Relative Something

Last weekend I made a point of pulling one of my guitars out of its case and spending some time tenderizing my fingertips on the steel strings. It has been a very, very long time since I played a guitar. It saddens me, but it is something that I face as a function of the limited number of hours in a day and the ridiculously large percentage of those hours which a day job consumes, and the variety of other interests which occupy the minutes and hours left over.

The calluses on my left hand never seem to survive the hiatus between periods of activity. It really is a shame, because I think music really deserves to be my first love. I guess it is no surprise that if I am not making my own music, the next best thing is listening to the music of others. Some nights I like to make a point of avoiding the visuals of television or video and put on a random shuffle of my collection of music to fill our space while I go about my activities.

Yesterday at work, late in the day, I had put on some background music for a part-time helper who arrives after most of the regular crew has gone home. In a work setting, it can be a challenge to select something that isn’t elevator muzak and also isn’t offensive to anyone within earshot. I noticed that my iTunes Radio had been left on something from the 70’s, which seemed to fit the general age group of the people on hand at the moment.

I was occupied enough with my own tasks that I was paying only sideways attention to what was emanating from my computer speakers. Then a song came on that sounded completely different to me, as compared to the previous too-many-hundred times I’d heard it before. It was “Roxanne” by The Police.

This is the kind of song that played so often on the radio that my senses just glazed over when I heard it. Like all over-played songs, in time, I didn’t want to hear it at all. Now, some 30-plus years later, I was hearing it from a fresh perspective. I find myself amazed every time this happens, but given a span of time, and the random happenstance of any moment, one song can suddenly emerge anew in my ears. That song really has some great moments. It’s as if I can suddenly discern what all the fuss was about back in the day. No wonder so many people were fans. At the time, I barely noticed anything about their music that deserved more attention.

Now I am trying to imagine how to define my tastes in music. One possibility is by revealing what lies mostly beyond the fuzzy area of my interest. Even though I can appreciate hearing some orchestrated classical music, it is a rare occasion that I will purposely put it on. I don’t care for most country music, nor heavy metal rock or acid rock or electronica or hip-hop or rap or radio favorites of any genre or pop or punk. I do find isolated moments from each category which do appeal, however.

I guess the next question might be, is the bulk of my interest defined by the music that I didn’t itemize there? I’d probably have to keep going on listing categories to which I don’t listen to achieve a more fitting result (latin, disco…?).

So, what is it that does strike my fancy? I’ll look into that in a future post…