First off, thanks for the pointers and support you've given me in the last post. I managed to borrow those timpani mallets today, and hand speed training is a GO.
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There's something I wanted to share with all of you... it's not a song, but rather, what I experienced recently -- in fact, just a few days ago.
In addition to the bodhráns and the guitar I have in my possession, Seán and I unearthed a few more instruments that had not been played for yonks -- two accordions, a violin, a tin whistle and a MIDI keyboard. Nearly all of them had fallen out of tune, but I just wanted to draw a sound out of them. I picked up the violin and its bow, and began drawing it over just one string, and I just got lost in the motions of it.
"You'd make a good violinist, you," I was told.
I was deeply moved. That may have been true, but when contemplating a second instrument for me to learn when I was 12 years old, the common choices were the violin and the flute -- and I didn't want to play what everyone else played. I didn't want to fit a 'mould'. My favourite instrument was the same then as it is now -- the drum. I forewent the violin and the flute, knowing full well that I wanted to be my own person.
But that day, as I drew the bow over that old violin, there grew in me a desire to breathe life into any instrument I found... regardless of what it was. I wanted to play something. I still want to play something. I just don't know what...
I don't know if my dream of becoming a multi-instrumentalist will ever be achieved. But that little incident, I felt, was beautiful. I don't quite know how else to express it.