I need everything to be the same but also nice things that happen unexpectedly give me great joy. After 36 years I still haven’t figured that one out.
So when I’m in West Cork what I like to do is take my saz to Woodpoint and play, the audience mainly being the birds, but sometimes people are curious about this somewhat unusual instrument from Turkey. This is the saz.
And this is Woodpoint:
From 2011, I can’t seem to find a more recent relevant picture!
Last year when I first started playing the saz at Woodpoint, I had to play it acoustically, so if it was too windy I was out of luck, couldn’t hear it. But then I got this:
It’s a minature amp that can only be heard with headphones, but I love how portable it is, fits in the palm of your hand, and it’s got overdrive, reverb, delay and chorus, very versatile for something so small.
So I was playing the saz, having a great time, and then the wind picked up, which actually wasn’t a bad thing to happen given how boiling the day was. But then I started to hear a sound that was really joyful and very peaceful. At first I didn’t know what was happening. No I’m not about to tell you something spiritual happened, I’m not about to tell you my consciousness became one with the universe, no, nothing like that happened. It was really simple what happened.
The wind was blowing against the strings of the saz, with enough force to make a musical tone. But it wasn’t an aggressive sound or anything, it was this really calming and peaceful sound. So I had this really nice drone going, and I just let the bottom two strings sound, and I just played the top string. It was such an unexpected thing to happen, you bring an instrument out to Woodpoint, and then all of a sudden a very strong wind decides to help you make music.
Unfortunately I can’t let anyone know what it sounds like, because my amp can only be heard through earphones, but the nearest comparison I can think of is this, imagine the drone of a sitar combined with the sound of an Aeolian Harp, an instrument that is in fact played by the wind and sounds like this:
The distant between the strings and my fretboard is too low in places on my saz, causing a sound that is annoying when you play it near the top of the neck, but somehow the wind made even this obnoxious buzzing sound really nice.
Funnily enough last year I was absolutely hoping that when I brought my saz out to Woodpoint that it wasn’t windy, but next time I go there, I hope it is, because I can’t wait to hear that amazing sound again.
Oh and (if it turns out to be difficult I may regret committing to this, but anyway) at some point I’m going to do a blogpost on either the saz or on 24-Tet music (a type of tuning system often used with the saz.) So I hope you’ve all learned a valuable lesson, the wind doesn’t just knock things down, it also makes music! (But mainly it knocks things down.)
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