Keyboard notes; Desk Notes; Floor Notes

Okay, it's been a while since I've blogged anything.  Or written anything.  Or practiced anything.  I sort of got tired of fighting the whole reading part.  I've been feeling increasingly depressed about my own limitations even as I work with students whose reading steadily improves, most often well beyond my own reading.

I've been wasting a lot of time wishing that I could get my reading to improve, too.

Regular musicians, professional musicians, amateur musicians, they all feel confident in their ability to learn new stuff.  And they're always talking about learning new stuff.  And they're excited about learning new stuff.

I hate learning new stuff.  It takes so frickin' long to unravel on the page what I should already know.  I really SHOULD know.  And the same problem creeps into my horn playing, which I can tell you is unbelievably annoying.  One staff, one note at a time, one frickin' line.  Brain doesn't compute.  Or maybe Brain WON'T compute.  At least no where near as fast as I need it to.

But I like playing new stuff.  And I love the feel of the phrases and the composer's musical genius under my fingers as they dance over the keyboard when I've finally internalized the frickin' notes.  Then the music takes me away.  I love hearing my horn part merge with the ensemble to re-create yet another composer's genius.  Ahhh, what an awesome feeling, music, when those sound-waves penetrate beyond the heart, beyond the soul, beyond the limitations of the world as we know it.

But until that happens, there are notes all over the keyboard, notes all over the desk.
And notes all over the frickin' floor.

There are notes EVERYWHERE.  Except in my Brain.