I have a Pete Seeger story, too
I was a high school student in 1991, sitting outside of the Emory University main auditorium, practicing my banjo ahead of a performance as the opener for the opener for the opener for ... etc. the Indigo Girls. An old dude came up and listened, and started humming along. (It was an old-time-style song I had written, "Bury Me at Sea"
. He listened, and hummed, and tut-tutted occasionally. Finally he looked down at me and said, "you're doing it wrong".
"Huh?"
"You aren't playing the whole song. You're playing each bar. Can I?" he reached out.
I was worried (this was just some random old dude to me), but I figured what the hell, and I reluctantly handed it to him, and he played it pitch perfect, clawhammer-style (I had been playing bluegrass-style, with fingerpicks; he just translated it). "Did you write this?" he asked.
"Yeah"
"Not bad. But you aren't playing what you wrote. Do you know the whole song in your head?"
"Yeah, I do."
"Then why are you afraid of it? Stop being afraid, and start playing. Play through the measures; don't be afraid of them. Heck, hold your left hand longer than you need to. It's your song." Then he looked straight through me. "Whatever music you make, it was what you meant to make, you got it, kid? Don't be afraid. If it's your music, you can play it. Now go out there."
He handed the banjo back to me and walked off. Some roadie who had been running in explained to me whom I had just talked to (I knew my dad liked him, and my dad generally had good taste in music, so I was suitably impressed). In the inevitable anticlimax of life, I still had two hours before I went on, but Pete's words, and his particular voice, still stay with me whenever I perform. It's your music. Don't be afraid of it.
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