Finding It

I'm glad to really have this opportunity. There have been times here and there when I would listen to music I have recorded with different people throughout my life and I would often return to a group from my 20's where the music seemed to have something. I did a lot of music since then, but it seemed more like I was working hard to make it good enough, but could not reach the goal. I was getting closer and closer, but the image of an old black man with a beat-up guitar on a street corner, playing something true, kept popping up in my mind. Was it that I really had nothing to say? Was it that no matter how much I polished the recorded tracks, I would find the music lacking? Why is it that the image of the old man, broken and worn out, stuck in my mind? The music just poured from him, and the notes were right, even when they weren't in tune.
Then I just plain got lucky. I assembled a group of friends and my son and requested that we just try to play some songs they made up. Instantly, the songs were not much like the original ideas, but something special that was created in the room by this bunch of guys. The music poured out effortlessly, just like my fantasy of the old black man. It dawned on me then, that art is not work, it is something that wants to escape and that is what is happening now...