ago I decided and realised that I could already play the piano. I just started playing what ever came to me. I make up lots of little rhythms and sounds which are music to my ears. Its not proper piano playing but i love it and play every day with immense satisfaction. It might sound awful to others but Its perfect to me and i will never try learning to play properly again because proper is other peoples proper and not mine.
