I’m sitting in the back of the tour bus writing this as we roll to the hotel. Tomorrow I go home for three days (although two of them are gig days), and it’ll be so great to experience the end of summer in my beautiful town, Seattle.
This time of year is really special, partly because it’s late summer with the hint of fall around us and partly because we’re in the last few weeks of a successful tour! Heart has had many great shows this year, highlights galore, and I’ve gotten to see my many friends in the business and in life. I have created friendships with people all over the country that I cherish. These friends see me sometimes when I’m working, and often we communicate when we’re all home, and I wouldn’t have those relationships without developing them around the band, the shows, the crowd and the music.
The music!! Yes, I said it. I am reminded everyday that it’s the music that makes almost everyone in my life happy. Of course, there are perfectly wonderful friends and family who don’t resonate with the buzz of music. I understand that everyone is different (Life’s Rich Pageant) and what a boring world it would be if we were all alike. I love them and I love music. I can’t help tapping my foot and nodding my head when a great groove is going on. Sadly, it’s often when there’s no music playing externally (moving through the air outside our bodies), because it’s all going on in my brain. I’ve learned to appear normal under these circumstances, and sometime have to squelch my need to quietly groove when there’s no music besides my internal music, so that I don’t worry others, but it’s there.
Also, music that we hear externally has been recorded! Almost always, I’m listening to music playing in the store, at the gig, in the car. These songs, it turns out, have recorded by people who have developed their understanding of songs and songwriting. They got good enough at it that the songs they recorded can actually be played in the world. It’s no small thing! Many, many musicians want to have their music and musicianship heard and appreciated, but far too few have taken the time to learn how to arrange and record it, and haven’t yet learned to keep doing that until things start coming together.
I had a conversation with my friend Riki tonight, a young singer who’d like to get her career moving. She’d like to learn more about recording, and is a really good musician. I was struck during my conversation with her that we all need a push when walking through new territory. Songwriters and artists often work with other people. Not always, but very often. In finding a writing and/or recording relationship with another person, we give ourselves the momentum and push we need to get work started, and over time we learn to finish it. This may sound easy, but it is remarkable that lots of songs don’t get finished. Either we aren’t convinced by what we hear, we decide that it’s not ready to be finished, or we haven’t gotten enough practice finishing songs that it seems too hard, or for some other, not music-related reason.
Musicians who get songs done can record them! It’s crazy, I know, but it’s true. If you finish a few songs, you can get ’em recorded and then do more! I love to work in my studio, and like many working musicians it can be hard to get in there sometimes. I have the beautiful opportunity to work with talented people in Ben Smith Music Company, developing music, recording clients and friends, and helping people get their songs done and recorded! I love it! And still, I encourage all my many friends, and I challenge myself, to find good partners to work with, to develop ideas, to conceive new directions and to believe in the process enough to get work finished!!
Let’s let our lights shine, let our wolves howl and let our feelings be heard.
Photo Copyright J Diffner Photography
