I have always loved the saxophone. I may live with a guitarist and I love what he can play with it, but there’s something about the sax that just blows me away. It’s my favorite instrument.

When I was in grade seven, we had one elective that changed every six or eight weeks throughout the year so that we would have an idea as to what we wanted to choose to take the following year. This included Technical Drawing (I was pretty good at that, much to my shock), woodworking (I was even better at that, and that’s what I ended up choosing), Art (nothing killed my creativity quite like a barking Art teacher), and Music. I already knew how to play the recorder, so I probably would have been best suited to the oboe, especially with only having a handful of weeks to play it.

I did not choose the sensible oboe. I chose the sax. The tenor sax. I was so proud to have a shiny albeit banged up saxophone in my grasp with a little package of brand new paper-thin reeds, and wow was I going to have fun practicing.

Have you ever heard an elephant die painfully on the plains of the Savannah? Me neither, but if I did come across such an experience I am willing to bet good money that it would sound exactly like me, playing the sax.

Luckily for me, my own horrid attempts did not destroy my love of the saxophone. Prince put out a song called “Partyman” and Candy Dulfer was featured in it. That sparked my attention, and then I discovered the collaboration between Candy Dulfer and The Eurythmics’ Dave Stewart, “Lily Was Here”.

I loved the song, and I still do.

I thought of her the other day and went YouTube-ing and found a great deal of excellent music that she’s put out since those old days. She is absolutely amazing and no matter how much I loved the sax I never had a chance of sounding like Candy. But that’s okay. Now that I have her most recent album, I’d rather just listen than try to play!

(Duh. Some “Friday” flashback. I wrote it up in advance and saved it as a draft. And then I forgot to publish it. OOPS!)