those patio lanterns
learning the rhythms of our parents
Few things say summer in Canada like sitting on the patio of some restaurant and listening to a mediocre cover band and for me it really is my favourite way to hear live music. You can have your big name concerts and music festivals. Give me a patio with traffic going by and some guy and his friends singing songs I already know. Give me a plate of nachos and whatever IPA you have on tap and I’ll have a perfect summer evening, even if they are terrible. Maybe even especially.
There was one young woman who I remember as having long blonde hair, but that could just be because she had that whole 20-teens trying to be late-70s hippie chick thing going on so my brain created this image of her that doesn’t really exist. We were at the Smoking Buddha, one of our favourite patios even if it is a little pricey so we only go once or twice a season. She did her own thing to the songs in her set list and more often than not it took me most of the song to figure out what she was singing. I didn’t care. The point of these restaurant patio bands isn’t their ability to sound like whoever they are singing. It’s their willingness to be the soundtrack to our summer.
I like to imagine what their winters are like. The guys, and it is mostly guys, getting together at each other’s houses to practice. Getting sent to play in the garage because they’re loud and she’s trying to get the kids to sleep and can’t you practice at Josh’s house this week? Why does it always have to be here? Or maybe their kids hang out with them while they practice in the afternoon, playing air guitar or using badly dented drumsticks on whatever is nearby. Growing up listening to the Tragically Hip and U2 like their dads grew up listening to Led Zepplin and Kim Mitchell. Classic Rock, that album-oriented drum and guitar driven 4/4 beat, is called dad rock for a reason.
What are their weekdays like? These dads who take the stage Thursdays and Fridays and sometimes on Sunday afternoon. I have a hard time picturing them as white collar workers, but that’s probably unfair. In fact, it is probably more likely that they are white collar workers because everyone else works shift work which makes committing to rehearsals and restaurant gigs more challenging. Not impossible, even shiftwork has a regular rhythm, but more challenging if you are trying to coordinate schedules.
It can be hard to coordinate schedules. Think about the last time you tried to get together with more than one friend. How far out did you need to plan? Did everyone show up? These guys get together every week to practice and they commit to patios all over the place. I have to be impressed by that.
Last week we were at a patio and there was a little guy, a toddler whose parents were still counting his age in months. He was completely taken by the two singers who, in response to his attention, launched into a children’s song I did not recognize because my own children are decades past that stuff. But I recognized it as a children’s song and this little person recognized it too because he started dancing. They went on to more standard fare afterwards, but this little fellow just kept standing in front of them, intermittently keeping rhythm with them until his parents had enough even if he hadn’t, and they disappeared into the party room where something was going on.
Clearly these two had little ones at home, unless they’re also moonlighting as children’s birthday party performers but I didn’t get that vibe. It just seemed like one of those genuine moments that grace our lives. A couple of friends who get together regularly to play the music they love had a moment with a small child much like their own. I belong to a hand drum group and every once in a while we sing a familiar children’s song just because we know that one of the children present likes it.
See, I get together regularly with friends to sing too. Most Wednesdays that hand drum group gathers at a Friendship Center and we sing songs, children running around until they are old enough to take their own seats. They don’t play air guitar, but they do use small drumsticks to try and copy the rhythm of their mothers. It’s a group that has been getting together in various forms for eight years now. Every year we celebrate with a karaoke party and in this and so many other ways we aren’t that much different from those guys with their cover bands.
Something magical happens when people sing together. My youngest told me about it years ago, he’s been playing Irish music for decades now and when I first started attending this group I messaged him to let him know that I’d found the magic too. Our children become part of these circles, our rhythm becoming part of their internal cadence. Whether it’s dad rock or mothers with hand drums or melodies from overseas, music is how our ancestors reach out to us trusting that we will carry them forward into the soundtrack of our children’s lives.