A Perfect Tuba, Book Report...

 

I was in a local merchant recently. They were ready for the gift giving season and I saw a stack of these traditional kid recliners for sale. They were camo, apparently targeted to East Texas tastes. Rated for the 1-5 year old age group they probably sold like hot cakes. I expect some buyers remorse when these kids turn 12 and they don't want to do anything but hey, it was a good Christmas.  

I just finished reading this book, A Perfect Tuba. I've played the tuba since 1969 and how I came to this book is a story in itself. My friend Anne told me about hearing a podcast interviewing the author Sam Quinones and I checked it out. It looked good and as books accumulate around here like fire ants and yellow flowers I allowed I'd see about it sooner or later. In a few days the book arrived in the mail. I'm not sure if it was accidently ordered or maybe sent by an unknown friend but if that's so I thank them again. I enjoyed it and my wife says it makes me easier to understand.  

In the book, Quinones, who has written several books on the opioid addiction crisis weaves a story of the history of great tuba players and famous horns which advanced the possibilities of the horn and stories of kids that came to the tuba as a kind of last resort (my story) toiling along mastering an instrument that more often than not does not lead to great public recognition, money or compliment but instead furthers the person, the organization and the community in which they are a part. 

Quinones writes of tuba and marching band, "They offer us lessons in how to confront our mass market culture of addiction." He relates that a band director once told him that what he wrote about opioids, you see the answers to these problems in tuba and band. 

In other words tuba might be the answer to the 21st century word enshitification, which began meaning the decay of online services which once benefited the user but swung to less features and more cost to provide max value to the share holder and is a definition that has begun to apply to other areas in our lives such as politics and society. 

That child recliner is enshitification. Next they get their own TV and of course a product to put in the cup holder and while a TV is pretty cheap these days the real cost of all this as you can imagine is down the line. 

Get them a tuba which you really don't even have to buy since because of it's cost it's generally a school supplied instrument. Here's a clip of where my horn has led me. "Up on the House Top" is a simple Christmas song but on examination there's more there. It's the second oldest secular Christmas song behind Jingle Bells and was written in 1864 by Benjamin Hanby. It's the first to mention Santa Claus but Hanby who died in 1868 was more famous for anti slavery songs such as "Darling Nelly Gray."

You might not make money or get famous playing the tuba. I don't own a recliner but I do sit in a sexy S-Chair. I cover songs that lead me down a historical path. I think the world is a better place because of these things. Maybe on another day I'll answer the question of which comes first, the tuba or the player.