Such As It Is

 

'Talent develops in solitude, character develops in the full current of life.”

-       Goethe

 

It feels strange not to write a blog every day, but truth be told, I don’t have much to say. When my days are spent playing piano for a few hours, walking or biking, looking up page numbers for footnotes in my new book, reading a book, listening to a book, watching a new series on TV (The Residence— highly recommended!), nothing seems to be spinning in my brain that feels worthy to share. 

 

I am happy to report that playing through the entire repertoire of Bach’s French Suites, English Suites, Partitas, Goldberg Variations and Inventions has gotten my piano fingers back in shape, helped also by some Beethoven, Chopin, Handel, Haydn, Mozart, Grieg, Debussy and Scott Joplin. Today I played some jazz with my great friend and saxophone player Joshi Marshall at Flower Piano and may I say, we were killin’ it! And the audience of some 50 people who we attracted (we were not a featured act—just found an open piano and started playing) would agree. So any “talent” that surfaced, both in my playing and book writing, indeed has been developed in solitude and that’s why a true biography of Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins and others would be so terribly boring— 12-15 hours of them practicing every day for years. 

 

When I’m traveling and teaching— or even just subbing at a local school—that’s when the juices get flowing, thrown headlong in the full current of life and every time I come up for air, there is something worth reporting. I love it and I need it and I value it. But am also happy for this different kind of engagement with life, off to the side of the roaring river and taking time to sit on my back deck while the weather is warm, even if it means a break from posting every day on this Blog.

 

Of course, I could comment on the news, but what’s the point? The only people listening are the ones who already share my incredulity and dismay and yes, it helps sometimes to find better words for what people are feeling—the most frequent comment on my last Facebook post was “Exactly what I feel.” So yes, I’ll keep commenting as the impulse arises, but the sensation of beating one’s head against the wall is not a pleasant one and the wall doesn’t care. Much better to improve what I can control and this time of solitude is my life at the moment. 

 

At any rate, my writing here always comes from an impulse— a phrase, a title, an idea— that surfaces on its own without my imposition and then invites me to follow it and splash it out. That might happen again tomorrow or not. Not in my control. But with nothing on the calendar but to begin Bach’s 48 Preludes and Fugues and take the next step to push my book into the publishing chute, I’m not promising anything. 

 

That’s the news, such as it is.