A lot of my favourite pieces of music—and styles of music, I guess—are slower, broader, deeper, more sweeping, and unapologetically meditative.
One of my favourite memories of Ottawa Chamberfest a couple years ago was lying down flat on my back in delightful exhaustion, surrounded by my cameras, beside the audience seats at La Nouvelle Scene on King Edward, listening to Rachel Fenlon premiere a piece by Matthias McIntire, “Sing Nature Alive From My Insides” (and how’s that for a title?). I hope it gets recorded eventually. I remember it being amazing.
There’s a student where I teach who I had a bit of an inside joke with—she would say “mister—slow…” and proceed to walk very slowly. That was it. I would do the same. We know nothing of each other otherwise—I never even had her as a student in any of my classes. But the reminder to be slow is a really important one for me—a recurring theme.
I tend to want to go, go, go—keep going—and as long as I don’t look down, cartoon logic will keep me floating on air.
But sometimes you need to look down, face and ponder what life is all about, and accept the bittersweet answers.
And when I open up a little, that’s where it begins to connect, and we see each other. To those who see me and remind me to be a little slower—thank you.