Echo Chamber

Music has always been around me growing up. As a child, I was often trying to learn how to play different instruments my family had scattered around the houses. At the time, I never really thought about that detail, but later I realized it wasn't just my life that music had always influenced — I had come from a long line of musicians.

Only recently did I understand that the crucible of teaching myself those instruments was a kind of coming of age. The moment where you stop being someone who plays instruments and become a musician.

I always enjoyed going to concerts and watching local performances. In high school, I realized that if I shifted my focus to music, I could graduate a year early. I almost did. Instead, I stayed. I chose to remain in the crucible a little longer — to hone my craft and give myself the time to decide what I actually wanted to do.

My family doesn't have too many crossed branches in the family tree — but because we were such a staple in the community, I was often confused about how I was related to everyone. Uncle John was one of those people. However we were connected, he was Uncle John, and he invited me over to his music night. Musicians sat around and played — pop songs, their own songs, their friends' songs. The front man passed naturally to whoever was leading that tune, or the next few. There wasn't a spotlight. It just moved.

When my Great-Aunt Sue gave me her father's fiddle, I brought it to Uncle John — one of the few carpenters I knew who worked on instruments. He told me the history as he knew it. That same music group meeting in his garage had grown out of the group my great-grandfather Victor played with nearly 70 or 80 years earlier. When Uncle John was learning to play, it was my great-grandfather's garage he came to. The circle had never really stopped — it had just changed locations.

Years later, I found myself drinking my sorrows at a local bar, playing sax at an open mic. I backed any singer who wanted it, and for most of the night, the stage was full — horns, strings, voices rotating in and out. After a few months, another horn player started coming around. He taught me things in his kind, loving way. (R.I.P. Marc.)