Fiddles

[David]

The fiddle
becomes a
violin

at moments
of extreme
emotion,

quitting its
habitual
chaffing

to sing
like a native
of old Wien.

[Elphin]

Hello old chap

Walked up my local hill this morning. In the lee of the cairn at 500 metres or so after chaffing through snow flurries, biting wind chill and some hefty gusts with my jaw so numb with cold i could hardly bite my apple, this poem came to me and I realised such moments are when this old fiddle becomes a violin.

Cheers

elph

[Antcliff]

Some Hardy...any excuse.

http://www.daypoems.net/poems/1076.html

[David]

If it's a poem you can take outdoors, Elph, I'm even more pleased with it.

One of my favourite Hardys, Seth. He never needs an excuse.

Cheers both

David

[Arian]

Well, I can't claim it's come to me at a moment of extreme emotion, not yet anyway, but I enjoyed it all the same. It's neatly executed, with a pithy form of expression that gives it an almost aphoristic nature.

Can't help feeling that the title does it no favours, though. I can see where you're coming from, but it doesn't seem to capture the spirit of the piece, somehow. Almost trivialises it.

Cheers
peter

[Nash]

I like this one David. It seems such a slight piece on the surface, elegantly written of course, but slight. But it's more than that though isn't it? At its heart is a very complex metaphor which brings to mind the Chinese concept of Wu Wei, well that's how I'm reading it.

If you're not familiar with Wu Wei then:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_wei

But I think your poem sums it up quite nicely.

Thanks,
Nash.

[Nash]

Oops, forgot to mention that I agree with Peter about the title.

[David]

Thanks Peter. I agree with you (and Nash) about the title. It was but a moment's work, and it shows. I didn't want to overfreight the poem with too portentous (thanks Ros) a title, though.

Nash, I am not remotely familiar with the Chinese concept of Wu Wei. Or I wasn't. I am now, or at least I've got some cursory acquaintance with it, so thank you for that. I think there is something about it that I was trying, obscurely, to express in the poem, so I'll be thinking about that. And (talk about overfreighting!) I've been reading Rilke lately, and I think he comes into it somewhere too.

It seems such a slight piece on the surface, elegantly written of course, but slight. But it's more than that though isn't it?

I've been thinking of it in terms of a slight thing that is (or would like to be) less slight than it appears, so I'm really glad you said that.

I also like the fact that it's (I think!) quite musical.

Cheers both

David

[Antcliff]

Rilke? Vienna, Old Wien....and I thought you were just punning. I associate Vienna with waltzes of course but not especially with fiddling that is expressive of extreme emotion. I am missing something here I think.
Seth

[Nash]

I've been reading Rilke lately

I've never read any Rilke. Something is telling me that you're reading him in the original German, David? But do you have any suggestions of good translations for us monoglots?

[David]

I've been reading Rilke lately

I've never read any Rilke. Something is telling me that you're reading him in the original German, David? But do you have any suggestions of good translations for us monoglots?

Ha ha! Sort of. I have a dual language anthology, so I struggle through the original with my A Level German, then read it again using the translation as a crib, to see how close I got the first time.

The book I've got is this one: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Selected-Poems- ... 480&sr=8-4

I don't think the translations are that great, but they definitely give you the general idea.

[James Major]

David? But do you have any suggestions of good translations for us monoglots?

Hass has a dual Edition of the selected Rilke; he's considered one of the best at capturing him. Patterson, also just took a run at the sonnets to Orpheus.

[brianedwards]

I've been reading Rilke lately

I've never read any Rilke. Something is telling me that you're reading him in the original German, David? But do you have any suggestions of good translations for us monoglots?

The Mitchell translations are widely regarded as among the finest Nash.

Enjoyed this David. Very musical yes, the last line elevating it to the quality of violin. Clever I think. Well played.

B.

[Suzanne]

Oh, that is nice.
I like how it( somehow? magic+talent) makes the instrument someone the reader would like to know.
Enjoyed.
Suzanne

[ray miller]

Lovely poem about a wonderful instrument, fiddle or violin. I love the rhyme of chaffing and native. 3rd verse is great.

[Nash]

The book I've got is this one: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Selected-Poems- ... 480&sr=8-4

Hass has a dual Edition of the selected Rilke; he's considered one of the best at capturing him. Patterson, also just took a run at the sonnets to Orpheus.

The Mitchell translations are widely regarded as among the finest Nash.

Cheers chaps! Much appreciated.

[Wilcken]

Hi David,

One of many reasons I like this poem is the fact that I'm a huge fan of Andrew Bird,

who pretty much plays it any old way he wants to.

This is so, so succinct of you to present the arc across the gap between classical and old world folk as a moment of "extreme emotion." There is just so much cultural and psychological subtext there. Hope you find the right name for it.

Wilcken

P.S. to Nash, I have to say since James mentioned Hass, that I read a fantastic essay by him called Looking For Rilke. I've read some by Mitchell as well. I'm no expert and I know there is tons of discussion in play on the topic of the preferred, if not the best version to read. I think the important thing is that we do.

[BenJohnson]

I keep coming back to this David just to enjoy the execution. You have provided us with a complete thought that is a stepping stone to a whole host of other thoughts. I started thinking technically that a violin is a fiddle, the difference in the perception of it, but of course you already acknowledge that here. The extreme emotion calls to mind the scene in 'Waking Ned' where the fiddler sustains a high note to the point of the string breaking. The nod towards Austria is neatly introduced as well.

Title aside this is a beautiful piece.

[James Major]

I like the elegant spareness of this, David. And, as has been noted, it is deceptively simple. My only reservation, if I am reading this right, is it seems to put one musical form above another. 'Chaffing' has negative conotations; you seem to be saying/ valueing classical over folk. My reading may just be informed by a certain defensivness as I grew up with the, 'fiddle' and its music, very much as a soundtrack in my earlier life. You could read this as in moments of extreme emotion, 'both' lift the medium to unexpected heights, but given the comparative structure, it is difficult to escape a sense of one form being marginalised but capable of dusting itself off and mingling with those of a rarer and delicate sensibility.

Regards

PS. Loved the Andrew Bird link, Wilcken. Hadn't heard of him before, but I'll be hunting down more.

[Antcliff]

My only reservation, if I am reading this right, is it seems to put one musical form above another. 'Chaffing' has negative conotations; you seem to be saying/ valueing classical over folk. My reading may just be informed by a certain defensivness as I grew up with the, 'fiddle' and its music, very much as a soundtrack in my earlier life. You could read this as in moments of extreme emotion, 'both' lift the medium to unexpected heights, but given the comparative structure, it is difficult to escape a sense of one form being marginalised but capable of dusting itself off and mingling with those of a rarer and delicate sensibility.

I am rather with James here.



Seth

[Wilcken]

Funny how many phrases I began and backspaced over trying to get to James's point. (Funny how it ends up, in the context of this topic, a self-reflective moment to look up the possessive of James yet again and it just sounds so pretentious, the proper way, though even the experts disagree.) I went through this same struggle about what sort of discriminatory value was being assigned to the fiddle versus the violin, and I landed in the place where I realized that one person's insult is another's compliment. So, what if the tables were turned on the violin here, placing a higher value on the moment where (in this scenario) the fiddle expressed "extreme emotion?" On the one hand it felt to me like this would reduce that moment to a raw emotive state that only the common folk can really put on a good show of (savages); a mere loss of control rather than the beauty and poignancy demonstrated by the lovely and very composed violin. But that would also be called the violin chaffing. So on that hand, it triggered a much larger history than Vienna's musical roots could ever contain. Words like "old" and "native" almost became fightin' words in defense of the fiddle. I realized how much classism (and resistance) this perspective suddenly brought up in me.

But then, as the poem is, there is that word "chaffing." Now I could really stick my foot in it here but I think you were on to this, David. What kind of an ass would call the sound of a fiddle, categorically, something like "chaffing?" A big pompous stuffed shirt of an ass, if you ask me. But it is precisely the suggestion of such an accusation that sparks within so many of us the tension that runs underneath the deceptive simplicity of this piece. We care called up against ourselves to sort such things out.

This morning, thinking more about this (and having so little personal knowledge to go on) I'm struck by the old chicken and egg question, in this case "what came first, the fiddle or the violin?"

I bet I've not made my point as lucidly as I might, but I have my day job to keep.

Wilcken

[Antcliff]

Hi

Whilst clearly with the fiddlers (and blowing a little at the idea that natives/instruments of Vienna are somehow the high end of emotional expression) I should add that I rather like "chaffing". For me it conjures up that amiable bantering that is seemingly typical of folk fiddlers. It is of course a product of needing to keep the audience from wandering (and to rest the hands during the gig). If you go to an Aly Bain/Phil Cunningham gig it is one long "chaff" until of course you get the sublime expression of emotion, on the fiddle. And then back to chaffing and the gags.

Seth

[James Major]

It has just occured to me that if you changed the title to: Fiddle, ie. meaning rubbish-- He's talking fiddle, then you could nicely subvert my arguement.......
Regards

[brianedwards]

Going against the grain has never been a problem for me, so why stop now: I LOVE the title. Sets the reader off in a suitably trivial tone that is then elevated by the final lines. Fortuitous brilliance if you ask me.

B.

[James Major]

.....deceptively simple, indeed. Why would the title be interpreted as,'trivial?'