I was born naked and confused(like most of you). I had no clue as to why i was taken away from my comfort zone. Think about it, you've been floating around in a pool of tranquility and automatically fed through a tube i may have played around with occasionally for nine months. Everything is slow and peaceful underwater. Not a care in the world. The right temperature, soothing white muffled background noise, alone with my thoughts(assuming i had any). Suddenly you are abruptly yanked out by the head and flung into 'the chaotic unknown'.
Well, to this day, i seem to still be dwelling inside that "chaotic unknown". Suddenly I'm a divorced, 32 yrs old single father of two beautiful children fighting stubbornly to keep a crazy dream alive. According to a book i've read, i would be considered an introverted intuitive thinking perceiver. A natural problem solver. Well, it's not too far from the truth. I tend to pride myself in my ability to care, listen and provide for my children and my own ambitions.
Life has been about improving the quality of my family life and my musical abilities. I'm beginning to believe and accept the role of a curious father and a working musician. Life makes sense to me in musical terms. Being fascinated by the history, the psychology, the philosophy, the neurology, the theory and especially the evolutionary impact music has on all of us, i have learned to explain things using what i've learned through this age old art.
For example, my son has been recently diagnosed by his teachers, his doctor and the school psychologist as an ADHD child. Personally, I can't stand the idea of a 9yr being medicated without first exploring other alternatives that might help him focus. I must admit, i don't have a behavioral psychology degree hanging in my office but i do love to read about psychology and i do have the opportunity to try out some of scientifically approved methods with my students and have seen tangible results. Helping a child with ADHD (especially your own) with homework and to study for a test isn't exactly a walk in the park. It requires patience and a clear and manageable outcome.
Science can be a very intimidating subject for anyone to understand, let alone a 9yr old with ADHD. So is music, i just so happen to speak it fluently. I understand the ability and elements required to allow a musician to actively listen within an improvisational context. Music fundamentally consists of rhythm, melody and harmony. In what we call a "Jam", i usually find myself completely immersed in a dance between what is presently flowing and what i anticipate might happen. The more focused i am, the slower time seems to be flowing. For example: the drummer plays a repetitive groove, for the bassist to maintain some focus on what the drummer's kick is playing to provide a solid foundation on what to improvise upon rhythmically. When the rhythm guitarist strikes a minor chord on the off beats of 2 and 4, the lead guitarist has to understand that the minor chord requires a relative minor scale to improvise with. If the drummer decides to increase the intensity of his playing, the rest of the musicians will latch on to that while dancing around melodic and rhythmic motifs they hear around them. The overall sound and journey of the Jam is what makes this exciting enough to capture both the performers' and audiences' complete attention. Everything that is worth pursuing using intense sensory stimulation has a purpose.
My son and i had one night to cram all of this scientific information about sound waves, vibrations, acoustics, decibels etc. Using his senses to visualize sounds waves and how they travel along with my guitar to allow him to add some color to the sounds in his head, we managed to talk about the vibrations that allow the sound to travel in waves. Without him ever changing the subject. I used as many instruments and implanted as many visuals in his head to stimulate his information gathering process. It was an hour study that went well past his bed time. However, i am proud to say that for a kid who was starting to get used to getting C's... he was pretty damn proud of his B+ the next day i picked him up from school. There he was, waving that test in the air with an ear to ear smile worth second we spent exploring the world of sound that night.
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