Don't quit your day job, but...

In early April, I got to read poems at the Scissortail Creative Writing Festival in Ada, Oklahoma. Then in late April, I got to sit in with Ray’s reunion band, Little Henry, at a gig in Sioux Falls. Giving readings and singing on stage are more alike than one might think—same performance aspect, same musical rhythms, crescendos, syncopation, and for me, the same mystery in the bones.

I’d rather sing & give readings than just about anything else I can think of. And I’m not alone. I’ve been hanging around musicians for a few decades now. Ray, and most other musicians I know, will take gigs without regard to anything else—holidays, anniversaries, family vacation plans, surgery, pending childbirth—anything. They’ll drive through blizzards, over treacherous ice-covered roads, in a high-profile used school bus with no windows and 250 zillion miles on it, to get to a gig. They’ll face the wrath of significant others left home to rearrange lives and pick up the slack. And all of this in order to drive long distances, haul & set up heavy equipment, play 3 hours, tear down & pack up equipment, and drive back home, for wages that haven’t really changed since 1975. And it’s not like they’re playing to 300,000 screaming fans. Often, it’s a tiny pub or dive-y bar with 20 chatty texting “beautiful people” (or 10 loud, obnoxious drunks) who think of the band as little more than an animated jukebox.

When I watch Ray play, I know he feels it too, that mystery, though he doesn’t feel compelled to examine it the way some overly analytical, can’t-leave-well-enough-alone woman might. Me, I got a million theories…

…like the standard psychological stuff: need for attention, compensation for lack of attention, need for approval, compensation for unmet emotional needs, delusions of grandeur, etc. etc. I’m not too proud to admit these all figure in. But I’m smart enough not to quit my day job. There’s no money in live music, not unless you sell your soul for stardom (uh...Mellencamp, Neil Diamond, Helen Reddy?). And there’s certainly no money in poetry unless we revive the wealthy benefactor system; that’s right, I’d do private readings in a corset, push-up bra and powdered wig if it paid a handsome monthly salary and included a velvet settee.

…like the need for an audience. I know folks think performers just want people to look at them. But if that were the case, I’d write rhymy, Hallmarky, funny or overly sentimental poems, because these are the poems people want to hear. Or I’d sing only Tammy Wynette, Patsy Cline or Aretha Franklin (sorry, Aretha) songs, because these are the songs people expect women to sing. Who wants to hear a poem about the burning of Joan of Arc or listen to an obscure song by Jane Siberry? It’s like wearing your lime green and yellow plaid jumper in junior high when everyone knows neutral solids are in. Everyone. Duh.

…like the fact that I’ve been performing since I could first form words. Singing “White Coral Bells” or “Row Your Boat” in rounds with Mom and my brothers was SOP for backyard work, family gatherings, dinner table. One of my earliest memories of my dad is him crooning “Autumn Leaves” or “Fly Me to the Moon” in the car, and us trying to sing along. And the closest I got to a religious experience at Twin Brooks Bible Camp (what were those counselors doing after lights-out, up over the hill?) was my teary daily wailing of “Old Rugged Cross” in the chapel.

…like it’s a healing thing, a vibrational thing. It’s chakras popping open. Sometimes when I’m singing, a little tremor starts in my sacrum, rumbles up my spine, lights up my solar plexus, shivers my brainstem, swirls around in my cranium for a nanosecond, then pours out my mouth like holy water. Don’t get me wrong—I’m not saying it’s so gorgeous that people in the audience are spontaneously baptized or grow extra fingers. In fact, sometimes it’s off-key, dragging behind the beat, and croaking like frog calls. Even then, though, it trembles in my bones and makes me feel blessed. In those moments, it’s just me & the waves. It can literally make me cry, it feels so good.

…like it’s pure physiology. Singing and reading aloud stimulate the frontal cortex in the brain. Therapists use them to ease stuttering. Some innovators are even using singing, “Melodic Intonation Therapy,” to re-wire the brains of stroke patients so they can regain lost speech.  Singing, according to neurology prof Gottfried Schlaug, fosters deeper connections and new pathways between brain hemispheres. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8526699.stm. So maybe I just like that wiry whole-brain supercharge.

But really, in the end, I think it's about release, about letting go. We take SO much in: responsibilities, obligations, frustrations, work, worry, sorrow, anxiety, disappointments, fear. Singing, and to a lesser degree reading poems, is an outpouring. When I close my eyes and sing, I can breathe. Seems ironic, I know, since singing actually requires more breath. But once the anticipation jitters are gone—almost the instant the song starts—everything else is gone and I’m as relaxed as I can get while upright and awake. Singing at home doesn’t get me there, either; part of me is just too aware that I can stop at any moment to put the wet clothes in the dryer, start the dishwasher, grade another paper. And the awareness causes tension. At a gig, though, there’s nowhere else to go, nothing else to do except let it out. No phones. No work. No worries. Often, no audience. Just those notes, the rhythm vibrating in the soles of my feet, the humming in my rib cage, the song. The beautiful, beautiful breath. Ah[ohm].