I strummed my fiddle like a ukulele, ran through a couple options in my head, and txted my accompanist.
“I have no idea what I’m going to play.”
I’m sure he laughed when he read it.
“It’s a fiddle contest. You’re not supposed to know ahead of time.”
Spoken like a true musician. A year ago, I was throwing a song set together last minute for a fiddle contest, and considering whether or not I was even going to compete. I was fresh home from Europe, and tho I had taken my sweet fiddle with me, there hadn’t been much practice time, and I was definitely rusty. There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to embarrass myself unnecessarily – especially since I know practically everyone else I’d be playing against. But, hey, you get ten bucks for playing. If you win you can afford a snowcone, if you lose you can still afford a snowcone. They’re $1. Play some music, turn your tongue blue, life is good.
So I went. It’s fresh in my mind, so let me paint you a picture.
I slung a case across my back and headed out early morning to meet downtown on the square and stake out a practicing spot. It was the same as always. Little knots of musicians scattered here and there all over downtown, making music and shredding bow hair as they fine-tune the last break on that hoedown or tune of choice and nod to their guitarist. “Again.” Gathered in alleyways, the bank parking lot, or behind a food trailer – heck, wherever you could find a free spot and drown out somebody else’s song so you could hear your own. I waved a bow at a friend in greeting, and joined a random jam that started, the songs old and familiar under my fingers. Looking back, I don’t remember everyone that was there, but I know it was like normal – a mix & match of people I knew well and those I’d never met – joined together by a common love for music. We played and sang and laughed together, and called out song after song. Stared at each other for a solid minute trying to remember the lyrics to the second verse of Grandfather’s Clock, or what key we usually play Whiskey Before Breakfast in.
If you’ve never been in a jam, you can’t understand. It’s a beautiful thing, to play music with other people. And it’s never ever the same. We can play Red Wing through a solid fifteen times and it’ll sound different every verse. It can’t really be captured. People gather round, and listen, some dance and tap their toes. I can’t tell you how many times we’ve gotten kicked off the square after the contest because we were drawing too much attention away from the band that had been paid to preform. But we really don’t care. We’re playing for us – for the sheer enjoyment of it. Leaning in closer and closer till you’d think somebody’s gonna get poked in the eye with a bow. We’ll go and go and go if you let us.
‘Cause we don’t know we’re making memories. We just know we’re having fun.
This year I’m looking at the window at the square. I can’t hear anything yet, but it’s still early. The musicians will come. They will play the same songs, and sing the same lyrics, and we will hear the same music.
We just won’t all be there to make it.
I look out the window, see the still-empty square, remember the music, and I wonder. Would I have enjoyed the music more? Would I have stayed for one more song? I don’t know. But I guess that’s life. It’s like a fiddle contest. You’re not supposed to know ahead of time.
Missing people today ❤
Rachael
Wide Awake 