i've been on and off moving some things around in our house during my jazz listening today (so the currently upbeat good ass Patrice Rushen tracks are helpful) and my brain, when directing my body to do repetitive low attention tasks like "move stuff from a to b", wanders.
today it wandered to family music.
so, while I'm taking a break from wearing a path in some floors, I'm going to ramble, thread-style.
there's a social dynamic that's arisen over the last 20? years maybe wherein two acquaintances might find themselves at a conversation point where one asks the other "so, are there any musicians in your family?"
and then the other participant will either list off a sibling or two who played in band in school, maybe a parent who sings.
and then it's off to other topics, often, as I've seen it happen anyway.
so teaching each other music, and practicing music together, became part of social things, so that music could be shared. it's always been that way for sung music, but with the advent of the industrial revolution and some other economic changes it became easier for common folk to get inexpensive instruments. and they did - they loved it!
with the rise of consumerism and institutionalized learning and some other things, music started to become an add-on activity to life.
some people do music. other people don't, they just listen to music.
and everyone said "well, of course - some people just aren't good at music. they just aren't meant to be musicians! and that's okay!"
like I said, not all of my greats and grands were good at making music, but they did it.
some were - my aunt Minnie played church organ for fifty-some years without missing a single solitary week.
but it didn't matter either way - they learned because they did it together, they were shown and they practiced, not formally, just together as a family.
@djsundog I met a chap here in England whose family were all involved in gospel music. He said he wasn't good at singing and playing piano, but then he played. He was excellent (he was comparing himself to his musical family, I was comparing him to most people). Anyways, the reason I mention him is we're FB friends and he posts videos of e.g. black gospel families all singing together at home. I don't dig all the God stuff, but such videos leaving me longing for such everyday musical culture.
@jdaviescoates I grew up as a preacher's kid, so that was a big part of music in my early life too. I'm not involved with any church any more, and yeah, the musical void that left made me reconsider re-joining a church if only for the regular social music opportunities.