Another Cold Rainy Saturday in October

I woke up around 6:30a and made my usual 4-cup espresso pot full of finely ground Peruvian delight. Nothing special going on except that it’s raining again. I sat on the couch in the dim morning light as is customary this time of day, sat there with my earplugs in to let the quiet wash over me and keep my thoughts flowing at random until I wake up a bit and start to focus on my breath and the calm. I could hear the rain pelting the cover on the stovepipe that vents the wood heater (the one I’m probably not going to use this winter because I really don’t want to deal with the mess) to the outside. I got one cup of coffee down and shut off my snooze alarm…again…again…

I dozed back off at some point and remember dreaming of elephants. African elephants communicating with each other standing face to face and me hiding in the back of a Chevy van watching the whole thing. Then something gave the van a nudge and it was in motion going off down a long steep hill rattling through the brush to come to rest at the bottom and an elephant standing at the top looking down. The next thing I knew the room was light and I was out of coffee. I got up and went over to pour another cup and found the pot stone cold. When I glanced at the clock over the fireplace it said 10:30. What?! So I woke up, drank a cup of coffee, went back to sleep and dreamed of elephants and slept till 10:30a. And still the rain.

I must admit I got that old feeling that my Papaw Compton used to instill in me when he’d come over to help with any number of chores my Daddy had to do. I was prone to sleep until about mid-morning in my teenage years. Papaw would usually say something like,”Where you been, boy? It’s 9 o’clock. The day’s half gone. Ain’t no use you coming out here and getting started now”. I initially felt that old twinge and wondered what I could get done starting this late in the morning but decided to ignore the self-criticism and just get on with it. I had been planning to go up the road about an hour and a half towards Lebanon, VA and look at an end table with a drawer in it to put all my junk tuners, pencil sharpeners, random business cards, rubber stamps, power chords and headphones that I should’ve thrown away a long time ago and so on. So I got full of coffee and lit out.

The drive was great once I got to Abingdon and turned northeast out of town. It’s really beautiful up that way even with all the rain clouds hugging the hills and valleys. I just slowed down and let ‘em all pass me on the way up to Lebanon. No hurry on new slick roads. Mainly it was a good day to let my mind wander and just enjoy the scenery, the calm. I just sat there and stared out the windshield and got half hypnotized by the wipers. I got to thinking about the week prior and what I need to do to get on top of the coming week. I have had a rewrite to Monroe’s “Monroe’s Blues” in my mind for about a week and ran over that in my head for most of the trip (most of the past two days actually). Some progressions resolved, some still a puzzle. The drive seemed long, way longer than the hour and a half. When I finally reached the store I passed it and had to go back only to find it had closed 10 minutes before I got there. Great.

Going back home seemed a lot faster and my mind was still churning. This has been a daily thing now that I’ve moved up here. Seems like my mind just races all the time. I remembered going into ETSU around 7:45a last Tuesday and came upon an otter crossing the road in front of me before I had gotten 300 yards from the house. I can’t for the life of me figure out where there’s enough water this close to attract an otter but I’m sure that’s what it was. The lady next door, Sarah, said that there was a bear in the yard last month. So where are all these critters hanging out? Got a couple hounds over the hill I know because I hear the bastards barking almost constantly when I’m here…ah-woooooooo, ah-wooooooo, ah-woooooooooooo. ARGH! According to local folks they run in a pack and nobody knows where they are but I’ll just bet I can find ‘em in about 10 minutes. Just follow the noise. I can’t tell if somebody’s got ‘em chained up outside and they don’t like it or they’re just barking because, well, they’re dogs and it’s their job.

I got to thinking on the way back about how many people would love to be in my shoes (well, my office really) on Tuesday and Wednesday every week because Wyatt Rice’s office is next door and he runs guitar players through there all day long while I’m running mandolineers through the other door. It dawned on me last week that I get to hear Wyatt working all kinds of stuff out for free and I guess it dawned on me that I had been taking it for granted that I have one of the premier modern flattop players in the other room. So, grateful for that and I’ll be listening harder from now on. I also got to thinking that I’ve been getting asked to come to jams and parties by some of my students and it made me feel good, that I am coming across like I had hoped, that being a kindred spirit and not like some stiff shirt. I hope that this continues because I really want them to feel relaxed and understand that I’m on their side and want the best for them. Being an artistic person is hard enough on a good day without having obstacles to go around or over or through.

Another thing that has come up lately that I’ve been pondering is that I’ve been privy to a few short conversations with second and third generation bluegrass and oldtime players who have all pretty much expressed bewilderment with what most of the young bands sound like. One person said that it sounds like “just any old thing” is thrown in without consideration for melody. I have to admit that I agree in large part. It has always been my opinion that the melody counts for something and even Bill Monroe, the Father of it all, sometimes strayed too far out on the edge. But I know that he was looking to grow his art form and I think the younger players are too. We all want a voice and to express ourselves and take part in the fray. I had a conversation with John Hartford 20+ years ago now about this (yes, it was happening then too. It’s always happening, always has been. Even the revered oldtimers have been quoted as saying that they changed everything their fathers played) and he said that as far as he was concerned the freedom was inside the boundaries, not outside where a lot of people go looking for it. I feel like every art form has guidelines that make each one what it is and sure, we all have different influences, especially these days with so much variety available on the web. Everybody steps on the edges and blurs the lines, but I think the Hartford statement carries a lot of weight; the freedom is inside the boundaries. Of course John was the first to say that art has no rules and would be the last one to be pinned down.

I think it’s important to ask what a “style” is about and what makes it what it is. I talked to my old roommate Bob Fowler many times back when I was in my mid-20’s about what “bluegrass” music was, what made it what it was, what notes were the “right” ones to play, what inflection, accent, attitude, you name it. Bob said that he couldn’t explain it in words but he knew damned well when he heard it. Nowadays you’d get fired from a workshop at any one of the numerous camps around the world for giving an answer like that to a student’s question, but I’ll have to say that I understand what he meant now and I think I damned well know “bluegrass” when I hear it.

When I got back home from driving all over creation on my fruitless end table hunt and a few minutes grocery shopping I pretty well took off my traveling shoes and socked in for the rest of the day and evening. I got the mandolin out and just slammed it for as long as I could hold out and then did it some more. I played for hours, something I have not done in a long time. In the evening I pulled up Netflix and clicked on “Count Me In”, a video documentary about drumming and some of the prominent drummers today. It was a great look at some different stylists living and dead and there was a lot of interesting and passionate dialogue regarding what it was about drumming that turned them on to doing it, about their heroes and their explanations into what it was about their playing that they loved. By the time the last few minutes of the documentary came around I was crying watching the intensity and joy I was seeing and remembering why I started playing music in the first place. I miss the passion I felt, the magic of it, the intensity, and made up my mind to get back on mission. I have been spending way too much time on the computer and not nearly enough time playing the mandolin to really stay in practice technically or stay on top of it mentally. I have been trying to keep up with the teaching schedule and my playing is suffering for it. But it seems like everything is starting to even out some and I don’t feel quite so overwhelmed as I did. I want to be the best player that I can become with the equipment and hands that I have now, I want to instill drive in these young players by being full of drive myself. I can’t say that I feel I have ever been that kind of role model but I have decided that all I have to do is not be afraid to love what I do anymore and not be afraid to show it. I have been letting the music down and it has never let me down. Not a fair shake on my part. I will do better. I might as well start by rewriting something by an artist that changed the whole course of my own life for the better. I’ll see where that takes me and I’ll go from there.

Life is good. MC