There is stillness, silence, a small gust of air then a tinkle of chimes. No one moves in the world yet the music plays softly. The wind chimes are disturbed in the breeze. In their disturbance they sway against each other creating music, a miniature orchestra which emits a tuneless melody. There is no sense or pattern in the music, there is no consistency with the unpredictable wind which conducts them. It is a confusion of notes working with and against each other. The unstoppable wind plays the chimes without their consent. They are destined to create music as they hang in the air. The chimes are the instrument, the breeze the musician, the music the inescapable result of nature.
Like the chimes that are played by the wind, so is the Aeolian harp. Strings strung across the sound box, across the air cavity. It sits in the wind where invisible fingers seem to pluck the strings. The sound resonates through the harp, humming notes that seem to come from another world. Again the wind is the musician who plays a tuneless melody. The sound is a compilation of notes that moan and hum. It is eerie and mysterious, yet it is beautiful. The strange mix of sound sends chills through the body, nothing seems to play the instrument and the instrument itself doesn’t look as if it is being played. Instead this music seems to resonate from no distinct place. It is as if the music is everywhere, surrounding us. Maybe this is true, the harp is played by the wind, the air that is constantly around us. The music is created by the air and thus it is in the air, surrounding us even when it is most inaudible.
If air and wind are the essences of music then I myself am an instrument. Music rushes through me so naturally that I think little of it. Like this music that courses through me so does air. It rushes in and out of my lungs. I am unable to stop this and it is this air that plays me. Like the Aeolian harp and like the chimes I am played by an invisible force. This air, the music that runs through me is my life. With this life I create music, I take that air in and with it I make new music, audible music. This music is what I share with others, I play for myself but the world is now involved. When I create music I am involving the outside world in the inner workings of the music that runs through me.
It is this air, this music that rushes through me that keeps me in harmony with the world. At the lowest of moments, when I feel most out of tune with the world it is music that brings me up to catch my breath and stabilize me. Over time music has become more important to me, more of it courses through my body. I have come to realize that I rely on music as much as I do on air. Without it I wouldn’t work right, I would hardly be considered alive. My body might still keep running but emotionally I would suffocate. It is music that keeps me emotionally in tune when my stress and anxiety threaten to flatten me.
Not only is it the beauty of creating music that keeps me going but the community that music builds. The family that is built in a band, the ability to rely on your fellow musicians, this is part of the beauty of creating music. There is a need to support each other, one part is not complete without the other, there is a balance needed that all bands strive towards. No instrument being overpowered or gone unheard. Each instrument, each musician has their part to play, they support each other and this support seeps out like air under door sills to be present at all times. A musician’s ability to rely on another musician doesn’t stop when instruments are put away. A community is built, this community becomes a part of the air, it is a part of me and I live off it.
Like those chimes that sway in the breeze it is nature that pushes me to make music. I have no choice, it is a part of me, it is part of who I am. I can’t place where it comes from; the music seems to resonate from everywhere within me. I am an Aeolian harp, the music is untraceable, it resonates from within me. It is strange and beautiful to live off of music, to have music support you through life. How have I come to rely so heavily on it? There is no easy answer. Why is music so important? I can’t answer that, it just is. For some unknown reason the beauty of music has entered me as easily as air, now that it’s there I don’t think it will ever leave. No one can stop breathing once they start, not until they pass on. Even then air continues to flow, living on for the use of others, to keep others alive. Music is the same way, it never dies, even when the musician has come and gone, the music stays behind.
I breathe in music as I would air. When I exhale it is to make music. Like the wind chimes I will always hang in the wind, exposed to the elements of nature and like those wind chimes I will continue to make music no matter what I am exposed to. We are both played by the wind and music is in our nature. While I am played like an instrument I am kept in tune, I may never discover where the music inside me resonates from. It may stay as mysterious as the music of an Aeolian harp. Yet, the music that runs through my body like air will never stop, it will always keep me breathing.
