Musical Musings

My sister and I had a musical rift for a long time. She liked country music and I couldn't stand it. The very sound of it instantly depressed me. I loved jazz and she couldn't tolerate it. I wondered about that a lot - why was it that what sounded so perfect to me was so agonizing to her?

There's a lot of music from the seventies that I associate with my early childhood. My parents had a pretty good collection of albums and we had a big console stereo in our living room that we'd play records from, especially on Saturdays. My dad always had music on as he worked in his studio, and since my room was right above the studio, I could usually hear what he was listening to. And we always listened to music in the car. I used to thumb through the rack of albums, or sort through the stack of 8 tracks in the car, and match up the artists with the music as I formed some pretty strong opinions about what I liked and what I didn't like.

The short list of what I liked:

The Eagles
Jim Croce
Harry Nilsson
Elton John
The Bee Gees

The even shorter list of what I didn't like:

James Taylor
Carole King

The thing about James Taylor and Carole King was that it bored the life out of me. When their folksy type of music was on I just wanted to get away from it. I didn't like the sound, to me it sounded like neediness and melancholy.

But then, in the summer of 1993, just after I'd come home from England I began to like Carole King. My dad had a new Toyota MR2 and we would drive around in it because he liked to test its capabilities on Sandhill Road and he had a new CD by Carole King called, Colour of Your Dreams, which he really wanted me to hear. I don't know whether it was the wonder of the setting - being home again, being in an awfully fun car with my dad, being enveloped by the music from the Bose sound system - but I loved it. And I still love it. I can't say I started listening to any of her older stuff, but the sound of King's music is now like a link to good times, it's comforting and familiar.

As of last night, I like James Taylor too. He was performing in the Conference Center along with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Utah Symphony and I went to see the concert with my mom. I was happy to go to an event, but I can't say I was very excited to hear James Taylor. I'm also not a huge fan of choir music, although I completely admire what they do and how good they are.

Right when he started singing I felt like a kid again. I remembered sitting in the back of a car, going I-don't-know-where, and then I thought about curling up in a warm spot from the sun as it filtered through our drapes onto the green shag carpet in our living room and walking out into the driveway while music was coming from the garage.

The sound of his voice had a powerful effect. For nearly two hours, I though nothing of my life now. It was all just music and memories. And I really enjoyed it. I felt almost a kinship to him, in a weird sort of way it was like I'd made amends of some sort. He was taking me back to a different time and that was really nice of him.

I haven't done it yet, but I may download a few James Taylor songs and just keep listening.

Crazy.