I'm fascinated by musical biographies, and in this case I don't mean carefully researched books about major musical figures. I mean the stories of regular people, whether career musicians or just engaged fans and supporters. I've often described a life in music as a long series of epiphanies - those moments when you say to yourself, 'oh wow' or 'now I get it' or 'I've never heard that before' and dug a little deeper down the hole because the last discovery made you feel good.
So I was taken by this weekend's post at The Score, the New York Times' periodic blog about music making. Daniel Felsenfeld describes his journey of discovery through various styles and artists on his way to becoming a professional composer. In a scene that reminded me very much of my own early life, he talks about trading tunes with his buddy who then lets him in on his private stash for a trial of something "really wild."
It seems implausible now, but the “something really wild” Mike held was not goth, metal, or punk. It was a neatly hand-labeled tape of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. He put it on, and I listened. I think it was then I actually heard music for the first time.
The whole article is definitely worth a read. And if you're interested, after the jump is the first excerpt I've posted from my book-in-progress about instrumental music and its often hard-to-access magic. It's a draft, and I'm not even sure how much personal story I want to include in the final work, but I wrote it and I'd rather get it out there than let it fester in my computer. If you have thoughts about it, or if you would like to share your own autobiography of musical discovery, I'd be excited to post it as part of a series.

