That was the river, this is the sea
Me, I’m still screwing around with my Portastudio…
- Roddy Frame
Last night, for the first time in months, maybe even years, I recorded myself improvising on the keyboard.
A lifetime ago, I left college to “follow my muse.” (Well, there were other reasons, too, but let’s stick with the poetic sounding one for now…) It was a creatively fertile period of my life - hell, Husher still speaks well of one of the songs I wrote back then. I saved up money from my crappy part-time job at TJ Maxx to buy better equipment to nurture the muse.
One of the first things my money got me was a Tascam 424 4-track cassette recorder, which became my scratchpad and studio all-in-one. I recorded dozens of tapes and full songs with it, until my songwriting took a back seat to playing in a band. Eventually the band dissolved, I moved to Maine, and my keyboard stands became catch-alls for dirty laundry, until my father-in-law upgraded his computer and gave me the Sound Blaster AWE64 sound card and MIDI sequencing software he had been working with. This opened up a whole new horizon.
Over the past few years, I’ve become accustomed to digital recording and sequencing, creating well-arranged beds of MIDI and samples to rest my voice on. However, I’m still using the same computer I recorded much of Prodigal Songs on, and the wear of old age is beginning to get the best of it. As a result, I can’t really do much actual recording on the computer these days (not that I’ve been writing much to record anyway).
Luckily, I still have my old friend the 424. Scratch that – years of neglect have rendered it impossible to record on track 4, so I now have functionally a 3-track. But hey, the Beatles recorded Sgt. Pepper on 4 tracks…maybe I can use this limitation to my advantage.
Anyway, with all my work-related stress lately, I’ve known I need to change something. A common theme in the podcasts and blog posts I’ve been reading lately has been art and its capacity to change us. Maybe I’ve just not been letting the art or music in enough to change me.
That in itself needs to change – it may be difficult to fit in the schedule, but I want to commit to more times like this, of just exploring musically with no set agenda other than “see what sounds good.” I need to find, as
Osenga so beautifully puts it,
The pulse that is always there beneath me, above me, behind me, before me, waiting for me to ride within its heartbreaking, breathtaking, dark and beautiful waves.
The waves that will carry me from the muddy river into the wide open sea.
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