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Allison Larkin

Internationally Best-Selling Author

You are here: Home / 3Ws / 3Ws – Peter Mulvey

3Ws – Peter Mulvey

October 8, 2014 Filed Under: 3Ws, music

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What do you create?

Having thought about this for thirty years, it’s this: I create evenings of musical experience. I mean, I write songs, and I make records, and sell those records, and my music gets played on the radio and in people’s houses and in their cars… but all I ever wanted to really do was play gigs. Ever since I was little. And that’s what I’ve done: played gig after gig, hundreds of nights a year for decades now. It’s ephemeral: there’s a thing that happens when the singer, the listener, and the song all come together and click. Whatever that ineffable THING is, that’s what I hope to create, and sometimes I actually do create it.

Why do you create?

Because I want to. Ani DiFranco has a song that contains my creed in one handy little verse:

I do it for the joy it brings
Because I am a joyful girl
Because the world owes me nothing
And we owe each other the world
I do it ’cause it’s the least I can do
I do it ’cause I learned it from you
I do it just because I want to
Because I want to.

What do you consume?

Poetry and prose, more than music. I probably read three or four poems a day on average, and I read novels, essays, articles, non-fiction books, especially lately books on consciousness. Also I consume calories to ride long distances on bicycles, I do that a lot, and I consume the sights and sounds that go in through my ears and eyes, the hawks and herons, sandhill cranes, the leaves falling in the streams beside the bike paths. And I consume as much silence as I can muster in my chaotic road life: ten or twenty minutes on the meditation cushion, or if not that, then silence in the car. Of course I do consume music, fairly voraciously, but weirdly less so these days. I don’t worry about that. Much of one’s aesthetic is forged early, when you’re listening obsessively. People speak of having a well: I have a swamp. It feels enormous to me. For instance, a while back I bought a tenor banjo, and started learning Irish fiddle tunes. Not to play at gigs, and not that I expect those melodies to wind up in my tunes… just because I’m the great-grandson of an immigrant, and because I love the mood and nuance of that music. So I feel like I’m pouring a few gallons of that bacteria into a corner of my swamp. Yay. Stuff will grow there.

Also I consume avocados and apples. And lots of strong coffee, the greatest drug on Earth.

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Links

Website: http://www.petermulvey.com

Tour Schedule: http://www.petermulvey.com/tour/

Twitter: PeterMulvey43

Facebook: PeterMulveyMusic

YouTube: petermulvey43

 

1 Comment

Comments

  1. Ingrid says

    October 11, 2014 at 1:38 am

    What a beautiful post. I love the “because I want to” reason. An inspiring read. Thank you.

    Reply

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We are in the habit of starting and ending our day We are in the habit of starting and ending our days side by side in our lawn chairs, while the light rises or dims. It’s still chilly at the outer edges of the day. Sometimes Roxy shivers. I bought her a sweater, but she won’t wear it. Sometimes I try to wrap her in my jacket, but she’s not having that either, so I throw her ball and try to get her run and then she comes back to her chair, warm for a little longer. #dailyroxydog #huskychihuahua #dogssittinginchairs
“I got a secret I should tell. I’m going up to “I got a secret I should tell. I’m going up to heaven in a split pea shell.” ~ @petermulvey43 Words Too Small to Say
Happy as a dog in a freshly dug nap hole. #dailyro Happy as a dog in a freshly dug nap hole. #dailyroxydog #huskymixesofinstagram
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