So it's been a while since I've posted anything up here, mostly because I keep typing up entries, previewing them, then wantin to make a change but stupid freaking BLOGGER won't let me browse backward without wiping out everything that I just entered in. And it usually feels really retarded to retype an entire entry, though it may seem like a mere trifle. It also feels a little strange to force myself to write about every little quirky thing that happens to me in the dingy capillaries of the MTA, so I've been trying to hold off. But here's something cool.
A few weeks ago I was packing up after a few hours of playing. I descended to a lower platform to head home for the night, when I passed an asian man who was playing on a long-necked, three-stringed instrument that appeared to be fashioned from a turtle shell. With a surge, all my knowledge of Harry Partch and eastern, microtonal music flooded back to me and was converted -- miraculously -- into understanding and total enjoyment. I say that this was a miracle because, though I am fond of all music and certainly a proponent for its continued existence and creation, and am aware of its functions as well as the differences in its manifestations depending on the culture from which it originates -- despite all this, I am not a huge fan of eastern music. Well, not a big "listener" of it anyway. So transfixed was I, that, had Rachel McAdams approached me and professed her undying love for me after years of watching me from her celebrity hilltop, as well as her uncanny ability to land me the role of Carnage in Spider-Man 4, I seriously doubt I would have as much as blinked.
After he finished his smokey, wirey song, he looked up at me, and seemed to appreciate my attentive listening. Then he noticed my guitar, and gestured toward it ambiguously, animatedly speaking in its direction. I confess that I didn't really understand what it was about my guitar that he was commenting on, but something in his good-natured smile and curiousity-filled eyes led me to believe that he wanted to try his hand at playing my guitar. So, I opened up my case, and attempted to hand the symbol of contemporary western music to an eastern traditionalist. This was not, evidently, what he had in mind, and he began laughing beneficently (as did a few onlookers, though I doubt that any of them knew what that word meant), before implying that I would be welcome to try his lute-like instrument (an offer which I politely declined).
In the most tentative, language-barriered terms, we began to speak of music. He showed me how difficult it was to play his lute (because of his incredibly fast strumming method, he employed the use of a sharp, very stiff pick that he fastened to his thumb, much like the approach of some bluegrass musicians, I believe). When he saw my harp (my yoke was still hanging around my neck), he seemed genuinely interested in the notion of playing two instruments at once. I was very near attempting some sort of east-meets-west jam session when, as it is sometimes known to do, my train arrived, and our conversation came to an end.
I saw him a few days later, and he had no clue who I was.
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