Alright, so a couple people have asked what the title of this blog means. I suppose after about two years, I should clear it up.
Living in Rhythm. You (should) know that I'm a musician. For as long as I can remember, I have heard things differently than a lot of people. I have a 'trained ear'. When I was a kid, my parents thought I had a hearing disability, so they took me to a specialist and had my hearing tested. Turns out, my hearing is SO good, that I can tune out anything I don't want to listen to. Which, at the time, was my parents, evidently (ha!).
Anyway, this skill was only developed further when I joined a 60-person concert band, and a jazz ensemble. You learn to listen for your queues. You listen to the intricacy. Doing score studies as part of my musical education certainly helped, as well.
Anyway, what this all lead to was my ability to notice a lot of things that some, maybe most, people miss.
For instance:
While watching movies, I often find myself listening to the score, watching the scenes as they relate to the music, and then I'll have to rewind because I've missed all the dialogue.
I have spent most of my life since I was 16 waiting for that perfect song that plays in time the the turn signal on my car. I never found that song on my first car. My '07 Sebring so far has one perfect match (not just - "that's so close!" - this is in perfect time). That song is Hey Now by Augustana. No one understands how rare it is to find this! Most turn signals are not on a fixed beat; it's an uneven rhythm. My car's is even. I smile every time this song comes on when I'm driving.
The last time I got my hair cut, my stylist was clipping in time with the Kylie Minogue song that was playing. I asked her; it wasn't on purpose.
The other day, my best friend 'danced' past my office (she does this often, which is getting funnier and funnier the further she gets into her pregnancy), and it happened to be exactly to the beat of the Nathan Angelo song I had playing through my headphones.
This also means that I can't listen to music and not chew my gum to the beat. I can't be listening to my iPod and not walk in time to the rhythm of whatever song is playing. And yes, my pace changes as the songs do.
So I hope that serves to explain the blog title a little bit. And I hope it doesn't make me sound like a crazy! Or a total nerd.
Dude I think I just respected you more as a great friend of mine-for that blog. Cos it totally explains so many things about you that I already kinda knew. I could tell you were one of those ppl who truly heard the beat of the song before the lyrics hit your eardrums. It's how I hear music too-I feel it in my soul-and then it all just starts to make sense.
I think maybe you are prolly the only other person who will get what I mean-and even if you don't I still feel you will maybe have an inkling for what I'm getting at. Great Blog btw!!!
i smiled reading this.
i adore your passion for music :)
I'm jealous, which is something that I try to avoid being. I wish I could hear with that kind of clarity.
I know the exact moment I want back.
Was in Germany at this concert by this great composer and the performers were spread out through the space and the piece was just these crazy, rolling waves of sound and silence. I remember thinking that I wanted to hear everything. I wanted to be inside the piece and I just couldn't get close enough.
It's still my most memorable concert ever.
So thanks for a reminder of the piece that changed everything for me as a musician...
There's just something about sound...