Monday, January 5, 2009

the Harmonium



I can walk by this beautiful instrument in my studio, and be transformed. It has this great antique smell that reminds me of being a kid and our heavy wooden walnut furniture, the way it smelled when you opened cabinet doors.  It's loud, it drones, the air passes through the reeds and it gets me every time. I can sit and play with it and not be writing, just feeling the sound pass through me, through the table, into the air. It is good for me to play without the intention of getting something, but just to be there.  They use it in India to chant to, to have a note that keeps everyone on the same frequency. It sounds old and romantic, like an accordian, it seems to have a real voice.  I used it a bit on the album that will soon be released.  As a piano player, I generally play a keyboard when playing live, pianos are rare and hard to get tuned for a stage and all, so it's so wonderful when I get to play something that makes its own sound, that I can feel the air passing through, that seems to play its own melody as soon as I touch it. 

Happy New  Year! Happy January! I'm so glad the holidays are over, they were really tough this year, and I wake up down and out. I know it's not forever but it's how it is now. I miss my darling boy.  Life is full of heartache. And it's full of beautiful simple things. Really, I feel like I don't know enough about life to say anything about it. Ha ha, miss writer-of-songs. I guess I'm always trying to figure it out, always saying you can't. That leaves lots of material.

Have a good first week of 2009. Imagine good things. It makes them closer.

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