Just a Song Sunday: The Return of the Song

It's been a long time since I've felt like bursting into song at any moment. I've missed that need to express myself in music, but it's starting to come back. You have no idea what that means to me.

I am a music therapist.

To me, that statement means that I am immersed in music. It is something that follows me everywhere I go. It is something that I do. When it is absent, I miss it.

I spent most of the past several years with music being a job instead of something that just happened. I spent most of my days doing music with my clients, but my own musical voice was pretty silent. I wrote songs for therapeutic music experiences (TMEs), but the songs were tasks rather than spontaneous expressions. I hated it because an important piece of my life was gone. I am relieved that I am starting to interact with my world through music again. 

The cat? Not so happy that I am bursting into song at any and all possible moments. Fortunately, she hasn't got to the point where she leaves the room when I walk in...yet.

I started to recover from this musical hiatus about three months ago. I started improvising with my clients again rather than doing the music I had planned to do. The need to create music became stronger than the need to sing the same old songs. This past week, however, I have returned to the constant singer of past days.

I wake up and sing to the cat. I am grabbing the instruments around me and improvising songs about things that are happening in the environment. When the students scream in the room next to the music room, I have to improvise songs to go with the screaming. (Most of the time, that's because I am getting ready for sessions and already have the guitar in my hands. I challenge myself to figure out the pitch of the screams, and then I go! I've been singing songs about life not being fair, about staying in the classroom, about leaving peers alone, and various and sundry other things.) I am interacting with the world through and in music again, and that is something that I love.

The downside to all of this? (Of course there is a downside - it's me!!)

With the return of improvised songs and constant music in my life, my composition practices are suffering. I'm making wonderful music, but I can't capture it or remember it enough to write it down. I think I should spend most of my life with a recording device attached to me, so I could capture those moments of musical fun and engagement. Oh well. At this time, I think that the music that is shooting out of me is not supposed to be fixed. I think that this music is supposed to be fleeting and not captured. Eventually I will get to the point where I can remember that music for longer than the duration of the song.

I am singing again.

For any and all reasons - a song is my way to interact with my world, and I am thankful for that.