It was 3pm yesterday, I had just come in with my guitar 30 minutes earlier for the final phase of sound check when this lady walked up to me and asked, "are you the bass guitarist for the concert?"
Yes I replied, trying to run along but she held my hand in anchor and asked again, "I heard you're a perfectionist, and you don't stop rehearsing the orchestra until every tone and semitone is gotten with time signature, really?"
At this juncture, I smiled. I had put my all in to this concert, traveling down here even a week before hand. It was a gospel concert featuring top artists in the city and beyond. I had paid my dues in rehearsals, we all had, but then having our final talk backstage, I said "All we've done still has a chance of not making sense..." As inquisitive eyes turned on me, wondering if I felt we still hadn't rehearsed enough despite more than enough we had done, I smiled one last time and continued, "music is nothing when the audience is deaf."