Gardening and Music- Part 1
Much to my surprise, 9 years ago, a passionate love affair for the garden began when my wife, in her third trimester with our daughter, asked me to take over the garden duties. As soon as I picked the first pepper grown under my surveillance, I was smitten! Many elements of playing an instrument and making music have wonderful illustrations in the world of gardening, and this month's guitar newsletter kicks off a series about the correlations between tending a garden and playing guitar and music. From the choice and care of gardening tools, to the importance of a healthy compost or deciding on the best seeds, there are many parallels with playing guitar and music.
In order to grow vegetables you need a few good reliable tools to dig up the soil in order to plant the seeds. A shovel, hoe, rake, trowel and wheelbarrow are sufficient. They don't have to be brand new or top of the line. In fact older tools, just like vintage guitars, often were built to last. Honestly, I am so fed up with expensive garden utensils that break within one season of use!
The beginning of gardening season is the ideal time to take an inventory of your tools. However, being open-minded to the addition of an imaginative new tool can be inspiring and makes a difference in the workflow that lies ahead. A few years ago, my wife gave me a rather scary looking tomahawk-like trowel for Christmas, and it has become an indispensable, "lost island" utensil for me. Quickly, I found myself using this fantastic weapon for weeding, digging rows, demolishing hard clay clumps, tearing open mulch bags, excavating horseradish and stubborn carrots or scraping off hard mud stuck on my boot soles. https://www.hoedag.com/store/p3/Garden.html
Similarly, an unexpected recent tool of inspiration in my music world came as a gift from my good friend Dustin, who out of the blue sent me a neat guitar effect pedal. It's the micro POG by Electro Harmonix, which adds multiple octaves to your signal and thus radically changes the sound https://www.ehx.com/products/micro-pog/. Especially in combination with other effects, you can explore a plethora of otherwise unattainable soundscapes. I discovered a rather unique cathedral-like organ sound by running it through a phaser and stereo delay. Thanks, Buddy!
If you intend to grow healthy and robust vegetables, you will need fertile soil, and that starts with an aged and well-balanced compost pile. I have finally surrendered to amending mine only with items that will decompose fairly quickly such as vegetable kitchen scraps. Thick branches will not decompose into dirt within one year! Nowadays, even the fall leaves are mowed and bagged before going into the bin.
Having a personal musical diary of ideas is just like engaging with the compost pile. Those ideas have to sit for a while until they mature. It is also necessary to rake through stored musical ideas and pick out what is really working and in what context they can be used. Keeping a musical diary can be as simple as notating melodies on a manuscript paper pad or quickly recording a new chord progression into your phone. Look at a musical diary as a rest stop between creative practicing and the finished product. Set aside time in your practice schedule to focus on a specific part of songwriting, like a catchy guitar riff, and try your best to capture something even if you know it isn't working yet. At the same time, just like examining the compost pile, leave in only what really has potential. Don't be afraid to edit and delete vigorously.
Picking what to grow is also about keeping only what works well. This is a hard decision, and there are so many varieties available and only so much space. Early spring my wife and I have a little powwow to discuss what to grow and where. We make these decisions based on our goals for our all organic kitchen garden.
This is also similar to setting up specific musical goals. What exactly are you trying to accomplish? Is it to learn more about music theory, become better at reading music, master a certain technique or learn new songs? Do you want to get more familiar with recording techniques, improve your guitar tone, perform with others and overcome performance anxiety, or rediscover the joy of music in your life?
You will have to do some serious soul searching to determine what you really want to express and how to go about that. The answers to these questions are like leafing through the seed catalog in winter in order to decide what you will grow in spring.
Let's not forget one thing though; gardening, like playing guitar, is a lot of fun, and very rewarding. Both will allow you to see and enjoy the fruit of your work, and you will be able share to it with others. Just like playing an instrument or being active in performing music, it is an ongoing learning process with many hidden treasures along the way.
May this month's newsletter be an encouragement to start gardening, and I hope you experience how tending and watching plants grow provides insight into your own musical journey. In this spirit, I would like to include a spotify playlist of George Harrison, one of the greatest guitarists and songwriters in history, and end this newsletter with the opening dedication of his autobiography, I, Me, Mine, which simply reads: "To gardeners everywhere." George Harrison On Gardening - YouTube
Thank you George, I get it.
~Chris
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