Don’t know what brought it to my mind, but this morning I suddenly found myself thinking about the incredibly wide variety of musical experiences I’ve had in my life.
If someone asks, I explain that I had a career as a classical flutist. One could get the idea that all a classical flutist plays is classical music, but that certainly wasn’t true in my case!
Well, for starters, I went from piano to flute to saxophone before finally returning to study the flute seriously. From age 15-20 I was a saxophonist and Big Band Jazz was my world. I was in five different big bands, playing the music of Stan Kenton, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Thad Jones-Mel Lewis, Vince Gauraldi, and Chuck Mangione, to name a few. It was a lot of fun!
During that period I also spent a (very) short time as a member of a rock band; it simply didn’t take.
I moved to San Francisco, determined to make a living as a musician, and that’s when things got really interesting. To make it as a freelancer I took pretty much every gig that came my way.
I played for Noh Oratorio Society; The Flute Exchange; the show orchestra at the brand new Marriott’s Great America; recordings at Skywalker Ranch; for tips outdoors at Ghirardelli Square (where I was also asked to be part of a TV movie!); for lots of orchestras; and for a gazillion weddings and parties.
But maybe the most unusual gig was the one that popped into my head this morning, after not having thought about it for–oh, about thirty years! And that was the Chrysanthemum Ragtime Band! Yep, I played and recorded for a ragtime band.
When I look back at all the different things I’ve done, I’m grateful that I worked most of that karma out of my system before I came to Ananda. By the time I arrived, I knew with crystal clarity that my happiness did not lie in the next big performance or prestigious gig, and that knowing has allowed me to dedicate myself 100% to Swamiji’s music and to making it more available to the world.