Music and poetry

For years, I’ve been somewhat skittish about the idea of combining music and poetry. I’ve always thought of poetry as containing its own music, and saw additions as unnecessary bells and whistles.

The project with Faro has changed my mind somewhat. I’m not only hearing my older poems set to music, but I’m hearing music in my newer poems — not necessarily hearing music behind them all, but definitely noticing a more musical influence on the way I stitch sounds together, rhythms, etc.

All this also means that I may make it to the Lizard Lounge soon — finally. I’ve always held out against it because I did not want to perform with the Trio. I’m less concerned about that now, and actually think it might be fun.

There’s also a guy in town — Bob Jordan — who’s been bugging me for years about doing a CD with me. Bob used to work with Eugene Chadbourne playing guitar and doing tape effects on some of his tours. I like what he does, but never took the idea of the project all that seriously. I may revisit this soon.

It’s good to take a road less travelled — especially for someone as old and snobby and set in my ways as I am. While I try to take risks in what I do and vary my style as much as is needed for the poem in question, I also recognize the limits inherent in my approach, and I haven’t been as comfortable lately in what I’ve been writing. There’s always the voice in my head saying “been there, done that — or if you haven’t, someone’s done it better.” I need to break my patterns. This is helping.