Old Time Music is bizarre in that from the outside looking in, all you see are a bunch of musicians playing some really old music (like 1700s, 1800s, etc.) But the reality is actually very different. In the act of playing these tunes, one is not playing in the past, there is a presentness to the music. It is alive NOW. Who cares if it was alive then. It is palpable music in that ordinary people play it and play it together....still. There is something profound in the fact that those old fiddle and banjo tunes have survived for so long - that people have had the interest and the zeal in succeeding generations to learn the tunes, too. Old time music, for those who have caught it, is a very accessible music for expression. Those old fiddle tunes begin to gain clarity - their feeling understood....whereas before it was just some bowing and some notes. Now you can feel the story of the tune even if there's no words at all. There is a spirit attained. Everyone grasps the spirit differently. And yet they gather together in large flocks to share the same. I once heard somebody describe a circle of old time musicians as in "communion" - their heads bowed, eyes closed, etc. Sometimes the playing is raucous and full of jubilation. After a while, one forgets what their fingers are doing and...... I think I have no choice now but to accept that there is something supremely special about it all.
Bizarre that music evolves, and yet old time is evolving at such a slower rate over time, though it evolved into OTHER forms of music that followed it: blues, "country", etc. Perhaps it is evolving in its own circle so slowly because of its distinction. There actually is an element of preservation to the music. But that preservation is not stuffy nor scholarly. It is a preservation based out of admiration and respect for those who came before us and loved the tunes the way we do.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03lusDmD_v4
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Sunday, May 17, 2009
wham
i once had such romantic visions of what life should be. Life should be learning how to make a fiddle from an old Firefox Series book. Life should be a wife and kids. Life should be the quiet of Springy piedmonts and dilapidated barns. Life should be big tables and big meals. Life should be dancing and more dancing.
I was reading the last chapter of the cookbook "Raw Food Gourmet" - sort of my last contemplation on the matter. The name of the chapter is "Raw Spirituality".....and by the end of the first paragraph I realized this woman is totally deceived. In essence, her brand of raw fooding (to acheive less toxic distraction to get closer to God) is a religion unto itself. The Raw Food religion. Where staying raw is the tribulation. Where one is purified by what goes into their mouths. Then I realized this is not so uncommon. In fact, man was designed to do these sorts of things - to seek for Truth in the wrong places. To think something is truth when it is a lie.
All I could feel after reading this woman's heartfelt and genuine expression of how raw food is a responsible spiritual decision was great sadness.
But then again, those Springy piedmonts and those bright-eyed frolics only coerce sadness, too nowadays. Not the earlier excitement, deep-seated contentment. Not the previous feelings of being vivified.
King Solomon says so many times that it is all meaningless. And I can't help but agree. The more I see how blind I am, the more I see how ALL OF THIS has nothing to do with this. All of this has everything to do with the things of the Spirit. All of my physical dependencies, my exterior idols, my strong attachments to the "things of this world" are beginning to rise to the surface. This sadness I feel is, honestly, the realization that I have to let go of the world and the things of it. Because in my deepest of hearts I know that to attach to the temporal is futile and meaningless.....but to strive for the things of the Spirit - THAT is what lasts. Anything else is death.
I will not find nirvana in etc. etc. etc.
Nirvana can't be what I seek.
Because Nirvana is the extinguishing of the flame because the day has come.
(right?)
Life is what I seek - a Truth which extends beyond emotion or aesthetics. I seek a Truth which I feel is only in Christ. that is what I have known in the Word of God. A Truth that latches onto me. Not the fleeting joy of some Berwald Quartet in a sunlit parlor. Not in the recognition in my best friend's face or their familiar voice. Not in my readiness to do something.
I was reading the last chapter of the cookbook "Raw Food Gourmet" - sort of my last contemplation on the matter. The name of the chapter is "Raw Spirituality".....and by the end of the first paragraph I realized this woman is totally deceived. In essence, her brand of raw fooding (to acheive less toxic distraction to get closer to God) is a religion unto itself. The Raw Food religion. Where staying raw is the tribulation. Where one is purified by what goes into their mouths. Then I realized this is not so uncommon. In fact, man was designed to do these sorts of things - to seek for Truth in the wrong places. To think something is truth when it is a lie.
All I could feel after reading this woman's heartfelt and genuine expression of how raw food is a responsible spiritual decision was great sadness.
But then again, those Springy piedmonts and those bright-eyed frolics only coerce sadness, too nowadays. Not the earlier excitement, deep-seated contentment. Not the previous feelings of being vivified.
King Solomon says so many times that it is all meaningless. And I can't help but agree. The more I see how blind I am, the more I see how ALL OF THIS has nothing to do with this. All of this has everything to do with the things of the Spirit. All of my physical dependencies, my exterior idols, my strong attachments to the "things of this world" are beginning to rise to the surface. This sadness I feel is, honestly, the realization that I have to let go of the world and the things of it. Because in my deepest of hearts I know that to attach to the temporal is futile and meaningless.....but to strive for the things of the Spirit - THAT is what lasts. Anything else is death.
I will not find nirvana in etc. etc. etc.
Nirvana can't be what I seek.
Because Nirvana is the extinguishing of the flame because the day has come.
(right?)
Life is what I seek - a Truth which extends beyond emotion or aesthetics. I seek a Truth which I feel is only in Christ. that is what I have known in the Word of God. A Truth that latches onto me. Not the fleeting joy of some Berwald Quartet in a sunlit parlor. Not in the recognition in my best friend's face or their familiar voice. Not in my readiness to do something.
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