Inbox for Sn: Pai Sho - Avalon

[uncle_iroh]

(Please note that Iroh still does not quite understand his phone so... this will be.... interesting.)

"My nephew tells me that I should ask you to leave a message. He says he will show me where to find that message once I have one. So please, leave a message."

Comments

[uncle_iroh]

Iroh smiled gently, settling in on the floor to sit and listen.

"Not bad," he said when the boy finished. "That was an interesting transition you added in the middle there."

[rediscovering]

"Interesting good or interesting bad?"

He looks worried as soon as he stops playing and hears Iroh's comment. It was off and he knows it, but like he said: he's not played in almost a year. Probably since the last time he played for Iroh on their ship, so long ago now, like another lifetime. He's flummoxed himself to be sitting here wanting to play tsungi horn, indeed feeling in an alternate reality... but very grounded in this sudden interest in it again, though. It's a way he can share his culture with people. No one abroad at home wants to learn about Fire Nation culture, after all; they hate them, there's no interest. And talking with Fire Nation locals, you just get a lot of nationalism... Sharing his culture with his friends from other worlds, the beautiful parts of Fire Nation culture that go unappreciated outside their small island nation, has been so reaffirming and inspiring for Zuko. Tsungi horn is just another great opportunity for that. One he knows he's good at — and wants to make sure he's still good at. He has a knack for little in life but tsungi horn, Iroh's always told him he's gifted at. Hot on all these ideas about music and dance and art from talking with Gokudera and Aurora, it's got Zuko on a healthy new kick here. He's gotta make sure he's representing when he plays for his friends! Always so serious...

[uncle_iroh]

He chuckled. "With music, that is always up to interpretation. I liked it, however. How did you feel when you made that choice, Zuko?"

[rediscovering]

“I don’t know, I noticed I messed up and forgot, so I just— improvised…”

He pauses, considering. How did he feel…?

“…A few weeks ago, Gokudera played piano for me in a bar,” he muses. “He played Four Seasons by ear, having just heard me sing the tune once for example, and then transitioned it into this beautiful song, it was so complex… I don’t know if he wrote it himself or not. Probably.”

He did not. It was Beethoven or Schubert or someone. But Zuko thinks so highly of Gokudera’s intellect, he just assumed it was his own. But indeed, it was Gokudera’s ability to improvise and work a new, very different tune in like he did, that stunned Zuko so. He’s such a structured person and tends to just follow music exactly rather than wing it like Gokudera had. It impressed him then, and again now, thinking on it with his own instrument in his hands.

“…I tried to play around the mistake I noticed, to disguise it.”

[uncle_iroh]

He nodded once. "That is a good lesson, both for music and for life. We all make mistakes, Zuko. But we can turn them into art if we do not let the mistake stop us."

[rediscovering]

Zuko can't help half a smirk. Of course he agreed with that sentiment; no one knew better than Iroh that Zuko does not let one mistake stop him. But the prince had never really applied the idea to music, having never placed much importance on it before adjusting his perspective recently... He just nods once in turn, knowing Iroh knows he understands. He raises the horn to his lips again, and begins to play another song, likely something probably learned from songbooks he studied for music practice back home before, but it's been so long since the times he used to practice regularly, and when his memory fails him, following the spirit of their conversation, he does put a little improvisational twist on it.

[uncle_iroh]

He nodded as he listened, giving it his attention. He did not recognize the tune, but that was alright. When his nephew was done he smiled. "Let us try something new, Zuko..." He stroked his beard, grinning. "Play, but do not play a song."

[rediscovering]

Zuko makes an odd, discerning face, confused and taken aback.

"Play— but do not play a song..." he parrots, tone thoughtful as if repeating the words will make them make more sense... It doesn't.

He pauses, frowning down at the horn resting on the side of his lap, as if it might hold the answers inside it. But it also doesn't. So after skipping a beat, he plays the tsungi equivalent of playing scales... That's not what Iroh meant, surely. It's not a song, though, to be fair. And he's played his scales on the tsungi horn so many times in his life it's basically rote memory by now. He looks back to Iroh expectantly without a word.

[uncle_iroh]

"While that is technically what I asked for, that is not what I meant. Simply begin playing, Zuko. No song, no scales, just play. Let the music choose the direction."

[rediscovering]

It takes Zuko a moment to contemplate, compose himself on many levels, before closing his eyes and setting the mouthpiece to his lips once more. He plays a tentative tune, but indeed lets the tsungi horn take the lead, trying to process his uncle's advice. It's (not uncharacteristically) a bit melancholy, but there's something bright about it, too. Perhaps just the spark of trying, in a way he'd never quite done when just copying songbooks on the ship... Something new; something simple, yes, but something different.

[uncle_iroh]

"Very good, Zuko! That is exactly it! Once you can master that, there will be little you cannot do, musically."

[rediscovering]

"I'm not trying to become some master musician, Uncle..." Zuko mumbles bashfully, the faintest hint of color crawling over his cheeks. "I just wanted to get one so I could show Aurora and Gokudera..." And that admission, too, keeps that hint of color on his cheeks.

[uncle_iroh]

"Uh huh," he said, smiling a bit. "And do you not want to show them the best that you can do, Zuko?"