WEAVING VERSIONS
OF ME
By Esther Young
Music was not my first love. Music is the temptress. It’s sexy. But writing is the whole reason I claim any artistry.
My story starts with a display of privilege in music exposure and education. At just five years old, I was the pigtailed girl in a purple satin dress, legs dangling off the piano bench. I was seconds from bursting into tears because I couldn’t remember how to start the song. All eyes were on me. Where did my hands go?
When I exploded into a little ball of salt and snot, I was saved by a mom in the audience, who whisked me offstage. It wasn’t the first time I would walk onto a stage and blackout, but I did overcome my stage fright. My whole family knew I loved to sing. My grandparents could ask me to sing a hymn–in English or Chinese–and I would go off, filling unfamiliar words with new syllables of words and turning any place into a stage.
And yet, I was still just a shy little girl around most people. It’s as if I saved all my personality for my diary, which I kept from the age of 8 and on. Unlike playing piano, it wasn’t a discipline. No one told me to do this. No one threatened to read it. My safe place remained mine.
I began writing for a supposed audience in my early teen years. As a church girl well-trained in the myriad details regarding God as heavenly father and creator, I started writing prayers–and did so earnestly, with care. How I worded my questions and made space for possible answers mattered to me.
It got rather serious at some point. I enjoyed writing, but those teenage confessions could write me into a hole. Music began to return as a lighthearted pleasure. I was now 15 and finally had quit piano. I started teaching myself guitar, reacquainting myself with chord progressions and sounds in between. Composing melodies came naturally, just as weaving words into lyrics came gracefully.
When I was 19, a poet friend introduced me to the beauty of open mics. These were places where anyone could belong. You only had to give and receive a little of others’ creations. Those present simply shared a mutual appreciation for the things made in solitude.
Frequenting these spaces, I became reasonably agile as a self-accompanied singer-songwriter. I navigated my early 20s, knowing I could alchemize my experiences into something beautiful. If I wrote honestly, I would eventually make sense of myself in my lines. That made for a successful song, even if it only spoke to me.
After the pandemic, these past few years of jamming, rehearsing, and participating in DIY shows have challenged and nurtured me into a braver and more sensitive artist. Rehearsing with jazz guitarists who are far more fluent than me and with trained drummers who know precisely what to listen for has brightened how I approach my instruments. Working with punk musicians who find themselves in the noise has expanded the way I imagine my own songs in recording.
Today, I write for all the versions of me.
As a first-generation daughter, I’m the product of my mother’s battles; I share her inner critic as I hold all my responsibilities, but my songs are my vehicle of discovery. Every performance is a rebellion against the box, where I offer my songs to anyone who has repressed parts of themselves to hold two families, two cultures.
As a deconstructed evangelist, I constantly release core facets of the religion that formed my identity; my songs are still my prayers. They lean out of absolute exclusion and tune into the dissonance of vast, messy truth.
As a community worker who integrates art into my life, every day raises new questions about the sustainability of my chosen life. But I live wholly and have always found that to be the reward.
