Waves and Bunches

Got a tune in my head this morning…again. It’s not always that way. Sometimes the days and weeks go by without the melodies, just the songs on the list of current work. But today a tune from yesterday came by early. I will give it all the attention it desires just as soon as I drink this second cup of coffee.

I remember talking to Norman Blake years ago, many years ago now, while I was working in the Hartford String Band. We talked about a number of things, but one thing we talked about that I remember was the erratic nature of creativity. Norman said that it comes in waves, sometimes you get a bunch of ideas and sometimes you don’t get any. I remember this being said by my Papaw Compton too, but his version was, “they come in bunches like buh-nanners”. Of course, his version had nothing to do with being creative because he couldn’t carry a tune in a bushel basket. Anyway, it does seem to bear out to be true.

There is no rhyme or reason to it as far as I can tell. The Muse hangs around or it doesn’t seems like. I started in on working away at the list of ideas, of blurbs and phrases in my voice notes app on my iPhone. Every time something comes to mind I put it there for future investigation. It has paid off time and again. I think that part of the success of the practice is the practice in itself of storing away tidbits as they come to mind, of knowing that I have the device in my pocket and can pull it out at a moments’ notice and put an idea there and forget about it for now, clear my mind and go on to the next thing. That works best for me. But the point I’m not making very gracefully is that it’s the “practice” of doing it regularly that works just like sitting down and practicing any sort of thing. It’s the regularity and continued pursuit that makes the Muse come in ‘waves and bunches’.

Right now I have a tune in my head that came to me from a voice note on my phone. That’s where it started anyway. Just an idea listed under “New Recording #20” sat there waiting to be rediscovered. I was primed and ready for it because I have been working away at tunes a lot this year, what with having all this time at home and all. So when I opened the file I heard just a simple idea, grabbed a mandolin and headed off into the unknown. In the last three days I have more than enough parts to complete a good solid old-fashioned fiddle tune from my own hand influenced heavily by the music I have rambling around in my head. The lines are coming eagerly forward and presenting themselves. Sounds sort of like Mississippi, sort of like Kentucky, sort of like etc. But they have been invited, I have opened the door and asked them to come in and they oblige.

I have been writing tunes regularly for a few months now one after the other. I don’t move from the melody I’m on until it’s worked out and feeling good under my fingers, until it lays out in logical fashion in my mind. I’m sure that some of them sound reminiscent of the others but I’m fine with that. They are part of a family of tunes, a product of what is on my mind currently and will change as my ideas change. They are all part of the vocabulary I am using now. I worked on a tune in F major for about a month two tunes ago before it finally came around to making sense to me and when it did it was different than I had imagined. It zigged when I thought it would zag. But eventually it made itself known. It came reluctantly. I remember a few years ago driving from Islamorada, FLA down to Key West just for a bit of relaxation. But on the way a couple lines came into my head and the lines came one right after the other as fast as I could whistle. It was almost as if they were waiting in a line in my head. I whistled the tune all the way back and felt excited that the tune made itself known. So there doesn’t seem to be any particular way that the Muse works. Sometimes it gives me bits and sometimes it gives the whole thing. Right now it is giving me a list of ideas I have to choose from and finish myself. But it is giving and I still think it is because I have been open to the flow of ideas, I have been ‘doing the work’. The more of the work one does the more the ideas present themselves.

The only thing I haven’t said is that I love the way this works. It gives me both a thrill and a sense of satisfaction to feel creative, to have my own ideas coming forward. On the other side, it is a stifling feeling when the flow is restricted. The current state of affairs is absolutely the more desirable of the two and I will keep pecking away at it to see where it goes. The secret is to just keep ‘doing the work’ regardless of how much productive output comes from it. The door has to stay open for the Muse to come and go as it pleases. The more the Muse comes the more the Editor gets crowded out and has a smaller and smaller voice. Every idea gets its due, gets a chance to grow into something full and have its say. I think we all have a desire to be heard and have our say and this is my way of being heard. The tunes speak for me. The more the merrier.

Life is good. MC