Too long

It is Spring and it has been too long since the last post.  Gonna pick up the ol box again this week and will start the blog back up.

Cheers,
Andrew

Funny thing happened on the way to the coliseum, or was it at the music store... Part 1

The next day I started my search for music on Amazon and found some good leads, but was impatient.  I wanted to start playing right away, not wait for 2-3 days for shipping to drop off my prospective purchases!  I thought about the sheet music store in West LA that I use to visit, but didn’t feel like the 45 minute drive in traffic only to get there and discover they didn’t have what I needed or to discover they weren’t even open any longer.  Also, I couldn’t remember the name of that shop, so I couldn’t call ahead to check.  Then it hit me, there was a music shop here in Alhambra!  I had driven down Main Street and noticed the instruments in the window, but wasn’t sure if they would have anything accordion related.  Heck, it would only take me a quick 3 minute drive to find out!

I was a bit overwhelmed upon entering the shop, there were guitars, brass instruments, wind instruments and enough string instruments to outfit an entire orchestra.  I felt like I had just stumbled into the center or a secret garden and gazed about in childlike wonder.  Simultaneous and opposed feelings of wanting to reach out and pick up each and every instrument and also a fear of consequences if I did, race across my mind.  I imagined the joy of picking up a trumpet only to suddenly see a “DO NOT TOUCH!” sign or to have the shop keep shaking his disapproving head emit a “ahem!” while crossing his arms and looking down his nose at me.  Slowly I came to realize that this lush sound garden was missing something.  I couldn’t put my finger on it at first, but then with a gasp of horror it dawned on me!  No accordions!  Not a one!  I staggered about the shop like a drunken maniac with a forlorn hope that I might be mad or blind or anything but in a part of the world without accordions!

“May I help you?” the man behind the counter asked.  I stood up straight from my nightmarish fantasy, and responded, “Um, yes, I hope… do you have any accordion music?”.  “Sure”, he said, “right over there.”  I smiled and pointed and the shopkeeper smiled and nodded.  I sidled over to the box and suspiciously looked it over.  There were several dozen soft bound magazine sized book separated by tabs labeled, “Jazz” and “Classical” and “Rock Opera”, but I didn’t see Accordion.  “A conspiracy!”, I though, immediately followed by, “Oh, wait, there it is.”, and there it was, “Accordion” in black marker on a manila folder that was missing it’s back cover.  There were five ancient looking books and without much thought, I grabbed the 3 that had “How to” or “Learn” on their covers and grabbed one of the final two randomly and headed to the cash register.

 I walked by a fellow store patron, a tall guy with a friendly face, who commented about my choices.  “Accordion, hu? You play?” he asked.  “Not yet but I am on a mission from god, so I will soon!” I responded.  He laughed and I continued on to the man at the cashbox.  As the shopkeeper rang me up I casually asked if he had any accordions in the shop.  He shook his shaggy mane and gave me a simple “No.” and I sighed.  The tall friendly guy called out from across the shop, “hey, I have one in my garage I never use, It’s practically new!”  To this, I responded, “I really can’t afford a new accordion”.  “Well, it’s just sitting in my garage, I’ll let you have it for what I bought it for,” he said.

My curiosity was piqued.  Stay tuned for next week’s episode, “It takes two to Tango Mk II”

There can only be one!

OK kiddies, gather round and I’ll tell you a tale, a tale of how the music started. It was an atypical hot August day.  Not an atypical day because it was hot outside and in, but because there was a weighty decision to be made, one that would change my life forever… OK, maybe not forever, but you never know!

So here we were, Aiden and I, staring at the alien technology in the velvet lined box I had just opened.  It’s strange that I remember the day so well.  With a shrug, I reached down to take the accordion from the case that imprisoned it for so long.  It was unbalanced and heavy and took a bit of shifting to free it.  I sat it on my knees and struggled to get into leather shoulder straps that were suffering from the ravages of time.  The cracked and frayed straps immediately dug into the exposed skin of my shoulders and I regretted the fact that I was wearing a tank top and considered putting the box down right then and there.  Aiden reached out for the black and white keys situated on the treble keyboard, this simple act urged me onward and kept me from putting the heavy beast back in its case.

It was an awkward moment.  I sat there straining to look down and figure out all the moving parts, and where I should be in relation to the parts.  I could figure out where to put my right hand this was the easy part.  I arranged my fingers so that my right thumb was resting on what I assumed was middle “C” and then looked over at the left side of the accordion and became stumped.  I slipped my left hand under the bass strap and strained my neck to look at the little black buttons situated under my fingers.  It was like assessing 120 soldiers in parade formation.  Row after row, 20 buttons across by 6 buttons deep, I was lost and knew I needed direction.  Just for fun, I ran my fingers along the buttons and was happy to discover the fact that one of the buttons had a little indentation.  I pulled the bellows apart while holding the bass button and the treble key.

Fortune and the gods of accordion smiled on that singular moment.  It so happens that the treble key was the middle C, and surprise, surprise the bass button I was holding sounded like a C major cord!  The sound was beautiful, like an organ mixed with a group of miniature cello players all working together to produce this throaty, air filled tone.  The note moved me, vibrating from the accordion and traveling like shockwaves through my chest.  I was not expecting this sound.

I looked over at Aiden, whose wide smile and wider open eyes locked in my choice.  I played a few more notes with Aiden giggling and reaching out for the keys.  Sorry trombone, you’ll have to slide back into your case and back into the garage for now…  There can only be one, and the accordion stays.

It began 4 years ago...

About 4 years ago, I read an article about the importance of introducing ones children to live music at an early age, and how doing so would help infants with their mental development.  I really don't know if there was any scientific basis for what I read, but that didn't matter, I decided that I would give it a try.  I figured it wouldn't hurt to start playing a musical instrument for my little boy. 

In my garage I had two instruments whose cases were just collecting dust and I just had to pick one to start learning.  At first, I thought it would be an easy choice but after looking at each case my imagination took over and I started weighing the pros and cons of each.  One instrument was my faithful King trombone, awarded to me as a gag prize at Circus, Circus! in Las Vegas... a story for another blog...  The other instrument was a disused accordion that I had never played.  I had played the trombone in grade school and off and on as an adult, but was never really any good at it.  This lack of trombonic musicianship was most likely attributable to a lack of practice more than anything else.  The accordion was never played; the most action it had ever seen in my hands was an initial squeeze of the bellows while holding down the keys... just to see if it made sound... 

            I had to choose.  Or did I?  Sitting in that sweltering hot garage in the middle of August and contemplating the benefits of choosing one instrument over the other, it dawned on me, I didn’t have to make a choice.  I picked both boxes up and went in the cooler, air conditioned house to settle the matter.  In his bassinet, playing with some toy or another, Aiden perked up to pay attention to dad and these new objects when I entered the living room.  First, I took out my trombone.  I added a drop of slide oil on the slide, set the mouth piece and blew a couple of notes.  Aiden lit up and reached out for the horn.  I played a couple of slides and tooted out a few more random notes.  He seemed interested and I wondered if I should even break out the squeeze box.  I decided to stick to my plan, disassembled and then put the trombone back in its case. 

Next, I opened the accordion case.  I can’t speak to the reactions of other folks, but something about musical instruments awakens a bit of magic when gazing at them.  I think it has to do with the potential of the object.  Maybe it is a conditioned anticipation of the wonderful possibilities stirred by the spell musicians cast with their wands, the instruments in their hands that tease out emotion.  Maybe it is something deeper, held to the core of our evolutionary past that evokes the emotional, I can’t say for sure. 

Looking down at that beautiful black and silver instrument induced two fundamentally defining emotions in me, whimsy and trepidation.    I pondered the accordion music I had heard, mostly German ‘oom pah” polkas and some Mexican music and thought, “what a ridiculous sound these things make, how could I take learning this seriously”.  In almost the very same moment I asked myself, “how in the hell can anyone learn to play such a complicated instrument?  Look at all those keys!”  I looked over at Aiden to see him looking intently at the box, he seemed as skeptical as I was about it.  Finally I decided I would take out the accordion and see what sounds I could produce, and while doing so had already decided that Aiden couldn’t possibly react any better to this instrument than he had to the trombone…

Next week, “There can only be one!”