He ran the kind of place musicians and audiences alike both love. The focus was the music, and appreciative audience members were the most important part of the idea. This type of environment is a place where any musician has a great night because the audience is there to listen, as opposed to having background noise while they carry on boisterous conversations.

I experienced two fine evenings in this man’s place. The audience was great. They were close to the stage. We had the chance to meet one another and talk a bit after the show.

But my two nights shared a common theme in this establishment: not enough people. While the audiences were great, they were small, very small. I thought it was just me, but last week my friend reported that after several years of trying to have a place where people in his town could come together for a good evening, he had shut his place down. He just simply could not get people to come hear all the different talented folks who came to their town.

All of us players appreciated this man and others like him who took the risk of giving music a chance to be heard. The small audiences appreciated the chance to hear the music in a decent atmosphere. But the numbers weren’t there, because those numbers were stuck at home, glued to the sofa, watching the television as it drains their very life away.

A generation who grew up on plenty of live music and the chance to enjoy it apparently has seen and heard so much that they have forgotten the magic that occurs when people get together. The idiot box seeks to detain them on that sofa, tantalizing them with hints of disaster right around the corner. The print and broadcast media in the town where my friend’s venue was located weren’t interested in promoting his shows, because he didn’t have big budgets to spend on the promotions. The simple fact of there being a person coming to sing their heart out is no longer news.

What is news — at least to musicians and anyone else who believes it does Americans good to gather — is that nobody cares anymore. There are tiny pockets of people scattered about who will gather for a concert, understanding there is a power to the gathering. But for the most part, the rest of the people are too busy flipping channels with the remote to be involved.

Meanwhile, there remains the old saying: “If you don’t use a muscle, you will lose it.” And freedom to assemble is a muscle, built by countless sacrifices of men and women long ago. But that old muscle now approaches atrophy, the sad state of disuse preceding death.

(Editor’s Note: Reach David Clark at dclark@outofthesky.com, or write him at P.O. Box 148, Cochran, Ga. 31014.).