Sometimes it’s not about being perfect. Or even being in the right key. Sometimes it’s the thought and the fun.
Kevin, with the Charlotte Blues Jam had a birthday recently. It was on a jam night. After wishing him a happy birthday on Facebook and responding to his ‘see you tonight’, I asked if we should sing. To which he responded ‘Only if it’s Blues!’ Little did he, or I, at the time, realize he had thrown down a gauntlet that I apparently felt a need to pick up.
I spent some time lamenting that I didn’t remember, and therefore couldn’t play, the Beatles’ song, ‘Birthday’. And then I thought I let go of the idea of doing something for him. Apparently not. Because. Just a couple of hours before the jam, with me about to get in the car and head that direction, the idea hit me. And I couldn’t let it go. On the surface it seems like a simple thing to do. Take a blues song, change up the words to be a ‘happy 
birthday’ sort of song. Except I chose one of the more difficult songs for me to sing as my base song.
I worked on the new words in my head on my drive to the jam and then wrote them down as soon as I pulled into the parking lot. I had enlisted some help before I got in the car so once there, the last bit was to get ‘my help’ and me in the same band. That turned out to be fairly easy. And of course, then, as we got ready to start the song Kevin wandered off to get some food and drink. He nearly missed his song. Fortunately, there’s video.
The first song that came to mind to do the rewrite of was ‘I’d Rather Go Blind’. This is not the easiest song for me to sing. Why I didn’t think this through I have no idea except that I was caught up in the idea with a short amount of time to pull it together. There really 
wasn’t time to consider other songs. It worked out though. When we started the song everyone else thought we really were doing ‘I’d Rather Go Blind’. Until I switched up the lyrics.
Admittedly, I was a little off key. I’m a little disappointed about this, though not surprised. It turns out, it’s hard to suddenly sing a whole new set of words over a melody you already struggle with. Add to that, I hadn’t had time to learn the words so I had to read them from the scrap of paper I wrote them on. There’s a recipe for not the best performance. But you know what. It 
doesn’t matter. It was done in fun, good spirits, and genuine affection. When that’s the whole point, it’s not about perfect.
As I noted. There’s video. I’ll get it sorted out and posted as soon as I can. I’ve got one or two songs that I may need to get the names of at some point. I sang a couple of new, for me, songs. They went well enough that I’ll be working on them more so that they are a bit more ready for their next opportunity. It looks like we’ve got a couple of weeks before the next jam so there’s time for practice. Though it will be here way sooner than I expect. That’s ok. It will still be fun.
Enjoy some pictures that I pulled from some of the video of the most recent jam.
