She carried a guitar

Most of my days are carried by with music as my companion. I hardly watch television, maybe an hour, usually at the end of my day. Music has been a constant part of my life, not one day have I gone without some sort of music playing along with my task filled day. This love of music is attributed to my mother. With a guitar in her hands she plucked away filling the house with various genres of music. Every weekend that guitar case would be opened up, prompting the cat to dive into the case for a cosy place to nap, and my Mother would master a new song. Listening to her play I learned about all sorts of things. Such as: how to tell the sound differences between a Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton song. How Johnny Cash changed the way rock and roll formed. How Bonnie Raitt helped change the way guitars were made. Why Willie Nelson is a lot more than some country music guy with braids and a bandanna around his head. I discovered that big time rock bands make it big all on account of writing songs based on chorus. Listen to Aerosmith and you'll know what I mean. This constant listening to her play, improving her skills affected me. I can tell the differences in a song just by hearing the minor changes in pitch. Being exposed over the course of my childhood to my mother's music allowed my brain to pick up on those lessons. I am not a musician of any sort nor do I have the talent, though I might have an "ear" for it as some may say. Many times I would have liked to have the blessing of musical skill. To play music seems so relaxing. It is a skilled form of expression I lack. Admittedly I am awful. I tried to learn and it was a failure. Holding an instrument was and still is so foreign to me, it just feels awkward and wrong, isn't that strange? It should feel intuitive, like it's a part of my being. Music will never be intuitive like cooking is for me. Accepting that music was not my talent I learned to love it another way. An avid listener is what musicians need so I'm that person. Speaking of listening to music there is this musician, Gregory Alan Isakov, that I am totally diggin' on right now. His folk influenced music is the kind I can listen to most. Have a listen, you might find yourself becoming a fan just like me. His site is full of information about him and his band, The Freight. And he lives in Colorado, and I'd really love to see him perform, I'll be keeping my eyes open to see if he'll have a gig while we're out there this summer. I haven't seen live music in so long. When you live in Colorado going to a bar was super easy and there is such a wealth of talented musicians, I miss it dearly. Being in DC, well it's just not easy to get to places. Going out is nothing short of a small day trip and is hardly worth the effort for such limited on time people like me. If we lived closer to the music scene and had shorter work days then perhaps hitting the bars would be a thing for us to do. Yet it's never going to compare to the sort of ambiance that a Colorado bar has, not even close. Though this does give me ideas. I need to investigate the local scene to learn about the musicians in this area. Being in the 'burbs sure makes for a more difficult hunt but it would be worth it to get some live music back in my life.

Still nothing compares to my Mama and her guitar filling the house with music.