Listening and watching time go by while living life. I realize it has been a long dry spell from writing here, yet within that lapse of time I have written a song. I went as far as to begin writing a piece about that writing experience, that was then never completed. Music remains high in my list of interests so I work at it every day for the most part. There are days where I fail to touch an instrument though. A couple of weeks ago life took me another direction with a dose of the flu bug. I am still here!
I have just begun playing and singing again post bug. It seems I need more practice to stay and be in that magic space, than what used to be true. The older brain seems to forget lyrics or even timing for moments. In playing music, moments are all there is and we hope that it will flow smoothly, all while realizing the humanness of being. Sometimes it works and sometimes, not so much.
Last night I listened to some of my recordings still incomplete, just a review to jog the memory, seeing the names, hearing the various parts, and enjoying the experience. It is somewhat exciting to hear some of these songs. I am referring to songs that you have not heard. Their representations are being created so that you may one day hear them, they are many and I can but hope I am able to complete this project. Over this past fall and winter I experienced some very serious physical problems that forced me to stop playing the guitar for weeks at a time. I made some changes to hopefully allow those neurological problems to fade away.
Here in this room where I live most of my life, I am now again looking at what is only a very rough outline about writing the last song I wrote. This song now has the name, Ode to Your Heart. Now that I am looking back on the songwriting experience from such a long gap in time, that experience is rather blotted out, covered by the experiences since then. January 18, 2018 was the day this song was created. I must have had an unusual state of mind on this particular day, because, as this outline says, this song was deliberately written rather than it being a spontaneous response to impressions that come in thought, as though the universe is talking and I hear it, which leads to capturing those images, my normal way of writing. For some time before this day, a period of maybe a couple of months, I had an idea about a song, yet without any type of structure at all. It was the idea of using a womans name in a song. The name I had concluded would have to be somewhat light, sweet, maybe lilting, I didn’t really know, the thought was one of more image than substance. The character behind the name completely lacks meaning of any kind. By choice I decided that were this the name of a person I had any association with, ever, that name would be disqualified. Thus on the day in question, the name came to me. I should say a name that became the name used in this song. Lilyan is the name.
Soon after the name was realized, I came to the computer and began to write. As is almost normal the song pretty much wrote itself. I was present, aware and altering the words on the page. They flowed smoothly into place. I recall fighting with spelling the word, eerie. Me and the dictionary in all of its forms, are less than good friends. Yet I depend on spell check, for without that, you would not survive reading the attempted words. The structure began as two verses and a chorus. Actually these two parts seem to differ in apparent subject, while it is assumed that usages of the female name and the word 'she,' represent the same character. After completion and review, I decided to begin this song with the chorus, then end it with the same. I wrote this first, having previously just decided what the name would be. I started with that word, Lilyan. Lilyan, I found you, but then I changed that to: Lilyan, you found me, I was walking. Actually here it does take the assumption I mentioned and voids that thought’s credibility entirely. What wound up being the first line of verse, after several changes and shifting of its three and four word phrases, the verse evolved into, "I awoke the morning, sky an eerie dark, felt it crying, oo, oo, ooo..." Yet I lack having an actual cognition of where that line came from, I mean the subject expressed. Seemingly it has everything to do with the character speaking in first person. The line sort of sets an overall tone which seems dark in nature. Furthering the dark expression, I stated her to be missing, without any reference as to where or how this happened. The expression then takes on the concern of those whom are affected by this missing status. The second verse takes this expression deeper into this status of a missing person. The song lacks any resolution to the conflicted, leaving the audience without any conclusion, then chorus repeats to close out the lyric.
I really should have taken the time to write this out when that described here in was fresh in real time. So it goes.
I have just begun playing and singing again post bug. It seems I need more practice to stay and be in that magic space, than what used to be true. The older brain seems to forget lyrics or even timing for moments. In playing music, moments are all there is and we hope that it will flow smoothly, all while realizing the humanness of being. Sometimes it works and sometimes, not so much.
Last night I listened to some of my recordings still incomplete, just a review to jog the memory, seeing the names, hearing the various parts, and enjoying the experience. It is somewhat exciting to hear some of these songs. I am referring to songs that you have not heard. Their representations are being created so that you may one day hear them, they are many and I can but hope I am able to complete this project. Over this past fall and winter I experienced some very serious physical problems that forced me to stop playing the guitar for weeks at a time. I made some changes to hopefully allow those neurological problems to fade away.
Here in this room where I live most of my life, I am now again looking at what is only a very rough outline about writing the last song I wrote. This song now has the name, Ode to Your Heart. Now that I am looking back on the songwriting experience from such a long gap in time, that experience is rather blotted out, covered by the experiences since then. January 18, 2018 was the day this song was created. I must have had an unusual state of mind on this particular day, because, as this outline says, this song was deliberately written rather than it being a spontaneous response to impressions that come in thought, as though the universe is talking and I hear it, which leads to capturing those images, my normal way of writing. For some time before this day, a period of maybe a couple of months, I had an idea about a song, yet without any type of structure at all. It was the idea of using a womans name in a song. The name I had concluded would have to be somewhat light, sweet, maybe lilting, I didn’t really know, the thought was one of more image than substance. The character behind the name completely lacks meaning of any kind. By choice I decided that were this the name of a person I had any association with, ever, that name would be disqualified. Thus on the day in question, the name came to me. I should say a name that became the name used in this song. Lilyan is the name.
Soon after the name was realized, I came to the computer and began to write. As is almost normal the song pretty much wrote itself. I was present, aware and altering the words on the page. They flowed smoothly into place. I recall fighting with spelling the word, eerie. Me and the dictionary in all of its forms, are less than good friends. Yet I depend on spell check, for without that, you would not survive reading the attempted words. The structure began as two verses and a chorus. Actually these two parts seem to differ in apparent subject, while it is assumed that usages of the female name and the word 'she,' represent the same character. After completion and review, I decided to begin this song with the chorus, then end it with the same. I wrote this first, having previously just decided what the name would be. I started with that word, Lilyan. Lilyan, I found you, but then I changed that to: Lilyan, you found me, I was walking. Actually here it does take the assumption I mentioned and voids that thought’s credibility entirely. What wound up being the first line of verse, after several changes and shifting of its three and four word phrases, the verse evolved into, "I awoke the morning, sky an eerie dark, felt it crying, oo, oo, ooo..." Yet I lack having an actual cognition of where that line came from, I mean the subject expressed. Seemingly it has everything to do with the character speaking in first person. The line sort of sets an overall tone which seems dark in nature. Furthering the dark expression, I stated her to be missing, without any reference as to where or how this happened. The expression then takes on the concern of those whom are affected by this missing status. The second verse takes this expression deeper into this status of a missing person. The song lacks any resolution to the conflicted, leaving the audience without any conclusion, then chorus repeats to close out the lyric.
I really should have taken the time to write this out when that described here in was fresh in real time. So it goes.
****************post edit****************
February 4, 2020
The song Ode to your Heart has now been recorded and posted on the website, https://thomasepeterson.com/mp3/Ode-to-Your-Heart.mp3
