Hello dwellers of the ORANGE ROOM. If you've come this far you'll know much about my life as a boy and perhaps chuckled or even gasped at some of my teenage escapades. My musical journeys have been covered many times.....so, what's left to tell? Lots...believe me!
The late 1980's and early 1990's were a difficult time for me and I have blocked much of those years out of my consciousness. As Charles Dickens once wrote, "it was the best of times, it was the worse of times. I really want to go back and carefully reconstruct those years to see what I can remember...what feelings I stir up. I want to go through that dark forrest again knowing that the story ends well and there was light at the end of the tunnel. That light was Sharen Scott...but lets start at the beginning. Get comfortable in your bean bag chair as we transport to the late 1970's.
As I have touched on in past blogs, I've made some mistakes in my life. I turned left a few times when I should have turned right. When I look back at my life and try to pin point where it began to go wrong, I would say it was my first semister in college. Had I known, or had my parents known, or if my guidance councilor would have done his job, ( most don't ) I would have taken GENERAL STUDIES my first couple of semesters at ICC. I didn't know how it worked...neither did my parents. Like a fool, I declared a major straight away!!!! A major in MUSIC!!! Now to the average person, that would seem like a perfect fit. I was a guitar player who loved music and performed most weekends.....but I was a SELF TAUGHT MUSICIAN!!! I learned by EAR!!! Sure, I played in marching band and jazz band in high school, but that was with minimal reading skills and better than average improvisational skills. However, Music Theory 101 was designed for those who were already equipped with the skill of sight reading and had a good grasp of music theory!!!! I had none!!! It would be like a kid signing up for an advanced French class who had never spoke French in their life. Looking back, I can safely say, I...my parents...my councilor...set me up for failure. That was strike number one!!!!
As the weeks and months progressed, I was slowly falling behind in Music Theory class due to my inexperience, but on the other hand, I was excelling in the performing arts. I was good enough at reading chord charts and improvising on the guitar that I passed my audition and joined the ICC JAZZ BAND!!! I also passed auditions and was asked to join the CHAMBER SINGERS, which were a singing and dance group. I would hear the baritone parts that were taught to myself and the other baritone and I could remember the parts....but, I wasn't reading the parts. I was quite proud of the fact that I had passed the auditions and was part of these prestigious groups. I also signed up for a semester of piano which I enjoyed but it was kind of the same problem. I had little sight reading skills. Our teacher, who wasn't really a very nurturing professor, liked to let her students know that it gave here great delight in telling 18 year olds that they were basically "washed up" trying to begin playing piano at such a late age.
How was that for encouragement?
At the end of the semester, our final project was to give a concert performance of one song, approved by the professor, that demonstrated both left and right hand movement on the piano while playing and reading the music. Well, the reading part was definitely going to sink my ship!!!! I was sure to fail and she knew that as well. I think she even looked forward to seeing this long haired, popular "rock guitar" player go down in flames!!!! But, I couldn't let her have that victory!!!! I chose a piece of music that was actually quite classical by nature and she approved the sheet music for my recital. I think she was a bit surprised by my choice.
There were two things that were in my favor. One, the song was Love by John Lennon and I was very familiar with the piano part in my head. Two, I was determined to practice as long as it took to master the performance. However, here were two things that were NOT in my favor. First, the the recital date was only a few weeks away. Secondly, OUR FAMILY DIDN'T HAVE A PIANO AT OUR HOUSE. I'd have to practice at school!!! The saving grace was our bass player's family did have a piano and recently, I had met a guy named Terry Burnett at school who had joined our band, GLAZE while leaving his Farfisa organ in my parents basement.
With a lot of visuals in pencil over the music, my left hand notes and finger placements were arranged in a way that I could understand what my left hand was supposed to play. Either my grand mother or Eric's mom helped me with the notation. My right hand could follow the simple melody of the music but the difficulty came with playing both parts at the same time. So....I practiced it over and over until I could just about play it all together.
The day of the piano recital came and the class converged in the small recital room equipped with a baby grand piano and a room capacity of about 100 seats.
My palms were sweating as I listened to my classmates play their chosen piano pieces. Some were pretty good... a few were less that perfect. Our teacher, Myrna Bietz, seemed to enjoy the pressure she had inflicted on this group of teenagers and soon it would be my turn. I've probably never been more nervous in my life!!!! I was about to ride the tight rope and Myrna was going to watch in glee as I fell to my death. I put my music on the piano music stand, which was full of notes and pencil hieroglyphics to help me guide my left hand. I closed my eyes, cleared my head and placed my fingers over the piano keys. I began the piece and and let the music and practice take over.
The semi classical arrangement sounded beautiful on the baby grand in this acoustically treated room. A minute in, and I was doing great. I may have made a small mistake as I came out of the bridge and back into the main piece, but it was very minimal. Another 30 seconds, and I was finished. I was so excited that I even pulled of a short D arpeggio as a victory flourish. ( I'd been practicing arpeggios for some time.)
As I turned to look at Myrna, she was smiling with the kindest look on her face that I'd ever seen. She stood up and applauded!!! I blew her mind!!! She was all set for me to fail but I pulled it off! She actually was very nice to me whenever we'd meet in the halls after that day.
That was the end of my piano training. I definitely think I could have learned to play piano had we had one at the time and if I would have kept playing. As it turned out, I'd plunk around on my Grandmother's piano when we would visit, but that was about it.
Unfortunately, that small victory was not helping me in Music Theory. I continued through the next year, but in February of 1979, I decided that I was tired of fighting the up hill battle of being a music major. I was fooling myself. What was I going to do with a music degree? Teach music in high school? No. It was a dead end. However, had I taken GENERAL STUDIES, I probably would have continued school and perhaps a career path would have emerged.
But ...on that cold February morning, I told my mom that was was quitting ICC and begin looking for a job. That was mistake number TWO.
Stay tuned for PART TWO of MY JOURNEY TO BECOME AN ADULT.
Just another song from the ORANGE ROOM...WHEN DAYS WERE PSYCHEDELIC.
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