Introduction to Torganic Shorts
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This is Torganic Shorts, where I give a taste of the full interview with selected quotes.
Featuring Wenzel McGowan
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My guest this week is Wenzel McGowan, saxophone player and member of the band Moonhooch.
Transcendence in Performance
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Doing shows, I often get to this place of complete forgiveness, of complete transcendence, and all these little issues that you have on the road suddenly are just pebbles on the floor of a giant ocean.
Saxophone Challenges and Meditation
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I was hitting a brick wall with my saxophone playing. I always thought everything can be resolved through obsessive practicing, but if you don't bring your practice to a deeper level, then you can practice as much as you want and you'll just always stay in that same domain, that same dimension. Well, I'm starting to try to take meditation and just apply it all the time and just realize that being relaxed and being happy is a choice.
Meditation's Role in Music
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I literally tell myself all the time, focus on your breath. How does it feel to breathe in? How does it feel to breathe out? What do I feel in my chest right now? What do I feel in my hands? What do I feel in my legs? So I just slowly bring my attention to my body and out of my head. That's literally something I need to do hundreds of times a day. Okay.
00:01:24
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And the more I do it, the longer I can maintain my body and my focus and my heart. And the better shows I play. And doing shows, it's the same thing. I catch myself thinking about the music, and then I'm like, no, I'm not thinking about this right now. I'm playing music. How did this affect your play? You know, I made it more shamanic.
Music as Healing
00:01:49
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Like now I view music and performance more as, yeah, just as this healing process of connecting the two worlds, so to speak. And I mean, that's pretty much the way tribes have been looking at music for thousands of years, you know? You get together in the community, you drum, and you connect to the ancestors, so you connect to the spirit.
00:02:14
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And connect to each other. And to connect to each other. Yeah, to like kind of integrate all these different energies that are out in the universe. I lived in the foot of a mountain without any contact related to the outside world until I was 18.
Wenzel's Upbringing and Practice
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Wow. And all I would do is read and play saxophone. I would practice saxophone religiously like eight hours a day.
Touring Life and Mushroom Foraging
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So when we load out for the venue, we bring out our gear and we bring out our kitchen. If we have time, James goes straight away to the green room, sets up a whole kitchen. And, you know, sometimes doing sound check, he'll suddenly run away and say, wait a minute, the garlic is burning. And I'm like, dude, we're sound checking.
00:02:59
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So we often do all these stops at forests to forage for mushrooms. And he knows all the mushrooms. He knows how to get chanterellis. It's amazing. How to get even lobster mushrooms.
00:03:12
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And you guys stop on the road in certain places that you know are scouted out and foraged for wild.
Pre-show Meditation Routines
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And the more he educates himself, the bigger variety of mushrooms we eat because he now is becoming more comfortable identifying a lot of different mushrooms.
00:03:31
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The best shows I play is when I get to practice for an hour, half an hour, then meditate for an hour. Again, sometimes I meditate another hour before the show. And then we do like some ceremony together. And then it feels like that the show, it flows totally effortlessly.
Life Advice from Wenzel
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Take a deep breath and trust. Just trust in the unfolding of your life.
Closing and Engagement Encouragement
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Please check out the full episode with Wenzel and be sure to comment and rate the show in iTunes. It really does help. Also, come visit Torganic at the blog and at my Instagram page for regular updates on my triathlon training, fitness, vegan diet tips, and musical happenings.
00:04:14
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Also, I have a new band with the great Meteana Morales called Walk Talk. We're working on our debut album and it promises to be something very special, but we need your support to make it happen. We have a crowdfunding campaign happening right now. You can find the link to our Indiegogo campaign at tordanic.com. And please spread the word and donate if you feel so inclined. Till next time, peace.
