At the end of freshman year, I added a music minor because a girl I liked was adding one and dared me to do it with her. (By the time we graduated, she was my accompanist.) The next fall, I took Baroque/Classical Survey and dominated with minimal effort and maximum enjoyment. At the same time, I was on the verge of failing Biblical Hermeneutics. To be completely candid, one night at 3:30 A.M., unable to sleep for the 10th consecutive night (this is all very Esther Greenwood of me, I know), I sat on my bed with a month’s worth of prescription sleeping pills and a glass of water. But, by some miracle, I decided to change my major instead, rolled over, and was asleep within seconds. The next day, I skipped all my classes, went to the registrar, and filled in mountains of paperwork.

Things just kind of took off from there.

Until every grad school I applied to rejected me. Now I’m useless again.

I once watched an interview with Michael Tilson Thomas in which he told a story about a family member (a parent, I think) who used to take a stuffed toy of his and pretend it was playing the piano. What the toy would play, of course, essentially amounted to a series of tone clusters. He goes on to talk about how, as a result, he grew up with a love of dissonance, because so many pleasant memories were associated with it. (I think this was part of one of those brilliant programmes Sir George Martin presented on the basics of music a few years back. I wish I knew where to find the clip.)

thanks for the great quality of your blog, each time i come here, i’m amazed.

black hattitude.