Oh dear...I'm getting that little twitch to travel. I'd convinced myself, that this year I'd stick closer to home, and work on the songwriting craft from here....but that darn Nashville Songwriters Association keeps sending me the emails that remind me that the songwriters symposium and Tin Pan South are coming up in two months time. And guess what, as convinced as I was...now I'm not! I can't help but remember what a wonderful experience last year's event was....and darnit I wanna go back!
Last year's trip was about as spontaneous as Cecil and I get to be (after we organize for the cows, and the boy, and the....) Okay, spontaneous isn't exactly in our vocabulary...but it was reasonably spur of the moment. I was at the tail end of recovering from my surgery, so I wasn't too immersed in work, and the cows hadn't started calving...we knew Bianca and Lisa could handle what needed to be done at home, so we made the decision to go for it!
I'd bought my brand new 1992 Corsica the November before (okay, 15 years old isn't exactly brand new, but with only 27,000kms, it felt pretty close) so we decided to hop in her and head south. Being convinced that by the time we got out of the car again it would be warmer, I put on my comfy blue moomoo and sandles. I wonder if the vehicle, the attire, and our conviction we were getting to Nashville in both had anything to do with the amount of time it took us to get through customs???? Whatever it was, they sure did tear us apart!
By 8pm the following night, we'd arrived. I can hardly describe the feeling of arriving in that city for the first time, when so much of your life has centred around music. It absolutely put a lump in my throat just thinking of those who had walked these streets before me.
Over the course of the next 5 days we saw it all...the Opry, the Rymann, the Country Music Hall of Fame, the streets and shops and musicians that are everywhere. But none of what we saw, could compare to the people we met. The syposium allowed me to connect with songwriters from all over the states, and even a few more Canadians! It was a really unique experience for me, because as you may or may not have guessed, there are not a lot of songwriters in Lavenham, Manitoba. Coming from a town where I'm the only one I know of to a city where I'm surrounded by 25,000 other songwiters all dreaming of thier big break, well I can tell you it was a bit of a shock to the old system! But, man, what a wonderful group of people to connect with!
Where else in the world though, in the course of five days, could you find yourself having the opporunity to meet the legendary Mac Davis. Or spend time chatting with Steve Fox after his gig? OR...put the knowledge you gathered from being a loyal Oprah fan to use, and actually find Davis's General Store and be able to eat a bologna sandwich on the same bench where Tim McGraw and Faith Hill go for their's? And I don't even like balogna for crying out loud...but darn it tasted good that day!
Heading for home, we couldn't be that close to Graceland without actually seeing it, so we made the stop. It's ablsolutely surreal standing at the foot of Elvis's grave, and being in the centre of all he held so dear. Wow.
And we can honestly say it was a whirlwind trip home....who'd have thought we'd be outrunning tornadoes through 3 states in March! But we made it.
Yup.... it's just calling my name. I have about nine more weeks to convince myself that that's not where I need to be. I'll keep you posted on how that goes.
L
www.musicwriter.ca
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