Thursday, October 18, 2012

Self editing...

I'm kind of afraid of becoming a one trick pony here.  You see there are really only a couple things on my mind.  One of them I can't/won't talk about.  The other...well...I already have.  At length.

I am in serious need of distraction.

When I was younger, I would play the piano.  My parents had one, and I used to spend hours banging on the keys.  Don't get me wrong.  I don't make any claim to actually being good.

I had lessons when I was a kid.  Learned how to read music.  Which I can still do, if I take my time with it, but I didn't take to reading music like I took to reading words.  I had to work at it.  I'm quite lazy.  Plus I learned that I have a pretty good ear for it all, and that in all honesty just made it worse.  I could hear a song, and pick out a fair facsimile...so actually reading the music, and learning it right just seemed like way too much work.  So I became mediocre.

It proved a phenomenal distraction however.  I would just sit for the longest time.  Making music.  Learning songs I liked.  Singing along when I knew the words.

Mostly I liked creating new melodies though.  I really liked the process of it.  Then I'd come up with some dopey mix of words, call them lyrics, and have myself a new little song.  My god I loved it all.  I'm not claiming any of it was ever any good.  I'm just stating that I really liked it.  It was a great way for me to work out whatever was in my little skull nugget at the time.

I don't really sing either.  Oh I can carry a tune.  I can mostly hit the right notes.  I just don't care much for the sound of my own voice.  And my range is absolute shit.  I'm somwhere in the low tenor range...but can't really sing all that low...and can't really sing all that high...but those 6 notes in the middle...I can nail em every time.

I haven't honestly sat down at a piano in over a decade.

I really
really
really

need to do that again.

I have absolutely zero access.  I've contemplated breaking into any one of the millions of mormon churches here in my area.

They'd probably get mad at me though.

By the way.  I don't hate musicals.  I know a lot of people who know me think this is the case.  It isn't.  I actually really enjoy them.  In fact I will probably be taking in Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson this weekend...or next, and I'm really quite excited about it.

I just only enjoy them once.  That's it.  It really is...all I need.  I can read a book, or watch a movie over and over again, its true, but for me...and maybe...hell even probably...ONLY me...musicals only impact me one time.  Whenever, in my entire life, I've seen a musical a second...or third...or 85th time...it's lost its impact.  I don't feel the same way as I did when it was fresh.

I just saw the season announcement for Centerpoint Legacy Theatre, and it is the safest, most boring, most unoriginal, season I've ever seen announced.  There isn't a single risk on there.  There isn't a single new thing.  There is absolutely NOTHING to be excited about...and therefore, I have concluded that it is a theatre that I will NEVER give a single dollar to.  They will generate exactly 0 revenue from me.

I know that we as artists are supposed to support the arts.  I know we have some sort of obligation to...yeah...fuck that.  I do support the arts.  I do not in any way support pussy ass theatre that does not challenge, embrace, or explore.  If your only goal is to get butts in seats...I assure you...mine won't be one of them.

Sorry.
End rant.
Seeing that kind of season posted though...
really makes me angry.
I want to kick the AD so hard in the nuts, that his great grandchildren sing Alto for life.

I just wrote six more paragraphs about it all.  Since I stated already that I ended the rant...I deleted them.  Probably for the best, they were pretty vitriolic.  Not a lot of sugar coating.  I guess I just gotta get that shit out...

Maybe...

See that's my problem.  I don't think it matters right now what the topic is.  I could just as easily go off about politics, religion, early mornings, diet soda...almost anything.

The pressure cooker is pressed and I just need to let out the steam...I don't think the topic is even relevant anymore.  The things I need to say I can't say.  The things I need to do require a willing partner.  The things being bottled up inside me right now, do not age well...and all of my ways to usually get that stuff out...aren't working.

I can't write, because I can't focus.  I try to focus, and it all becomes so angry...and ugly.  I don't like angry or ugly.  I honestly don't...but I can't find my pressure valve.

I need a bath.

I need a piano.

I think that's it.

I just need a piano.




2 comments:

  1. I was unaware of your musical ability. I could, at one time play the piano. It's funny, I was always pretty poor at it though despite focusing on music theory and composition at the university. I need to scratch that itch at times, but have been unable to really. I do approach writing dialogue a lot like writing music, which is why I actually have strange tendency to put in the odd punctuation at times. I treat comas and periods as rests. We need to find you a keyboard, that'll help with the urges to play the piano. You also need to just let go one of these days. Writing it down and then deleting it will eventually cease to be cathartic.

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  2. One of my favorite things living in Wyoming was going to your house and sit on the couch while you played. I would be all juiced up, ready to go to do something, then we had to wait for some reason and you would play.
    By the time we walked out the door I was all mellow and at ease, I loved it. I think thats why I listen to music instead of take drugs. You helped me stay off Drugs Jace, thanks!

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