Last night as I practiced Chopin and jazz chord progressions using the headphones, I thought about how that scene—me making music, my whole world opening up the way it does when I play, but where that lovely, magical world is inaudible and invisible to everyone else—kind of represents of my whole musical life. So much of my experience of music, whether playing, listening, studying, composing, has happened in private, often without even the partnership of a teacher. It’s a lonely life. Here's something I wrote on this blog years ago that applies just as much now:
As I pick up these old pieces of my life, I have this sense of nostalgia that is both delicious and a little sad. There was a path for me, the path of a professional musician, a path I could have taken but chose not to take. And the price is that I'm now a middle-aged tech writer with occasional but intense yearnings for a musical life, and with hopes that that musical life is somehow still attainable. It can be a lonely existence, where your best friends are a handful of long-dead composers and a very heavy hunk of wood, strings, and ivory.
Music is meant to be shared, right? It’s meant to be played for the delight and consolation and joy of listeners. It’s meant to be played with other people, too. My only experience of making music in a group has been the year or two I attempted to sing in a church choir. I never sang loud enough to make a difference, but I still found the whole experience transformative (at times). It is a miracle, the way multiple voices can sing multiple pitches and have it all come out as a harmonious whole. And it’s one thing to experience this miracle as a listener when watching an orchestra or even a rock band; it’s quite another to experience it as a participant. Either way, I will never cease to be amazed at the miracle of harmony.
A Bit about My Piano History …
I have played piano all my life … well, since I was three. No piano teacher would take such a young child, so I spent my first few piano years learning hymns and TV jingles by ear (plop, plop, fizz, fizz, anyone?). When I finally started taking lessons at age 6, I balked at the whole idea of reading music. Maybe that isn’t unusual for someone who has only ever played by ear. Anyway, learning to read music was one of the most difficult challenges of my childhood. I never did get very good at it.
Still, I proceeded to take piano lessons throughout elementary, middle, and high school, and into college. I considered going to music school; I would never have gotten in to a place like Julliard, but I could have studied at a state school. Throughout my freshman and sophomore years of college, I contacted music schools and perused their brochures, imagining myself a serious music student there. As I worked on pieces with my piano professor, I was always aware that they might be audition pieces for another school.
… and My Piano Dreams
Weirdly, I had no desire to major in piano performance, or even piano pedagogy. I ultimately wanted to study theory and composition—even though theory was so much harder than simply learning to play a piece. But I didn't want to be a pianist, primarily; I wanted to be a composer.
Anyway, I never went to music school. I stayed where I was, majored in English, and minored in music (and biology).
I also never played in a band. How I wanted to be in a band where I helped write songs and where I played keyboard solos! But I was a bookworm, and painfully shy and quiet—hardly cool enough to be considered for a band, and hardly social enough to meet anyone who was looking for a keyboardist.
I thought maybe I could just write music that other people could play and sing. That happened a few times. I won an employee talent show once where I played a song I’d written and someone else sang. A woman in the audience had me write out the music and lyrics for her so she could sing it for the talent portion of a beauty contest she was in. But mostly? The few songs I’ve written never went far, and I don’t even remember half of them. I was still terrible at reading music at the time, so instead of writing out the notes, I recorded them on cassettes that I threw away long ago.
Piano in Adulthood
Once I got out of college, I went to work and piano took a back seat most years. I say “most” because there were times, here and there, where I dusted off the sheet music and found a teacher. (During one of those periods, I started this blog!) I was lucky to find some very good teachers, and I worked my way up to a few advanced pieces I’d always wanted to play. I often would get permission from a nearby church to practice on one of their pianos during my lunch hour from work. And I always had a piano at home, so it was always there for the practicing.
At 31, I decided that, once and for all, I needed to learn to read music well. So I found a teacher, and we started from the beginning, and within a year I had become a semi-competent sight-reader.
Why am I writing all of this? I was supposed to write about my lonely musical life. Or my piano dreams. Or something like that. Anyway ...
Aching for an Audience
In his live album from the 70s, John Denver talked about how, when he was a young songwriter working for a guy out in Long Beach, he would work on songs he was writing, songs he was learning … and he “ached for people to sing to.” I know that ache. I’m not a singer, but I’ve long ached for people to play for. I’ve ached to share my music with others. But I’ve always been too shy, too insecure. I’ve never had the confidence I’ve needed; I've always figured I’m not skilled enough, not knowledgeable enough, not good enough. So I’ve had to be content with being the only inhabitant of that magical, colorful world that opens up whenever I play.
Oh, and I’m deaf. Not completely deaf, but I do have significant hearing loss, which I’ve had all my life. So that has always been a huge part of my not feeling “good enough” to share my music. I know I don’t hear music the same way the rest of the world does. I honestly could never be in a band for the same reason that I never felt comfortable in a choir: I never quite know what I'm not hearing.
And yes, I know Beethoven was deaf. But I am definitely not Beethoven.
Anyway, I gave up any piano dreams for good several years ago when I developed chronic tendinitis in my elbow. I didn’t think it would ever go away, so I accepted (with great sadness) that I would never play again. In a move of both cold practicality and profound depression, I sold my grand piano for pennies and gave away probably 90% of my sheet music. My piano life was over.
But then … thanks to an experimental treatment, the elbow healed. So I went piano-shopping. I couldn’t afford an acoustic piano and didn’t want one of the gazillion free uprights people are always trying to get rid of. So I got a digital … for now. And I’m playing again!
A Piano Future?
For the last few weeks, I have been trying to work out what my goals for music are this time around. Where do I want to go with music? Is it too late to go anywhere? I try to fight against the idea that “it’s too late.” I’m always telling adults that it’s never too late to start learning piano. I say, “Ten years from now, you can be right where you are now, or you can have ten years of piano under your belt. Which do you want it to be?"
So, where do I want to be in ten years? Or five? Or one?
I want to be able to sit down and look at a lead sheet and improvise something that sounds nice.
I want to be able to play certain pieces I’ve always wanted to play, whether classical or jazz or pop.
I want to enough knowledge of music theory (jazz theory in particular) to compose, to take the motives and melodies in my head and make something beautiful and interesting with them.
I want to know what to do with my left hand besides play the same tired old broken chords.
And I want to be able to share all of that with people. Maybe I’ll never play in a band—I’m not sure I want to do that anyway—but I’d love to be able to play “background music” at a party. Or even just go to nursing homes and have people smiling and tapping their feet to my music.
That’s all. It’s really not too much to ask, is it? I know I have musical talent and a creative mind. And I feel lucky that, after all these years, I still have considerable skill at the piano. It shouldn’t be that hard to get where I want to go, right? Yet, in all my years of practicing and playing, I never seem to get there.
I’ve signed up for jazz piano lessons with a jazz pianist and teacher I found on Instagram. Maybe he’ll help me turn this key to unlock the possibilities that I know are there. They always seem so close, but they’ve forever remained lock being a door I can’t seem to get through.
That’s all for now. I’m sure I’ll post more musings on my music life. Stay tuned …
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