At the break that first night, I was asked what I did the previous summer (a standard question), how I found out about the Abominables (another), and then told that I had to sing or play an Elvis song. While thinking about it, I told them that I'd not imagined what a delight it would be to be an accordionist in a marching band, because, like everyone else, I get sheet music with only single notes -- no multiples on the right hand, no chords for the left. It's almost easy! Then I played and began singing "Love Me Tender" and they all joined in singing.
The music is harder than I thought it would be. Never having played in a band, I initially had trouble keeping track of multi-measure silences, so I didn't know where to come in. Now I can calculate with the best of them, but I have trouble keeping track of where we are when I'm trying to play a tricky part -- one that's fast, syncopated, or with a swing tempo.
But I really enjoy it. I keep going back, week after week. I'm gradually catching on. I've almost memorized our (I started to say "their" but am determined to belong) signature song, "Sing, "Sing, Sing".
I played my first gig with them a couple of weeks ago -- the Atlanta Jugglers' Festival at the Yaarab Shriner's Temple, the back of which is right across the street from home. That's me in the back of the rest of the woodwinds, in the fedora Ian gave me. (I told them that the accordion is made of wood, so I must be a woodwind.) It was a hoot.
It was also the first time that I could hear myself play. The band is a true marching band, with plenty of brass and woodwinds and drums. We practice at the Little Five Points Community Center, in a room just like a high school band room. It's small and it's very noisy. I have to really pump it to hear myself. I started out with the flutes, in front of the trumpets, but moved across the room to get away from the strongest blats. One night, when I didn't have the music to something, I looked on to the music of the clarinetist next to me. I could occasionally hear faint sounds coming from my box, and they didn't sound entirely right. But it was only afterward that I learned how something with one sharp is actually in the key of F for a B-flat clarinet...
It was the same clarinetist who told me to stop worrying about whether or not I was playing the right note, or even in the right measure. "Just play whatever you want," he advised. I still don't know his name -- or hardly anyone else's, except Bruce and Charles (brooms), Bill Scott (trumpet -- and the only last name I know) and Tuba Diva (Souzaphone).
They're all very friendly. I told someone last Tuesday night that I wouldn't be joining them for the Mardi Gras performance tomorrow, and she was genuinely saddened.
It must be in my fate to be part of this. The morning of the Jugglers' gig, I met Marie and her Saturday morning run group at the Georgia Tech Starbuck's. When I walked in, they were playing "Sing, Sing, Sing" on the PA. It must be fate.
After rehearsals, a regular group repairs to Manuel's Tavern for beer and fellowship. I go about half the time, because I want to get to know some of them better. I'm hoping that I can find someone with whom to make music on a regular basis. Any kind of music, but preferably something where I can be heard. Or at least hear myself.
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