samurai photographer vs. a crimson grail pt. 2.5
AHHHH, AMPLIFICATION AT LAST!
I got to play through the Park I borrowed from DV today. I think that first E chord is still reverberating through St. Paul's nave.
It still scares me to hear such volume/power coming from myself. I don't know if I will ever get used to it. I guess I feel that once my sounds become amplified, they aren't mine any longer, but someone else's. Or not. I sort of don't want to identify the reason why, I'm not ready to accept the real reasons why I'm so hesitant to play loud.
I keep thinking to a few years ago, when someone I cared about very deeply told me that hearing me play in the Branca orchestra made him feel emasculated. Hearing that triggered a long-silent voice in my head, and the flood of "You're just like a guy/you're more like a boy than most boys are/you don't play like a girl" thoughts washed over me and made me question every creative decision I have ever made.
These past two days, rehearsing with 200 other people, I noticed there's more than the usual 5 women playing. I'm happy to see them. I want us to be visible, and to play music perceived as "boy" music, because I don't want any female musician to have to feel like I felt (and still feel, occasionally) that day. I don't want female musicians to think that they have to play "pretty" music to be considered "good musicians" - this seems to be less of a problem in New York than in some other cities.
Most of all, I don't ever want to be made to feel like less of a woman because of the music I choose to play. Hindsight tells me that the problem lay in this person's own insecurities, but that doesn't mean that his words didn't really hurt. The wound was there before he was, but he happened upon the best way to re-open it. It will never go away completely, at least not until I allow myself to play loud, through an amp, without an instant twinge of guilt. And that's my issue to deal with.
I got to play through the Park I borrowed from DV today. I think that first E chord is still reverberating through St. Paul's nave.
It still scares me to hear such volume/power coming from myself. I don't know if I will ever get used to it. I guess I feel that once my sounds become amplified, they aren't mine any longer, but someone else's. Or not. I sort of don't want to identify the reason why, I'm not ready to accept the real reasons why I'm so hesitant to play loud.
I keep thinking to a few years ago, when someone I cared about very deeply told me that hearing me play in the Branca orchestra made him feel emasculated. Hearing that triggered a long-silent voice in my head, and the flood of "You're just like a guy/you're more like a boy than most boys are/you don't play like a girl" thoughts washed over me and made me question every creative decision I have ever made.
These past two days, rehearsing with 200 other people, I noticed there's more than the usual 5 women playing. I'm happy to see them. I want us to be visible, and to play music perceived as "boy" music, because I don't want any female musician to have to feel like I felt (and still feel, occasionally) that day. I don't want female musicians to think that they have to play "pretty" music to be considered "good musicians" - this seems to be less of a problem in New York than in some other cities.
Most of all, I don't ever want to be made to feel like less of a woman because of the music I choose to play. Hindsight tells me that the problem lay in this person's own insecurities, but that doesn't mean that his words didn't really hurt. The wound was there before he was, but he happened upon the best way to re-open it. It will never go away completely, at least not until I allow myself to play loud, through an amp, without an instant twinge of guilt. And that's my issue to deal with.
posted by Jodi S. at 1:49:00 AM
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