Back to school
There is something about Middle-of-Nowheresville that is very conducive to childhood simplicity. Here, such ancient arts of apple picking, turkey calling, hayrides, cheerleading, pumpkin carving, and toboganning are still honoured and celebrated.
There's even a society called 4H - (Head Heart Hands and Health) - which is very popular among the rural youth in our surrounding counties. It's like the Young Farmers, but without the scrumpy. (I actually once went online to see if I might be eligible for entry. Unfortunately, along with the answers to burning questions like "where can we find barnyard sounds for our website?", the 4-H organization website conveyed the sad information that I am only 15 years too old to be allowed in.)
In search of rediscovering my own childhood, therefore, I am forced to seek other avenues. I'm definitely too old for cheerleading - and I never could do the splits anyway. It's not the season for hayrides, apple picking or pumpkin carving and the snow we had in January has long since gone.
Now turkey calling (the art of hiding behind a bush and making turkey noises to lure them in your direction) might actually a be possibility, in so far as this is apparently the time of year for hunting wild turkeys. I know this because the local Walmart has a helpful whiteboard with the hunting seasons for just about every animal, mineral and vegetable in the area. I've even found a local guy who MIGHT - no promises - take me out at dawn to try turkey calling. But this negotiation is at a very early stage: no turkeys in hand yet, let alone any turkeys behind the bush. And I have not yet considered the consequences if I turn out to be good at turkey calling. You may laugh, but wild turkeys are mean creatures. Only this weekend, a state trooper in Lima, Ohio was held hostage for three hours by a turkey when he tried to make a traffic stop.
So, with indigenous pasttimes ruled our for various reasons, what else could there be? Well, it seemed like fate when I spotted the small notice in the New Dominion Bookshop one snowy Saturday. The Shenandoah Recorder Society... meets on the third Sunday of every month... What better than rediscovering that sadly overlooked and underappreciated instrument, the recorder? The recorder, which gives most children their first experience of music , and is then cast cruelly aside in favour of loud, in-yer-face instruments like the trumpet or the sax, or moody, neurotic, intellectual instruments like the cello. Cellos and trumpets, after all, do have that certain UCAS form glamour while the humble recorder is inextricably linked with paint splattered primary school classrooms with those really low wooden chairs.
As soon as I made the call, however, and the clock started ticking to the next third Sunday, I felt an advancing state of doom. I have not performed on the recorder since 1986 - the occasion of my humiliating bout of the shakes on stage while attempting to play Pachelbel's Canon at the Nonsuch High School parent's evening. Plus, the man at the Antique Music Workshop in Plymouth, MA told me when I rang him for advice that amateur recorder consorts are notorious for back stabbing and internal politics - even worse than lute ensembles apparently.
So the first step, obviously, was to borrow a recorder to do some emergency practice on, my own being buried in a cardboard box in a garage 3000 miles away. The exchange was made in a dimly lit hallway at dusk. The woman gave me a very funny look indeed.
The second step was actually doing some practicing, most of which happened in the basement in the dead of night. SapphiretheCat is deaf, fortunately, so he didn't mind too much.
The third step was showing up at the appointed hour on Sunday in the appointed place - a church hall. American churches are HUGE. They have enormous ancillary buildings as well, all of which are well lit and central-heated and with flushing toilets. It's been a long time since I was last in a church hall, but if they had had church halls this luxurious when I was in the Guides, I might have stuck it out in the Snowdrops for a bit longer.
The membership of the Shenandoah Recorder Society was not exactly what I had been expecting, although having said that I am not entirely sure what that was. As far as regressing to childhood, well I suppose in one respect I was successful - I was the youngest person there by about 25 years. There was almost an equal mixture of men and women - I think it would have been an exactly even number, but I overheard someone say one of the Davis twins had run his truck into a ditch. Everyone except me had on some combination of orthopaedic sandals or clogs on, and baggy black or brown trousers. And everyone was immensely kind, kind to the extent of sharing music stands and life histories, and pretending not to notice when I missed a note or seven. Really, it was very sweet.
Two guys in particular caught my ear. One was called Bill, and the other one Lee. Very good hearty southern names. Anyway, Bill was probably pushing 60, maybe around 18 stone/250lbs, and wore massive white handlebar moustache, a red and white checked shirt and a builders tan. And he played his recorders so sweetly, it almost brought tears to my eyes. Lee was cut from the same jib: maybe a few stone heavier, and he played the smallest tiniest little recorder, the one that squeaks like a mouse. He also played with a LOT of vibrato, so it sounded like a mouse swaying on a tightrope.
So what, you and I are wondering, was the Antique music man talking about? Well, it's early days yet, but it became clear very early on that the woman who runs the group does have this Thing about toe tapping and body movement. She kept making very pointed remarks about it and glaring in my direction. Like Monica Seles and her grunting, I just can't help toe tapping - it's not so much that I am lost in the music like some kind of Anne Sophie Mutter, more that I have no natural sense of rhythm so I need something to keep me on the straight and narrow.
Body movement is more interesting though. In all my years of classical music training as a kid I was never once told not to move. I have no choice but to conclude it is a sign of American puritanical repression. This isn't the first time I have heard this comment in MiddleofNowheresVille, you see: I was criticized for excess body movement when I first rowed over here too - apparently it seems that the American style of rowing has much less than the British style. But wait - do I detect a theme here? Didn't I get my ass whipped by a bunch of OAPs on the water as well?
There's even a society called 4H - (Head Heart Hands and Health) - which is very popular among the rural youth in our surrounding counties. It's like the Young Farmers, but without the scrumpy. (I actually once went online to see if I might be eligible for entry. Unfortunately, along with the answers to burning questions like "where can we find barnyard sounds for our website?", the 4-H organization website conveyed the sad information that I am only 15 years too old to be allowed in.)
In search of rediscovering my own childhood, therefore, I am forced to seek other avenues. I'm definitely too old for cheerleading - and I never could do the splits anyway. It's not the season for hayrides, apple picking or pumpkin carving and the snow we had in January has long since gone.
Now turkey calling (the art of hiding behind a bush and making turkey noises to lure them in your direction) might actually a be possibility, in so far as this is apparently the time of year for hunting wild turkeys. I know this because the local Walmart has a helpful whiteboard with the hunting seasons for just about every animal, mineral and vegetable in the area. I've even found a local guy who MIGHT - no promises - take me out at dawn to try turkey calling. But this negotiation is at a very early stage: no turkeys in hand yet, let alone any turkeys behind the bush. And I have not yet considered the consequences if I turn out to be good at turkey calling. You may laugh, but wild turkeys are mean creatures. Only this weekend, a state trooper in Lima, Ohio was held hostage for three hours by a turkey when he tried to make a traffic stop.
So, with indigenous pasttimes ruled our for various reasons, what else could there be? Well, it seemed like fate when I spotted the small notice in the New Dominion Bookshop one snowy Saturday. The Shenandoah Recorder Society... meets on the third Sunday of every month... What better than rediscovering that sadly overlooked and underappreciated instrument, the recorder? The recorder, which gives most children their first experience of music , and is then cast cruelly aside in favour of loud, in-yer-face instruments like the trumpet or the sax, or moody, neurotic, intellectual instruments like the cello. Cellos and trumpets, after all, do have that certain UCAS form glamour while the humble recorder is inextricably linked with paint splattered primary school classrooms with those really low wooden chairs.
As soon as I made the call, however, and the clock started ticking to the next third Sunday, I felt an advancing state of doom. I have not performed on the recorder since 1986 - the occasion of my humiliating bout of the shakes on stage while attempting to play Pachelbel's Canon at the Nonsuch High School parent's evening. Plus, the man at the Antique Music Workshop in Plymouth, MA told me when I rang him for advice that amateur recorder consorts are notorious for back stabbing and internal politics - even worse than lute ensembles apparently.
So the first step, obviously, was to borrow a recorder to do some emergency practice on, my own being buried in a cardboard box in a garage 3000 miles away. The exchange was made in a dimly lit hallway at dusk. The woman gave me a very funny look indeed.
The second step was actually doing some practicing, most of which happened in the basement in the dead of night. SapphiretheCat is deaf, fortunately, so he didn't mind too much.
The third step was showing up at the appointed hour on Sunday in the appointed place - a church hall. American churches are HUGE. They have enormous ancillary buildings as well, all of which are well lit and central-heated and with flushing toilets. It's been a long time since I was last in a church hall, but if they had had church halls this luxurious when I was in the Guides, I might have stuck it out in the Snowdrops for a bit longer.
The membership of the Shenandoah Recorder Society was not exactly what I had been expecting, although having said that I am not entirely sure what that was. As far as regressing to childhood, well I suppose in one respect I was successful - I was the youngest person there by about 25 years. There was almost an equal mixture of men and women - I think it would have been an exactly even number, but I overheard someone say one of the Davis twins had run his truck into a ditch. Everyone except me had on some combination of orthopaedic sandals or clogs on, and baggy black or brown trousers. And everyone was immensely kind, kind to the extent of sharing music stands and life histories, and pretending not to notice when I missed a note or seven. Really, it was very sweet.
Two guys in particular caught my ear. One was called Bill, and the other one Lee. Very good hearty southern names. Anyway, Bill was probably pushing 60, maybe around 18 stone/250lbs, and wore massive white handlebar moustache, a red and white checked shirt and a builders tan. And he played his recorders so sweetly, it almost brought tears to my eyes. Lee was cut from the same jib: maybe a few stone heavier, and he played the smallest tiniest little recorder, the one that squeaks like a mouse. He also played with a LOT of vibrato, so it sounded like a mouse swaying on a tightrope.
So what, you and I are wondering, was the Antique music man talking about? Well, it's early days yet, but it became clear very early on that the woman who runs the group does have this Thing about toe tapping and body movement. She kept making very pointed remarks about it and glaring in my direction. Like Monica Seles and her grunting, I just can't help toe tapping - it's not so much that I am lost in the music like some kind of Anne Sophie Mutter, more that I have no natural sense of rhythm so I need something to keep me on the straight and narrow.
Body movement is more interesting though. In all my years of classical music training as a kid I was never once told not to move. I have no choice but to conclude it is a sign of American puritanical repression. This isn't the first time I have heard this comment in MiddleofNowheresVille, you see: I was criticized for excess body movement when I first rowed over here too - apparently it seems that the American style of rowing has much less than the British style. But wait - do I detect a theme here? Didn't I get my ass whipped by a bunch of OAPs on the water as well?
posted by alranson | 12:42 PM
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