The Beat of a Different Drum

I’ve always envied people with musical talent. Those who can pick up a guitar, sit at a piano, or pull a harmonica from their pocket and instantly produce that magic that is music. I’m afraid I don’t fit into that category. While me Ma sent me to piano lessons as a kid, it was pretty obvious that bash away though I might, Rachmaninov wasn’t going to have to lose sleep worrying about the competition. When I finally told my teacher I was giving it up, I swear a look of relief crossed his face. Only briefly, but it was there.

It’s a terrible affliction, to be blessed with the desire to create music, but not have a shred of talent to back it up. The movie "Amadeus" is ostensibly the life story of Mozart but told through the eyes of his contemporary Salieri, who desperately yearned to create the same beautiful sounds, but knowing he lacked the gifts to do so, drove himself mad in the attempt. I’m not even close to him in talent, (although I often have cause to question my sanity) but I can relate to his desire.

A couple of years ago, I joined the Colorado Isle of Mull St Andrew Pipes & Drums with a goal of learning the snare drum. As my attempts to self-teach had proven unsuccessful, (harmonica, tin whistle, bodhrán etc.) I figured that I might have more luck in a group setting with more experienced musicians around me. And to a point, that was true – it’s a whole lot better to be receiving regular guidance from those who actually know what they’re doing, rather than attempting to guess how things are supposed to sound. But, there’s no escaping the fact that it’s a lot harder to learn a musical instrument at age 40 than it is at age 14 and as the months ticked by it got harder and harder to hide behind my ‘beginner’ status.

The thing is; talent or no talent, nobody improves without practice and this is another area in which I’m challenged. With my work hours and commute, there isn’t too much time left in the day for things I need to do, much less the things I want to do. Many nights, by the time I’ve arrived home, eaten dinner and prepared for work the next day, it’s time for bed. Exercising, walking the dogs, paying the bills and of course, practicing my drumming all eat into sleep time and I’m afraid I’m not as disciplined as I should be about keeping up.

The shifting dynamics of pipe bands mean that over the course of a couple of years, several members come and go. Some leave to join other bands; others decide the genre isn’t for them. Right now, I’m the only beginning snare drummer in the band – the others are all playing at competition standard. This makes it harder for the teachers to spend as much time with me, focusing as they need to on working with the higher level performers. I can still bash around on my own of course, but it means it will be even longer before I improve to the point where I’m playing at that level myself.

So when, a few weeks ago, my drum sergeant Megan floated the idea that I might like to give tenor drumming a go, I wasn’t totally against the idea. Tenor drums are a very different animal to the snare. With a beat something similar to the base, the skill of a tenor comes from twirling the mallets clockwise, counter-clockwise, in spirals and loops, in front of the face, down to the side and back again. The tenor line has always been made up of girls during my time in the band but Megan sent me photos of Grade 1 drum lines where the tenors were all men. Big, burly men she assured me. I’m neither big, nor burly but fragile male ego pacified, I decided to give it a go.

"Don’t give up the snare" I was urged, learn the two together and you’ll find that developing your skills in one improves your playing in the other. OK, I can do that although I did feel a nagging worry that if I don’t have time to learn one instrument, how the hell was I going to manage two?

As it happened that weekend I, along with a number of other drummers from our band and others in the area, was already signed up for a two-day band workshop. Megan was teaching the tenors, while the snare was being covered by a drumming god being flown in especially from out of state. I decided to spend the first day with the snares, and try my hand at the tenor on the second. If ever I needed confirmation that I wasn’t going to make it in the snare world it came that Saturday. Oh, I was OK for the first few minutes during the warm up exercises but as soon as we got going into the harder stuff, I just couldn’t keep up.

"OK, let’s try this" he would say and off the group would go, while I’d flail around, not even close to playing the same beat. It was abundantly clear that even when I win the lottery (my retirement plan) and have an infinite amount of time to practice, there’s no way I’m ever going to be able to play at that level. And we hadn’t even started on the intricate stuff yet. So, the following day found me the only guy in a room full of girls attempting to master the art of mallet twirling.

I have to tell you, it’s a lot harder than it looks. The mallets are connected to your hands by means of knotted shoelaces wound around the fingers, which means that as soon as one attempts to spin them, they cinch up tight around the digits, cutting off your circulation and coming to a screeching halt in one swift movement. In time, I improved to the point where I could spin the things for several seconds at a time but still couldn’t help whacking myself on the wrists, the head and the face at frequent intervals.

I’ve still to pick up a tenor drum, but I am getting a little better at the twirling. I can now swing the things for a couple of minutes at a time before something goes wrong. Maybe this will be the musical instrument on which I finally discover talent. Although I haven’t yet noticed the promised improvement in my snare drumming.

Still, it’s got to be easier than marching around with a piano.

Guising

Back in the day, when Halloween night rolled around, Scots children would go out 'guising'. I’m told the word ‘guising’ is very similar to the German word for 'ghost' and suspect that’s no coincidence. All evening long, ghosts, goblins and other scary creatures could be seen roaming the streets in search of goodies. Neighbors would open their homes to guisers and invite them to partake in such delicacies as lemonade, shortbread, treacle pancakes and black bun. (No, I’m not sure what black bun is either – some kind of suet based cake, I think.) However, and this is important, unlike trick-or-treaters, guisers had to perform for their sweets. Sing a song, tell a joke, do a dance; something.

Although I was born in Scotland, I grew up in the North of England where Britain’s ancient pagan traditions held less sway and Halloween wasn’t much of an occasion. Our big event came less than a week later on November 5th, 'Bonfire Night', or in actuality, the night before when following tradition, we wired car bumpers together, liberated garden gates and performed all kinds of other devilry that my parents don’t need to read about here.

But even in Scotland, guising was already dying out by the time I was in my formative years. Public paranoia over the issue of child safety meant parents were less enthusiastic about their un-chaperoned kiddies entering the homes of strangers. Likewise, strangers were increasingly reluctant to open their homes to un-chaperoned kiddies. That was sad enough, but to make matters worse, Britain’s youth discovered the American custom of trick-or-treating.

What’s wrong with that? I hear my American readers asking. We all grew up with trick-or-treating and it’s a charming tradition. Little kids dressed as pirates and bumble bees and whatnot, leading their parents up garden paths towards porches decorated with pumpkins and fake cobwebs where cheerful homeowners are ready to dispense vast amounts of candy. It’s heartwarming – how could you be opposed to that?

Well, because British kids never really got into the spirit of trick or treating. What we had there was a formed of legalized extortion with a sentiment along the lines of

"Give us something good or we’ll make you sorry."

I have to tell you it was quite alarming to open the front door and find oneself confronted with five or six thuggish looking delinquents, some of them larger than me but non in costume of any sort who demanded a reward in exchange for not breaking your windows or something equally unpleasant.

Worst of all this transition took place at a time when I was too old to partake but as a homeowner, was instead on the receiving end. Where’s the justice in that? No, I learned quite early on that the best way to handle Halloween was to switch off all the lights, and hide in the bedroom until it was over.

Which is what I did on my first Halloween as an American resident. We were still in Phoenix at the time although Dear Wife was out of town and I had no intention of navigating the minefield of an unfamiliar tradition by myself. As a newly married man, I had no money to go out for the night so I turned out all the lights which could be seen from the street and sat on the bed with the television turned low.

Somebody rang the doorbell anyway which sent the dogs into paroxysms of rage at this breach of etiquette but I steadfastly refused to reveal my presence. Although I did sneak to the spare bedroom for a peek out the window where I was heartbroken to see a little fairy tale princess, who couldn’t have been more than about 5 years old, traipsing disconsolately down the drive towards her Dad. I felt like the biggest scrooge on the planet and had to resist the urge to run after her shouting

"Wait! I don’t have any candy but here’s some uh, canned tuna!"

In subsequent years I got more into the spirit of the thing and invested huge amounts of dosh on candy to dispense to the little monsters that appeared every few minutes at the door. One year in particular I apparently overdid the largess as I realized upon opening the door to the same group for the fourth or fifth time.

"You’re the only one who has any candy left" they told me matter of factly.

I always tended to be somewhat paranoid about running out of candy. The prospect of cleaning raw egg off the garage door, or unwrapping toilet paper from the organ pipe cactus in the front yard held little appeal, and I was much more wary of the later arrivals. As the evening wore on, the innocent little toddlers were replaced by hockey-masked serial killers and corpse brides. Things got worse still as the nine O’clock hour approached.

Although our suburb could appropriately be classified as “white bread”, we bordered on a less salubrious neighborhood. Around 8:30 or so, a convoy of mini-vans would appear, out of which tumbled an array of gang-bangers, hoodlums and L.A. Raider fans. Halloween doesn’t get much scarier than that. I’m pretty sure none of them were actually packing guns, but that didn’t stop me wondering what these future Guests of the State would consider a suitable ‘trick’ should I not complete my side of the bargain. I always made sure to keep some candy in reserve for the later arrivals.

Since moving to our little cabin, down a dirt road, miles from the nearest town, trick or treating has become something of a distant memory. There are no streetlights up here and most homes are on fairly large lots which makes traipsing from house to house less appealing. Most of the local schools now host "trunk or treat" events where the little darlings can gorge themselves senseless in a perfectly safe environment. I’m not exactly sure how the process works, but they sound like a splendid idea.

Still, we usually get two or three groups coming a-knocking over the course of the evening so I made sure to stop at the gas station on my way home to purchase a bag of Reese’s peanut buttercup miniatures. I put on the porch light, poured the treats into a bowl and sat back to wait. Not one single knock on the door. What a disappointment.

Have you ever tried Reese’s peanut buttercup miniatures? You should, they’re really good. Just don’t eat an entire bag by yourself.

If anyone needs me, I’ll be lying down.