The Strange Silence of Sandy

When hurricane Sandy swept through here, we lost power for seven days.  Fortunately, we didn’t sustain any property damage (which is more than I can say for most of our neighbors) but living without power for a week was something new to me.  Last year, with hurricane Irene, we lost power for three days, and thought that was a big deal.  As any preschooler could tell you, three ain’t seven.

The first few days were interesting and not too bad.  The weather was cold, so we ran the fireplace every night and played games by candlelight.  However, by day 4 or 5, we were over it.  The strangest thing for me, however, was the silence.  I realized it was probably the longest I’d gone, since birth, without music.

I was raised in a musical family, and from day one was groomed to be a musician.  I listened to music for hours a day from the age I could sit up, and practiced the violin every day from the age of three.  These days, as a composer and producer, large amounts of my time are still spent listening to music.  All of the years between then and now have been a constant stream of music too, except for those days without power.

The world is a different place without music - a place that most people would agree is not nearly as nice.  This is an important realization for people in the music industry who may feel like their contribution to society isn’t worthwhile.  It’s easy to watch emergency workers, doctors, policemen (and in the case of hurricane Sandy, the power crews) and feel like what they’re doing is valuable, while you are just wasting your time goofing around with music.  It’s true that what these people do is extremely important, and I have nothing but the most respect for them.   But as it turns out, the world needs a bit of what I do as well.  Music does make the world a better place.  I may not be saving lives, but I hope I’m making them better.

Happy holidays to all of you and yours from all of us at Omnimusic, and I hope it’s all that much nicer with some good music.

-Dave Hab