Practice Makes...

I paced my apartment. What should I do? I talked big game about being able to find a place where we could practice together, but now I was drawing a blank. Well, that’s not entirely true; I could think of a few places we could practice, but they’d all surely cost money. Right now we’re not exactly bringing in enough revenue to make a paid space worth it, at least, not if I want to be able to make rent this month. Shit, rent. There’s only two weeks left, and I’m still down over a thousand dollars. I need to think of something, and quick.

Well, I figured it couldn’t hurt to get a quote on the private rooms they have in the back at the music store. Maybe since I actually bought something, rather Sunny bought something, Doug would cut me a deal.

I called up the music store. “Hey Doug.”

“Hey Jimmy, what can I do for ya?”

“You’ve still got those practice rooms in the back, right?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s your hourly rate on renting those out? Sunny, my bassist, and I need somewhere to practice together.”

“For you, no charge.”

That caught me by surprise. “No charge?”

“No charge. I’m making an investment.”

“An investment? In what?”
“In your band. Music is more valuable than money to me. I hear ya play in the store all the time, and I overheard a little o’ her playing the other day as well. You two are seriously good, you got some real potential. That’s why I’m investing one of my rooms into your band. I’m fanning the flames, so to speak, and in return, I expect the two o’ you to make some great music. And… if ya make it big, I wouldn’t be opposed to some free concert tickets.”

“You bet Doug, thanks a million.”

“No problem, those rooms never fill up anyway, there’s always at least one empty. Feel free to drop by anytime we’re open. Oh, and just because I’m letting you two use a room doesn’t mean free picks and strings, you hear? You still gotta pay for those like everybody else.”

I chuckled. “I hear you, thanks again.”

“No problem, you two are gonna go far, I’m sure.”

I hung up the phone and immediately called Sunny.

“Jimmy! Hey, what’s up?”

“Hey Sunny, great news, I found somewhere we can practice for free!”

“Where’s that?”

“You remember the music store we bought your amp from? Well, Doug, the owner, said we can practice in one of the soundproof rooms he has in the back.”

“That’s great! When do you want to meet up and practice?”

“Are you free today? I’m kinda in a tight spot. I’ve only got two weeks until rent’s due, so I’d like to get our act together and fit in as much busking as we can before then.”

“Yeah, gimme like an hour and I’ll be good to go.”

“Sounds great! See you then.”

I looked over at my guitar. Usually, whenever I have some downtime, I like to fit in a little practice, but it didn’t make much sense to practice before going to practice, so I decided to listen to some music instead. Luckily, the flip phone I bought still supported the music app I like, so I didn’t have to worry about making new playlists.

When it was time to go, I grabbed my guitar and portable amp and headed out. When I got to the music store, Sunny was already waiting inside. She waved to me. I led the way down the hall until we found an empty room. It was smaller than I remembered. The two of us could still fit, at the cost of our personal space. I thanked the powers that be for granting me this opportunity to get so close to her, right after I had admitted my feelings to myself. I had never noticed before, perhaps because we had never been in such close proximity, but she smelled sweet. Was she wearing perfume? Did she put some on just for me? Did she know I like her? And more importantly, does she like me too?

Before I could ruminate on the thought too much, she spoke. “It’s a little cramped in here, isn’t it?” she said, blushing.

Flustered, I said, “I remembered it being bigger, I guess I’ve grown since the last time I was in one of these. Or maybe it’s because I’ve never been in one with another person.”

Still blushing, she continued, “shall we get right into it?”

I nodded.

We ran through the setlist without much difficulty. I could tell she was much more comfortable playing around me than around strangers. She had almost no difficulty immediately finding her groove, bobbing her head along to the music.

“What now?” I asked, wiping the sweat from my brow. “That sounded great.”

“It sounds great in here, but how do I know I won’t mess it up again next time we perform in front of an audience?”

“Hmmm… Well, you seemed to be able to overcome your anxiety after the first few songs, right?”

“Yeah…”

“Well, how about we really focus on practicing the openers, that way, no matter how nervous you get, you’ll have so much practice under your belt, you won’t be able to mess up even if you tried.”

She smiled. “Alright, sounds good.”

We ran through the first three songs a dozen or so more times. Even though I couldn’t hear any audible improvement, that wasn’t the goal of our practice. It was to build confidence with these songs. To drill them into our muscle memory. Once I was satisfied that we had practiced enough, I set my guitar down.

“I think that’s about good.”

“Are you sure? I still don’t feel completely confident…”

“I doubt you ever will from practice alone, you’ll only ever get that from performing. Eventually you’ll have to take that leap of faith.”

“Can we run through it one more time…”

“Of course, and just because we’re done practicing for today doesn’t mean we’re done practicing forever. We can always meet up an hour or so before we go busking to warm up, that’s what most professional musicians do.”

“Really? My previous band never did that.”

“Did you guys perform?”

“Yeah, we were pretty popular. We played in front of pretty big crowds sometimes.”

“How did you deal with the nerves back then? if you don’t mind my asking.”

“I didn’t really get nervous back then. My stage fright didn’t start until recently.”

“What changed?”

“I messed up, in front of a huge crowd no less. That performance was one of the main factors that led to us breaking up. It was so bad that my bandmates screamed at me. They told me I was worthless as a musician, that I had no talent, and the only reason I was in the band was because I was the guitarist’s girlfriend.”

“That’s not true at all, you’re a great musician! Don’t let them, or anyone else tell you otherwise.”

“Thank you. Yesterday I said that joining a new band was my way of moving on from my previous relationship, well, that’s only partly true. It was also my way of proving to myself that I am a good musician. That I can get into a band on my own merit. That’s why I was so adamant about doing the interview and audition properly. I needed to prove to myself that I could get in on skill alone.”

“Well you’ve certainly done that. You want to know the first thought I had when I heard you play?”

She nodded.

“I could immediately tell that you were a better musician than me. Even with all the time I’ve spent practicing, I still wasn’t even close to your level.”

She lightly punched my shoulder, smiling. “That’s not true, you’re way better than me!”

“I don’t think so at all. Now that I’ve had a lot of time to think it over, I can see that we both excel in different areas, probably because of our differing musical backgrounds, but in terms of overall musicianship, I think you’ve got me beat.”

She smiled.

“Alright, you said you wanted to run through the openers one more time, right?”

“Yeah!” she said, excitedly.

I grabbed my guitar and we got right back into practicing.