Here I stand amongst the crowd.

Unable to see, but that is ok.

Because from here up at the back,

I can feel you, the music,

sweep over me like it always used to.

 

You see for a while, I’ve been distracted.

So many things have happened to me over the last year.

Life has changed.

For the best reason, a beautiful baby girl.

 

It wasn’t that I wasn’t listening to you my other love.

God I was.  When I was pregnant and felt more connected

than I ever have to myself, you were there.

I would sway as I listened and would pat my growing belly

and hope that my baby would grow to love music as much as me.

 

I used you to calm myself as I was in labour,

As I felt like I had to go to places I had never been.

As I needed to feel something other than the pain.

To be stronger to make her come to this world safely.

 

I used you in sleepless nights.  I used you to rock

my child to sleep. I used you when I needed to cry.

I used you when I wanted to be distracted.

I used you when I was remembering a different me.

 

But to be here while it is being

performed live like it is just for me,

makes it feel more real. It takes me back

to who I was before and integrates with who I am now.

I feel reaffirmed. I feel connected.

 

You see from down here, I can close my eyes

and let it sweep over me, for all the pure sound

and movement I want it to be.

It makes my soul creep from the depths, in and out of the room

like I am the beat in the air amongst the beer stains,

the trying and the tired.

 

Your sound resonates within me and moves me like

I am in a different time and space.

And you are so young to be so talented.

I am grateful for people like you in this world.

 

You are up there on your own and so many things

are coming from you-emotion, experience, love, hurt,

laughter, sadness, transcendence and there is more I don’t need to list.

So I write this as thanks to you and to all the other

musicians and artists and creatives dead and alive

who move and inspire me.

 

Maybe you read this, maybe you won’t.

It’s not about that.

It’s about the respect that we as lovers of music feel

when we are in a crowd or at home or in a car or a space

when it all comes together.

 

When you are dancing or listening or singing along.

Or even like I often am now.

Finding myself in some strange dance or movement

with my baby and remembering when I would be so immersed somewhere.

In some club or place, lost like I was some other person.

Or no person at all.

 

Like when music was my religion and that was all I needed.

I write this as thanks for bringing me back down to the ground.

Wednesday night I went to the Corner to see Tash Sultana. I still can’t believe she is so young to be so incredibly gifted-but I’ll get back to that though.

See on this particular night, there were so many things I was thinking about.

I was thinking about the best time I went to the Corner nearly 9 years ago. That was the night I met my now husband and life went on a trajectory I had never thought about before.  I thought about how lucky I am because that night could have gone any other way.

Life is like that with the dealing of cards.  You want to think that you get the good ones but sometimes they turn out differently and you feel like you have to scrap yourself from the gutter to feel real again.  There were those times for me. Times where I did stupid things, sought solace in the wrong people and felt empty. That life seems so incredibly far away now, that it is almost like I imagined it.

But it is important for me to remember those times to be grateful for what I have now.  I think you need to have the black, rainy days so you can appreciate those beautiful sunrises and sunsets, the nights out partying with the best of friends or conversations that make you feel and inspire just as does the most amazing artwork, or architecture or movie or music does.  It’s all about those connections however they form or are articulated to you.

Maybe this is a mouthful to ingest but for me nights like Wednesday, when you are listening to music that transports you to different memories……is like the  unexpectness and beauty of life that you didn’t think you deserved but when in those moments makes you realise you do.

So back to the talent that is Tash Sultana –a one-woman performer who is only 21 I think.  She reminded me so much of my younger cousin Anna – a resilience and pure soul that gives.  A traveller perhaps.  But I can tell Tash has been places and has places to go.

Watch this space…..

On this night, I thought about friends and family, I thought about all the music that had inspired me throughout my life and how that reflected as me as a person.  I like so much.  Those who know me might call me unique or weird or a dag or many other a thing, but I think the eclectic nature of my tastes is a reflection of who I am and I’m so ok with that.