August 5, 2010

Cue Music, Please.

In my mind there is always music playing -an accompaniment to the various thoughts and scenes that play out minute by minute.  In truth, much like the sense memory a scent can bring on-I can hear a note and attach it to a current stream of thought.  Like now.  Yep.  Just had one.

I blame it on my youth.  I used to sit with my ear right up to the speaker as LP after LP dropped down onto the record player.  Motown, Mammas and the Pappas and the original cast recording of Hair.  As I got older, and my record collection grew, I knew just the song I wanted to hear that played well with my thoughts.  There was not much I did not like.  And then, years later, on the first day I began studying with a master acting teacher, I learned the value of all that music.  We were instructed, on that first day, all of us eager to act. to be, to find the music attached to the scene we were given.  I knew then I was at the right place.  And when,as it happened, the teacher directed the very first play I performed in New York, we found the music as a cast, that would play through the transitions and beats of the show.

And so it has been. 

I am like a shark, in that, I don’t do well when I stop.  I  need to be constantly moving. I drown when I stop.  I get confused when I stop.  Disoriented.  It is hard for me to focus if I am not moving.  I need the music and the constant flow of thought to stay creative and alive.  It works for me.  I know when to hit reset.  I know when to turn the LP over. Fast forward.  Rewind. Pause.

Begin again.