This is a short I wrote for English Comp. class at PPCC and it's all true from memory - for whatever that's worth.
Here is also a copy of Fisher's Hornpipe with a 2nd Voice part here. It wrote the 2nd part for Mando or Fiddle, but it's not tablature, so go ahead and pull out the oboe. (I'm kidding)
The ring in the center of the pavilion was lackluster from close up, and the dark blue wooden crates that surrounded it were old and dirty. The people sitting beside us in the white plastic chairs were friends of friends and must not have been acquainted at the time since I hardly remember their names, although I'm sure I got to know every one in the year to follow. Somewhere in the middle of the seesaw act he caught my eye, and I saw him walking slowly towards me to my left. I hardly gave him any thought or attention – it must be part of the act – I thought. Only when he was getting dangerously close did I point him out to the man sitting beside me.
Fernando was the one guy in our group whom I knew pretty well. We had worked together for almost two years in an eight- piece band for two corny singers who sang sort of a cross between traditional Mexican music and American country. Of course there are many elements to their style which are quite unique, but to unfamiliar ears that description fits nicely. He was a great guy: Dependable, calm, passionate, handled criticism well, and was a pretty good keyboard player. He stood about five and a half feet tall, had short dark hair and dark skin – like most Brazilians – and wore a great smile and as the song suggests, had a way with women. He was the one who had brought me there.
Apparently Fernando knew some people who were related to people who were good friends of powerful people and who just happened to own three of the biggest itinerant circuses in South America. One of these circuses was about to be renovated, and a live band was to be added to the show in the fashion of the Canadian and European shows of the time. That's why we were there; we wanted the job.
The big cat stopped for a moment about fifteen feet from where we sat, and by this time we were not the only ones to have noticed him. One of the acrobats hurried behind the curtain while one of the clowns tried to get the leopard's attention by gesturing in front of him, and as it was pretty obvious he had no idea what he was doing, Luke – yes, that was the cat's name – just ignored him.
There might have been more of a sense of fear if there had been more people at the show that night; it seemed very empty. It must have been a Tuesday or Wednesday, and we were sitting in what they called the “VIP Area”, which was the area directly in front of the ring, off the bleachers.
Maybe because I initially thought it was part of the show, I wasn't really afraid... until a little girl a few feet away from us jumped up and screamed. Of course men don't scream... or jump up. Men calmly stand up and move their chairs away from danger, so that's what we did, although we didn't sit back down until Luke was gone.
After a few minutes, the bald clown – he was truly bald – responsible for not locking up the animal safely, had chased Luke back into his cage, but not before a little growling and complaining from the detainee. Sadly, it was a small cage and he spent all of his life in there. Even during his only stage time, he would be featured in that cage for a mediocre magic trick. He behaved like a grouchy seventy year old man who lived by himself with no living relatives, and it was pretty obvious that he had become tired of fighting and had settled for that fate.
Now I'm not going PETA all the way here – some of the circus animals such as the elephants were pampered like babies – but I felt really sorry for the old cat and many times thought he'd be better off dead.
As always, the show must go on! So we sat through the rest of it, ate popcorn, made dumb jokes, and wondered where we would find our guitar player if the meeting scheduled for after the show went well. I had never been to a circus before and was pretty excited to be that close to those kinds of performances. After all, we had 'VIP' seats. To say I felt like a child at the time would be presumptuous: I was a child. I was in my late teens and living the life of an old musician with nothing to show for it but a handful of violin students, weekend weddings and a boring gig with some boring music. I wanted to see the world, travel, learn, but still maintain the financial independence I had grown accustomed to, and the circus gig was perfect for all of that and much more, as I later found out.
To be continued... (hopefully)
