Bygones
http://lounge.espdisk.com/archives/887 (best) http://espdisk.com/alansondheim/bygones.mp3 I married my first wife in the late 1960s and three people, Rhoda, Bill, and Jagdish, gave us a sarangi as a wedding present. I never played it; it was far too difficult. It's inscribed JUNE & ALLAN LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER! LOVE, Rhoda, Bill, Jagdish That didn't happen, and the instrument remained at our parent's house in Pennsylvania. Finally my sister took it and hung it on the wall at her home in Toronto, and later, at her cabin. Recently, I asked for it back and picked it up this past weekend, when Azure and I went up for my niece's wedding. The sarangi had never been played. One of the sympathetic strings was broken. I brought it back, and have been tuning it up. The inscription haunts me and I thought of playing a threnody to so many lost years, lost friends, lost communities. I've been morose and at the same time, wanted to make the sarangi sing. I repaired two strings and a crack, tuned the main strings low, to G, reset the position and angle of the bridge, untangled everything, cleaned it up. I tried different bows, settled on an old Indian one without tightening it. I wanted to play something called bygones for myself, and as a welcome to the instrument itself, and as a gift to Azure. It's all harrowing and confused. Here's the music, errors and all, running over four or five octaves. Thanks to Azure and Margie and everyone who puts up with me. _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
