Playing By Ear as a way of life
Last week I went to Alaska and taught a week-long 4-H kids’ music camp. It was fantastic; both the trip and the camp. I’ll write about some of it a little later, but since its been six days since I got back I figured it was high time that I at least posted some pictures. 
See all Cordova Music Camp photos (there are dozens!)
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See all Cordova Music Camp photos (there are dozens!)
Several years ago, we went bowling. We hadn’t been bowling for quite awhile before that so it was fun to do it again. It was quite a game.
We had placed a wager on the game. Whoever won, received a homemade muffin from the loser(s). I had a special technique where I ran with the ball, rolled it and then slid on the ground on my knees. It worked very well. Two bowlers next to us who were doing all these fancy leg things and pro-bowler stuff were surprised that I was doing better than they were.
So, I won. However, I bet I had a lot of beginners luck because the next time we bowled that year, I was a gutter-glutton (or however it’s said).
Papa and I went to the market to pick up a load of dried fruit. Among the fruit stands, a fella came up to us who heard us play on the mall. We told him about our learning method and about playing by ear. He agreed but also said that written music is important for preserving music. We semi-agreed but said about music was preserved before writing from passing down the music orally. He semi-agreed with that and told us about this guy, Colin McPhee. It was very informative. However, it started to turn into a lecture about what Colin did in Bali and yadayadayada. As you’ve read in my Social Examining blog post, you know that I look in the person’s eyes no matter what (since I’m too lazy to look away). Well, by looking in the eyes, it kinda gives the signal to the person that you are interested (it wasn’t that I wasn’t interested, I was just ready to go). If I looked away more often, that might’ve gotten him to wrap up the story.
Anyway, Papa finally said, “What’s your point?” That moved the story along a bit. He basically summed it up into the reason that without written music, the musics of the past will be lost. Papa brought his own perspectives into it. I was so ready to go. I wondered if I slowly walked away, I could leave without much notice. However, that would put 100% of the attention on Papa and that didn’t seem like the most team-spirit way to go.
Finally, we somehow wrapped it up. I forgot how but we must have ’cause I’m here writing this!
Luke thinks I have a little bit of a problem in socially approaching a situation because according to him, I don’t look at the person until the last second.
That’s not quite true. There’s a bit of a process. It starts when I approach the person I want to talk to from afar. As I am walking forward, I look at the person’s whole self to see what’s on his/her person, what he/she is wearing, the shape of their body (That helps later on to pick somebody out of a crowd) and basically whatever you see when you look at somebody. It’s much easier to look at somebody from head-to-toe when he/she isn’t looking at you. When you are face to face with somebody, the only thing that’s socially acceptable to look at is the person’s face.
Now after I have inspected the person while walking forward, if I still have some more distance to walk before getting the person’s attention, there’s no point in still looking at the person so I look at my surroundings. Finally, once I am in front of the person or if the person has noticed me, I engage eye-contact and proceed to talk.
Anyway, once I’ve made eye-contact, I tend to just keep looking in their eyes when they’re talking. Most people (mostly in men I’ve heard), while they look at the person who’s talking , they sometimes look away occasionally and then resume eye-contact. I find it easier/simpler to just keep looking in their eyes wether I’m paying attention or not. Now, Papa said that that is what women do but I’ve seen him do the exact same thing when somebody is talking to him. Nothing wrong with that. It’s convenient to not look away too ’cause it’s more polite. Plus, it makes them keep talking which, while I may not be interested, it gives you a higher “rating” with that person. (’cause the person will like you more when you let them talk rather than you taking up all the speech-space)
Now keep in mind, this mostly applies to people I don’t know well. With family, I don’t tend to look at the person because, hey! We’re a family! We’re beyond looking at where we’re talking.
‘Going barefoot’ is a good metaphor for a Taoist approach to life. We Abbott boys, young and old, go barefoot all the time. One of the first lessons my sons ‘taught’ me, when I was old enough to learn, was that I didn’t need to wear shoes in Santa Cruz. They never have worn shoes on a daily basis. I never bought them any shoes because they never asked, and we never have snow on the ground. We home schooled the kids so we didn’t get a flack from the ‘establishment’.
[As you can see, there are three pairs of feet here, Pa's, Luke's and Kyle's. Guess who's feet belongs to who! Go on, take a guess]
It is a modern irony that we can afford not to wear shoes. As Henry Thoreau so wisely said, … Continue reading ‘Barefooting Our Way Through Life’
We live a few blocks from the main drag in downtown
A few months ago, just in the gate from being downtown, I heard yelling by ducks and ravens. I saw a red tailed hawk with its broad wings taking off to the top of the telephone poll as if in slow motion. I looked around to see if the ducks were okay; we have three, and saw only two living. Under the orange tree, lying spread open was bright red blood and feathers and exposed breast bone.… Continue reading ‘Baby Monitor Is For the Birds’
In the beginning of this year, Mama has discovered this Dr. Phil-ina who looks like a slim Paula Dean from the Eating Channel. Anyway, this gal Byron Katie has a life-changing way of taking the fun out of arguments. How? well, when you feel negative feelings towards somebody, you take those feelings and turn them around. Let’s role play here: So, think, “That guy is stupid!” Well, when you Byronize it, it sounds like this, “That guy is not stupid! I think he is but it turns out it is a reflection of my feelings towards myself which I am projecting onto this Starbucks clerk who gave me a Double Cha-Mocha Ascretymbia instead of my regular Grimbles Coffeeprimonade.” Sure, it puts a more Taoist Perspective on life, but it’s hard to have a good argument with Byron-Vision turned on.
I notice that when ever I wanted to eat my fill… and beyond… and wasn’t really drawn to step onto the scale, I would see it sitting there in the bathroom daring me to step on but I’d just ignore it. I finally got fed up though with being heavier than need be so I’ve been losing weight. I marked my belt each time I cinched it up another notch, and wrote down the weight. From now on I’ll know immediately when I start putting on the pounds even if I ignore the scale. Of course, ‘clever’ me, I might just throw this belt away and buy a new one.
One day, Papa builds a time machine and goes back to 1965 and gives his former self (then struggling to play music) a copy of the ToneWay Music Method. The 1965 Carl subsequently learns to play by ear on his own, eliminating the need to create a music method with his family three decades later, and thus preempting the creation of the ToneWay Music Method. But then… where did the Method come from? —Luke, explaining the AFM version of the Grandfather Paradox during breakfast.
Brothers Kyle and Luke, and parents Leslie ("Mama") and Carl ("Papa"). This is our family blog.
This has been our main project for over seven years: helping folks to learn to play music.
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