Private To The Beat | Miriam

[Auteme]

Miriam Tachi ​

Auteme didn’t understand music.

It was the dirtiest secret she had. Which, the more she thought about it, wasn’t so bad. Lots of people didn’t understand music. Lots of people hid flaws and qualities much worse than not understanding music.

Everyone who knew her knew that she knew just about everything. Of course, that was just what they thought about her; she knew that she knew basically nothing, and she knew she had a lot more to know. That was what made learning so enticing. Even though others had walked the path before her, she was exploring with new eyes until she found a path that was yet untouched. The forest of learning was thick, and it was always a joy to find how the paths connected.

But music -- music was the place where the forest had been cleared, walked over a million times. In every culture there were dozens of different ways to describe each component of singing, and that wasn’t even starting on the thousands of different instruments created or the biology of individual species’s aural organs and vocal chords. Music was ingrained in every culture in the galaxy, and while Auteme could understand cultural movements it was difficult for her to link them with the various musical styles and genres, especially after galactic society became more fully formed.

It wasn’t that she didn’t like music. She loved it. She listened to it while she worked and studied. Charlie had gotten her into some Seoulian stuff, though that was more for the cute dance routines and cute idols than for the actual music. Auteme thought she had a pretty good ear for that kind of stuff, and she was pretty sure she knew good music from bad music.

It was that little inkling of interest that had led her to reopen her studies into the field. She could never understand all music, just as she could never understand everything in the galaxy, but she could get a basic enough understanding.

Miriam Tachi happened to be her best and most convenient bet. The cultural advisor was visiting Coruscant, and Auteme had managed to convince Miriam to teach Auteme a bit about her culture’s music.

So Auteme sat on a leather couch in the small lounge room in the Senate building, across from Ms. Tachi. Her notebook was on the table in front of her, and her bag rested against one of the pillows to one side of the couch. She had, as ever, perfect posture, and her hands stayed respectfully clasped in her lap.

“So… I do feel very new, to all this,” she admitted. “So I’ll let you take the lead. Tell me about music.”

 

[Miriam Tachi]

Auteme

Miriam didn’t understand music either, for what would it mean to truly understand something so abstract? Something so incomprehensibly large that it simply couldn’t be described using any of the words known to people? Music was the blood of life itself, the beating heart of existence. It was all around them and all you had to do was listen. It was a craft that many had perfected and strived to master but that few ever seemed to fully understand. Music was more than just harmony and melody and rhythm or systems on a flimsy piece of paper. It was chaotic, it was as equally entrancing as it was disturbing and there was marvel to be found in that.

But, for the sake of it that was far from what Miriam would actually bring up for this particular lesson. While she was a small-time representative of her planets’ culture she had nonetheless been approached by one of the Jedi to help explain the one topic that Miriam truly burned for. The excitement in her voice had been evident in the barely comprehensible line of gleeful squees she had given as Auteme had asked her to teach. It was to be her first lesson, and in so many ways it was as equally a joyful matter as it was incredibly daunting. Did Miriam know pedagogy? Not in the slightest, but she could recite her own teachers’ sayings and mannerisms fairly well.

There before Miss Denko-Durren sat a woman in a bright white robe seemingly tailored to perfection with details that shimmered in nearly all colors of the rainbow, light itself seemingly bending over backwards to pique everyone’s curiosity and attention. To say Miriam thrived off of it all would be an understatement. While not one to be boastful and particularly in-your-face about her skills, she had nonetheless been approached as a professional and she wanted to look the part.

Her legs crossed, arms folded neatly against one of her knees as she put her hand to her mouth in deep thought.

“Music is…” Miriam said and let in a deep breath and let her hand fall into her lap. “I don’ wan’ get to’ philosophic’ on ya, but in shor’ is evr’thin’ aroun’ us in this ver’ momen’ and time. Wha’ music is for me tho’ is no’ wha’ it is for man’ others, yeah?”

“So rather, why don’ you tell me what’cha think’et is, Miss Denkor?”

 

[Auteme]

Miriam Tachi
​

Looking professional was not what she saw. The beautiful dress the other woman wore made Auteme feel like a toddler who didn't know how to dress herself. Attention wasn't something she cultivated. It was difficult for her to not give her attention to Ms. Tachi.

It did make the listening a little easier, given that she was focused on the well-dressed woman across from her, but Miriam's accent was still difficult to understand. Auteme couldn't expect everyone to have perfect Basic, anyways. If only she'd studied a little more she might've been able to speak with Miriam in the woman's native language.

The point she made was oddly fitting; interpretation was subjective. To her, Auteme had an accent. It wouldn't be right to try and correct all that now. Instead she focused on the question -- the best teachers were the ones that offered questions such that the students could find their own answers...

Alas, Auteme had no idea how to find her answer.

"Um... well, music is art," she said. "It's sounds, that people find pleasing, are there are lots of ways of going about making... those sounds. And to everyone it'll sound a little different, so just like other art it's subjective, as you said."

 

[Miriam Tachi]

Auteme

Though it wasn’t being said, it was clear that Auteme struggled to understand what Miriam was saying. To some extent Miriam would feel ashamed of it, but ultimately it seemed she got her message across. Music was subjective, and a universal truth. Mastery was impossible, and yet it was also desirable. It was the infinite loop of life, and in that regard — well, needless to say Miriam could have said a whole lot on the topic of music.

“Ah, yeS.” She said and slowly nodded at Auteme’s answer. “It es, indeed jusT thaT.” It felt so unnatural to speak like this with the harsh notes of the ‘basic’ tongue. On Miriam’s planet they tried to end most if not every word with a soft sound, like a breath that parted their lips like that of the wind passing on a field or someone who had eaten something far too hot. This dialect was just… Chaotic and raw. Naturally there was a beauty of it’s own to that as well, but it was not something that Miriam had been used to any greater extent.

“MuSEC—” Miriam sighed and shook her head. “Pardon me, maam, bu’ I jus’ can’ do a proper core accen’ jus’ yeh’.”

With that out of the way,

“Bu’ yes, you’re righ’. Music’s all the beautifu’ soun’s, bu’ is also the res’. Chaos, destruction. Percussion, drums, an' even screams make som’ o’ the bes’ musehc' dependin’ on wha’ i’ is ya duin', yeah?”

“A love’s quarrel, a masteh’s display. These ah’—” Miram’s eyes closed as she gave a gentle laugh at herself. “Sorreh, I have a tendency to ramble when I ge’ work’ up or exci'ed.”

“Ya call’ me here to learn abou’ something very dea’ to me. I'm happy wiv’ sharin’ wha' I can wit’ ya, so don’t be afrai’ to as’ questions.” She beamed a smile at the girl before her. “My ol’ teach’ use’ to say, in our language — ehndahst den viiseh stellar frawger.”

“I thin’ it wou’ translae in’o ‘only the wise as' questions.’”

 

[Auteme]

Miriam Tachi
​

"It's fine! It's fine. Really, it's fine. I mean, everyone talks different. There are so many languages. I'd never force you to speak -- well, I mean, I don't know your language so I guess I'm kind of forcing you to speak Basic, but you know what I... um, I'm gonna stop myself right there." She didn't know Miriam that well; she ranted tons of information at her friends but this was a semi-professional setting and it'd be a bad idea to give the wrong impression. Auteme was a little weird.

She listened intently, her hand not stopping as she transcribed the words to her page. It was a lot slower given the... accent, but Auteme was nothing if not a diligent note-taker. It was comforting to know that even the stunning woman across from her could get a little ramble-y.

"Your teacher sounds quite wise," she said. "As for questions..."

She took a moment to collect her notes and pre-meeting research. Yes, the philosophy was without a doubt incredibly important to music, as it was with all art. But Auteme had been hoping for a little more technical knowledge and applications. She could learn from the Holonet, sure, but there was a lot of confusion of terms and no universally agreed upon definitions.

After a moment, she leaned forward and posed her question. "Do you have a favorite piece of music?"

Presumably some following elaboration would be in order. Auteme readied her note-taking hand.

 

[Miriam Tachi]

Auteme

There was a warm smile on Miriam’s lips as she listened to the young woman before her. With her legs crossed she leaned forward, arms crossed by the elbows as she covered her lips in deep thought. A weak, oddly melodic ‘hmm’ hushed from the singer’s throat as she tried to contemplate the very reasonable question that Auteme had asked.

Really, it had no business being as hard of a thing to think of as Miriam found it to be, but here she was thinking and thinking, and not reaching any form of consensus on the idea. There were the old tales of bravery from back home. There was the songs her mother had composed. Songs of art, and beauty, and love that made the Sephi woman warm just thinking of.

“I thin’...” She began as her hand fell from her lips to flop like a fish before her, pointed at Auteme. “My mother’s musi’ is the one, hm.”

“She wro’e a lo’ of songs abou’ nahtuur— errr, nay-shure.” A small, amused albeit indignant exhale burst through the woman’s nose as she laughed at herself again. “Nature.” She grinned. “My home has a grea’ many fores’, laychs, an’ moun’s.”

“‘Tho I ‘spose ya can’ really tell from my looks, eh.” She shook her head and motioned for her lithe, average-sized, average-everything’d body. “Ne’er was a goo’ clim’er, hm?”

“Bu’ musish is bes’ experience’, no’ spoken of.” Miriam said and stood up, beckoning the young girl to do the same. “Rais’ yer, han’s ‘efore ya.” Miriam said and held her own hands before her. “Gi’me a rhythm.”

“... Do ya kno’ wha’ a rhythm is?”

 

[Auteme]

Miriam Tachi
​

There was no language more difficult to understand that one's own. After all, what were words, anyways? Auditory signals that held prescribed meaning from years of social conditioning and learning the inherent meaning of certain sounds. There was a subtle magic to them; able to give plastic form to formless things. They had a music as sweet as any lute or viol. Was there anything so real as words?

Yet music -- the same, yet somehow different. Music was sound just as well as words, and could surely carry meaning just as complex. It was just a matter of learning that meaning.

No, maybe she shouldn't have been limiting it in such a way. Miriam was attempting to teach Auteme about the soul of music. It was the same as language; that was why she was able to understand Miriam. Terminologies could wait.

In the meantime she got to look at the woman's very... 'average' body.

"We're all good at different things," she said.

"Oh, a rhythm? It's just a repeating pattern of sound," she said, sounding like the Holonet text-to-speech reader. She brought her hands up, dropping her pencil, and began to clap. It took her a few moments to find the right rhythm. Slow, but not too slow, she hoped. It was harder than it looked.