Rehearsing

Today I spent some time rehearsing for an upcoming show. I went through a whole set in order, which I confess is something I often don't do. It's more common for me to play a song or two...take time away for another activity...then do a couple of other songs. I can keep the songs fresh that way, but I don't experience the full flow and rhythm and shape of a whole show, which I need to do to be fully prepared. Over the last few days, I've been taking that time to rehearse the show completely.

I think of the word "rehearsing" as looking ahead to the future: preparing for a show, visualizing it in advance. But when I'm actually singing the songs on my own, today, the experience feels more like reminding or reconnecting...a referring back to songs I love and the feelings I had when I wrote them.

Just now I wondered what the origins of the word "rehearse" are. I found out something interesting. The word is said to mean "to repeat" (that's true: we repeat the songs over and over to improve our performance) but the origin of the word comes from "re" plus "hercier" which means "to strike" or (here's the interesting part) "to harrow".

"Harrow", a word I wasn't familiar with, is an agricultural term referring to a tool with spikelike teeth which is drawn over plowed land to level it, or break up clods, root up weeds and so on.

So...to rehearse, then, is to re-disturb the earth...to unearth again..to stir up deep-rooted feelings that have perhaps been smoothed over or tamped down under the pressure of our daily walk.

Now that's more like it...that's what rehearsal feels like to me.

It feels like digging in the ground and finding something new again.