A few years ago my sister told me of an expierence she once had. I would like to relay that story and pose a question.
She was traveling by car on one of those long road trips. You know the kind. You start out all refreshed and ready to hit the "open road"...six or eight hours later your hair is standing up on one side of your head and there's french fries stuck to your shirt.
She's in Mississippi or Alabama, pulls off the interstate into a rest area. It's 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning. As she made her way to the restroom she could hear crickets and interstate traffic in the distance. As she got closer she could hear something else...singing. There was an elderly cleaning woman in the restroom. Sliding her mop from side to side singing, Amazing Grace how sweet the sound...
Sis stopped outside the door and just listened. Taking in the song, the source and her surroundings. That song at that time made quite an impression on her. Me too I guess. It's been a few years since she told me about it. Music has the power to rivet us to a place and time.
It doesn't even have to be a spiritual song. That power is as real as it is hard to define and begs the question, when do you play what?
A good friend of mine has a Bar B-Q business. I asked him how he developed his menu. He said "I cook my food the way I like it, if other folks don't care for it they need to be eating someplace else, I cook to please me"
Some of you pro musicians are expected to play a certain style of music because thats what you are paid to do. Even then, do you always play the same ones in the same order?
or do you change it up depending on how you read the croud?
I,m not a pro, but I get this question: So and so said you play the harmonica, why don't you play something for us? Sure, what would you like to hear? I don't know, just play something.
Michael