J.S. Bach

In the days that I practiced piano 2-4 hours daily, I never dreamed that one day I would simply not have time to sit at my instrument, or more accurately, that I wouldn't make time to practice for disciplined intervals. Alas, most days now, I fail to practice. Sometimes this is because I truly am too busy taking care of children, but more often than not, I just don't make myself do it. This is a sad situation, and over the past two weeks I have tried to ammend my disfunctional musical habits. While it may not be possible to sit at the piano for two consecutive hours until my feet fall asleep while pedaling like I used to, I can almost always squeeze a half an hour to an hour in each day if I make an effort.

In the last ten days or so I have made an effort to practice while I am waiting for students, or after I have finished teaching them for the day. I have rediscovered how much I enjoy Bach fugues. I had to wait until I was in college before I had the skills to play Bach fugues. They are very complex things, kind of like a mess of spaghetti with two or three different melodies happening at one time. When you put them all together they creative polyphonic harmony. Bach's mind and genius never fail to impress me. Few people can sit down and sight read a Bach fugue (there are amazing pianists that can, but I am certainly not one of them, nor are most people). Some people become frustrated with Bach because there is no instant gratification. To play Bach takes painstaking work, repeating the same page or half page over twenty or thirty times in a practice section and then moving on or repeating it some more until your fingers learn what to do. I always tell my students who are advancing in their music that there is a gap between the notes your eyes and brain can read when playing a difficult piece, and the motions your fingers can accurately make. You have to painstakingly teach your fingers what to do because they don't have very much intelligence on their own. After excessive repetition, however, they can fly over the keys, and you just have to keep track of where you are.

Right now I am reviewing my favorite fugue of all time from the Well Tempered Clavier Book 1: Number two in C minor, and I am learning a new fugue, number seven in E flat major. I like the combination of practicing one fugue that is comfortable to play and wading through another which takes extreme concentration because I do not know it yet.

Ulitimately, what I have discovered in the past few days is that I need to be practicing regularly, not only to keep up my musical skills and understand frustrations my students are having as well as reviewing practice techniques I should be teaching them, but mainly because practicing is good for my mental state of being. It keeps my brain in shape, but more importantly, through the repetition of practicing I have always found myself to be able to do the best thinking and organizing. It refreshes me and helps me put my life and thoughts in order. I once heard a poet speak who claimed that he was successful at writing because he played a Bach fugue each morning right after he got up, before he sat down to write. This makes great sense to me.