celtic music | beth magill

I am currently in the aftermath of three amazing Swannanoa Gathering programs that have just ended – Traditional Song Week, where I was mostly a student and a guest staff for two events; Celtic Week, where I was “all student”, and this last week, Old Time Week, where I pretty much stayed away.

I was exhausted from the first two weeks of staying up very late, imbibing a bit more than I usually do, going from class to class to slow instrument jam to concerts to a dozen other “Music Camp To Do’s”, leaving about 4.5 hours of sleep per night. We were all operating on the same schedule! Well, many of us anyways. Some folks are smart and make bigger deposits in the sleep bank during the week. I am not one of those people… because it has been an entire year since I’ve seen these “music camp cousins”, there is entirely too much fun and music and catching up to do to get a proper amount of sleep. Responsibility can come later, after all these dear folks have returned home, and the sound of constant fiddling and fluting and concertina-ing have ceased…

I also stayed away because I was badly in need of some down time from being around several hundred people and living in a dorm for two weeks. Wowza.

So I moved back home for Old Time week. When I went back out to campus for just dinner a few nights, I noticed two things: A lot of wonderful people around… and, I was out of the loop. Irish flute and Old Time music just doesn’t mix around these parts. At times, I felt a bit sad and forlorn about it. It is just the way it is…

I must admit I am feeling a bit lost without my buddies from Celtic Week right now… This is hard… and, it is always the case this time of year. It always will be, as well.

Here are some of my pals from this year’s Advanced Flute Class with Kevin Crawford. We Irish flute players don’t often get to hang as a pack like this!

I bless my amazing music community, when I am both in, AND out of the loop.

What amazing music community is yours?

Whether it’s your church choir, the monthly singing session, the concert series you go to, the symphony or the summer concert series in your town, it’s important to have one. To me, anyways. We need each other. We need community. And when it’s musical, it’s magic.