The Singing Bones

The Beginning of Things

Starting something is always hard.

I named this blog with the idea of the fairy tale in my head. The Singing Bone.

Link: https://www.grimmstories.com/en/grimm_fairy-tales/the_singing_bone

A story that is, at it's core, about how no matter how hard one may try to conceal the truth, it always comes out. It always sings. I feel that way about writing sometimes. I can try to hide in it but really, it's all just me. Me in fancy dress. Me playing. Me running away.

I mostly wanted this blog to keep track of things that inspire me or make me think and to have a place to put some of the random thoughts and avenues that I end up going down. To help me remember where I've been, essentially. And if anyone does happen to read it and have some things to add or expand upon then that's awesome, too!

I had some ideas of what the first one could be about but as I was reading today, something came up that I thought might work perfectly.

It's an excerpt from John Purser's study, 'Scotland's Music: A History of the Traditional and Classical Music of Scotland from Early Times to the Present Day.'

"Connections between bird-song and music and speech and piping cannot be given a time of commencement. In the European context we can go back far enough to satisfy the sceptics - back to our first visitors some eight thousand years ago... Pipes are as old as man's ability to take a bird bone, which is naturally hollow, and blow through it, perhaps adding a hole in the side to add a note... Just such a pipe was found on the coast of Denmark dating from 5000 BC."

This captured my imagination immediately. I thought about this early human sitting around, full after a meal, perhaps. Turning this small bone over and over in his hands until he raises it to his lips to blow. Music. The beginnings of piping. A singing bone. What an idea.