11,404. RUDIMENTS, pt. 536

RUDIMENTS, pt. 536

(no exit)

None of these piano people,

I ever felt, directed any real

words or learning at me. It

was just rote  - here it is, do

this, learn it. I'd come back

the next week, they'd play

for me what I was about to

play for them, in my paltry

and unpracticed way, and
then I'd play it, and then

they'd play it back again, for

me, perhaps showing me how

wrong I'd been, where I'd

flubbed up, or, just how well,

by contrast, they were. It was

a humiliating way to have to

learn anything, made little

sense to me, got boring very

quickly, and fostered a certain

contempt. I could have done it
all just as well with a tape 
recorder. These jerks just

wanted their 35 dollars, or

whatever the hour was

supposed to have cost. I

admit, here and now, that

during the course of a week's

time I really didn't press too

hard on learning the stuff.

maybe if I played it twenty

times or so that was a lot.

The Schirmer's books, they

were OK. They sure were

pretty too  -  that nice yellow

color on the covers, the

stylized cleft they used

for a logo. It was all pretty

cool. One thing I never got

was how, it was said, I had

a cleft in my chin  - which

was supposed to be nice,

and the music scales also

had a cleft, but bearing no

relation, certainly, to my

chin. Yes, of course, I

learned later that one was

a clef and one was a cleft.

But what's a 7 year old know

about that stuff? Point is,

anyway, that no one ever

really explained a damned

thing to me. Or if they did

I never heard it, but I did

listen all the time. It seemed

to me that music education

could have been a lot nicer  -

even in this informal, and

non-conservatory format, if

someone had just treated it

all a bit differently  -  the

theory of keys and timing,

for instance, and the ideas

of syncopation, stretch,

duration,  staccato, grace

notes, and the rest. I had

to learn all that either on

my own or from surmising

what was going on in a

composer's mind as I

played, or tried to, through

some of the stuff.

-

Composer's mind! I used to

think  -  what a magnificent

thing! I played, because I

had to, week after week also,

the endless scales and chords

crap I abhorred  -  as horrid,

repetitious, without context,

to me; all a seeming aimless

exercise. In retrospect, of

course, I can now see that

they were not that at all  -

they were necessary, brutal,

and muscular breakdowns

and component exercises

for the learning of chords

and fingering too, and the

means of an adept and swift

conquering of the dexterity

needed to manage what

was being done. But again,

it was all presented to me

as pure drear, a dreadful

25 minutes of wastefulness.

Had someone just better

explained.

-

I ended up approaching 'music'

much as I did mathematics

in school  -  a subject I did

not like at all, though numbers

came easy enough. It was all

the methodical figuring and

formulas that I could not take

a liking to. I managed getting

the needed answers, yes, and

quickly enough as well, but

apparently I never could

'explain' how I'd gotten there

without using the accepted

schoolroom formula  -  which

I never used. It was the same

with this music  -  never fully

broken out or explained to me,

I got to it anyway, but in my

own manner. My problem was

in accepting anything done by

those old composers and all as

anything I needed to perfectly

replay. That's what I never

understood  -  and I soon did

realize that perfect renditions

of old 18th century and other,

Minuets, Sonatas, Sonatinas,

Gavottes, Courtly Dances, and

all of that, was purely for the

purposes of the instructor  -

having something objective to

go by in order to judge me, or

any new player. It made no

sense to me. Why would I

care to reproduce exactly

something done in the early

19th century, in 1959? That

was all dead stuff -  we had

spacecraft, radio, TV, lights,

roadways, cars, travel, new

medicine. We had an entire

and new world of new things.

They'd never even have imagined

the view I had of things  -  why

should I then slavishly replay

their old music when I could

do it, yes, but in my own way,

reflecting my own being and

vibrancy. My tunes were and

would always be, recognizable

'Fur Elise' versions, yes, but

in my own way on my own

terms. I liked to play with time,

break the structures of the old

thoughts and rigors, adding

notes, adding or eliding new

phrases, twists on things, even

breaking into ad-libs and playful

sidebars. It was all music to me,

from and of the heart and mind.

Why needed I to be in their old

prison, doing their old, frozen

in time, stuff? I begrudged no

one  -  don't get me wrong  -

there were plenty of people

who perfectly enjoyed their

reinvigorating of old skeletons,

and that was fine by me. I

was just determined to make

my own, new, bones and 

structures.

-

I sensed, even back then, all 

of what I'd be up against. I'd

just been dead, for a while,

and came back from some 

weird depth of sacred space

where round was square and 

square could be round if you

first accepted any of those

designations but didn't have

to. Who said trains kill you?

They were wrong there too.

-

I knew no one had ever come

up against someone like me.

I knew that, and my ways and

tactics were sure to disorient

them. But I was ready, and I

was set to go, primed for

battle, and willing to accept

the upcoming years of my

needed preparation in the

wilderness. To this day, no

one knows what to make 

of me, or my ways, or my 

tactics. They're all still gaping.

-

One of my grandmothers died

in a nuthouse. There are a few

photos of her, somewhere,

taken by my father, of her in

her coffin, dead, at the wake,

or viewing, or mourning  -

whatever any of that is. It's

an old custom, I'm told, to

do that, though it's no longer

done, or I never see it. I can

hardly remember her, but we

did visit  -  a strange, babbling,

whitehaired lady in a long

hospital robe. I'm not even

sure what she spoke was

English; but it was something.

I never talked to her, just 

stayed around. We'd go visit 

her in her sanitarium or

whatever it was, Greystone,

as I recall. Her attendant
would bring her out and 
turn her over to us for a 
few hours and, with some
sort of picnic and lunch 
idea, we'd go out to the
large grassy, inclined lawns
and sit out, eating on blankets
and such, while talking and
smiling. Woody Guthrie

was in there too, suffering 

from whatever that Lou

Gehrig disease thing is where

you lose all muscle control,

Hodgkin's lymphoma or

something. I never saw him

though  -  didn't even know

 about him back then. My 

grandmother had somehow

been convinced that one of

my sisters had been named

after her, so for these visits

we had to 'pretend' name 

her, calling her that other 

name which wasn't hers.

Nothing mattered; she was 

only like a year old. It 

seemed sometimes to me 

that the entirety of life 

was all a fiction  -  just 

piles of crap that we all 

stack up and convince 

each other is real. It's a 

nasty concoction. I was

always trying to find ways

out. And then I read that

play by Sartre: 'No Exit.'