la la la

I'm sort of sick, I kind of feel like illness is creeping up on me. A sort of siege against the fortress of my body, with an epic battle soon ensuing on the microbiological level. I need to rest my head soon. I don't know if I'll be able to write down everything that's happened lately; not that anything special has occurred recently, but I still feel like putting it all down from my thoughts into words.

Tonight I went to the church band rehearsal for the first time in a long time. I was the first ever youth to become a member of the church praise and worship band. I debuted on the bass after learning some basics my father taught me a week before. He called it a crash course on learning how to play the bass. I knew the notes of the four open strings: E, A, D, G. That was pretty much all I knew and all I went by. Back then, the church band was my dad on vocals and keyboard, Dodi on guitar, Rob on bass or drums, then there was me, taking over the bass guitar for Rob so he could make use of the drum set. I got pretty handy with the bass, I knew some pretty cool licks and knew my scales pretty well despite being constantly criticized by my father. I soon learned guitar and started playing that during praise in worship. The church band started to grow with Matt learning the bass, other youth kids bringing their school instruments to band practice, and several adults wanting to serve the Lord with praise and worship. It is now almost a miniature orchestra, complete with: a cello, two violinists, a professional flutist, a drum kit with alternating drummers, a percussion set, a piano, a few alternating bass players, and anything ranging from one to five guitar players, with ages ranging from twelve to whatever. To make a long story short, I quit playing the church band because my father, a veteran musician, would never ever criticize anybody for their musical capabilities or lack thereof. Anybody but me that is, I was the only person he ever criticized but I don't blame him. Leading and conducting the mismatched and musical group that is our church praise and worship band can be very, very frustrating at times; and he's take out his frustration on me, pointing out every mistake I made while everybody else made the same mistake. I understand why he did that and I don't blame him, but after so many years of putting up with it, I decided to leave. And I did. But tonight I came because my father has been feeling kind of under the weather and left Dodi in charge. It was nice praising the Lord with music again, maybe I'll start coming back to the church band. I'd like to not play guitar though, since there is a sufficient amount of guitar players. I'd like to play banjo or mandolin or something like that. That'd be cool.

I learned this old hymn today, it's called "Be Thou My Vision". I saw David Bazan of Pedro the Lion play it on youtube and decided to learn it. It's a really awesome song. I think I'm going to play as a special number next Sunday. I'd like to incorporate my harmonicas.

I also learned a Decemberists song called, "The Crane Wife 1", today. The Decemberists are so awesome, I'm going to to have to write about them another time though. I still need to learn the lyrics but I learned the basic chord progression and melody.

Ugh, I need to go to bed now. I have to get up early for band rehearsal tomorrow morning. I didn't get to write everything, but oh well. Goodnight.