Weave - Meeting through Music

Author

Aaron Gabriel Neyer
August 02, 2024

Welcome to the Weekly Weave!

Woven Web is a community rooted in Boulder Colorado and reaching beyond, with a deeply held vision for a more connected world. We seek to find greater harmony between technology, society, and nature through facilitating communication and understanding and developing systems for connection.

In this Weave

  • Meeting through Music

  • Coming Up in Community

Meeting through Music

Music is one of the most essential forms of communication that humans use. For millennia, we’ve used music to transmit culture and to connect with each other. Observing the patterns of music throughout time enables us to understand the changing tides of culture; and making music allows to participate in this ongoing cultural conversation. Sharing music is entwined with sharing culture, and sharing culture enables us to connect with a far greater degree of meaning. How many people are you friends with because of music?

Here in Boulder, and in the wider area, we have a thriving and evolving arts & music community. We have some fantastic venues where amazing musicians regularly perform, such as The Velvet Elk, The Fox Theatre and The Boulder Theater. We’re also just a quick skip from Red Rocks, with it’s continual stream of world-class musicians, as well as from Denver which is ranked 8th in best music cities in America.

What makes the Boulder music scene really special for me is the grassroots music scene, which as I perceive it, has been gaining more and more momentum lately; at venues such as Roots Music Project, but also in people’s homes and backyards. We gather together, share food, and enjoy beautiful music by local upcoming artists and also by more established musicians who continue prioritizing grassroots community. Sometimes these are more publicly hosted events, such as by our friend Aly with Conscious Roots Presents, and other times these gatherings are coordinated via WhatsApp threads or personal text messages to friends.

Recently, my housemates and I have hosted a few kirtans and song circles at our house, as well as musical jam nights. And last night I attended a house concert at another friends house. I love how these intimate gatherings help us grow community, but also how it helps each of us grow musically. Music is a language and like any language, the more we are exposed to it, the more adept we become at using it. And particularly when we have opportunities to get to not just witness, but also participate, such as in a jam, a song circle, or a kirtan; this active participation grows us as musicians and enables us to connect deeper with each other.

In The Music Lesson by Victor Wooten, Victor’s teacher expresses that in order to get good as a musician you have to jam with other good musicians. Just like how as children, we are regularly jamming with other expert english speakers; witnessing it being done really well and given lots of space to mess up. I think this lesson is applicable to so many areas of life; and can help us not just become better musicians but grow our skills at interacting with one another throughout all of these facets of existence. And it starts by surrounding ourselves with open-minded humans who can help us grow, and being willing to be playful and make mistakes that enable us to genuinely learn.

Keep an eye out for amazing musical opportunities shared in the “Coming Up in Community” section; and also remember, many of the best opportunities are shared from friend to friend in this intimate process of building community. If you need a friend, don’t be afraid to ask.

Coming Up in Community

Thanks for tuning in. Reply to this email and let us know what you’re thinking and how you’d like to engage with community. And forward this email to someone who you’d like to participate more in community with!

See you in the web,

~ aaron gabriel & woven web