Death Rehearsal

There's a music lesson I give that goes something like this:

One of the finest pieces of music I know has a rhythm that goes like this: du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du… (a steady stream of 8th notes) for over two minutes without a single change in rhythm. The melody goes like this. (Silence) In short, no melody and the most boring rhythm imaginable. How can this be music? Well, listen. (I start to play Bach's Prelude No. 1).

What makes this work? This piece based solely on changing chords (played as arpeggios) is built on a harmonic system of tension and release. We all have some ancient memory of being in the watery womb where all was complete relaxation and no tension. No night, no day, no happiness, no sadness. All is one. Why do we come out crying? Because suddenly we're thrust into a world of duality—there's light and dark, hunger and satiation, we wake, we sleep. An ongoing cycle of tension and release that stays with us our entire lives. So we naturally long for those moments of release, of relaxation, of comfort. One moment we're screaming our hunger cry and the next, we're cooing at the mother's breast, held in her comforting arms with the milk flowing. 

So Bach's little piece (and all harmonic music) replays that little drama. Some of the chords are like mother's milk, some the first hints of hunger, some the full-blown pangs demanding satiation. Or you can think of it as being in your own home, stepping out the door into an adventure, stepping further away into some danger or longing to be back home and then finding your house again. Lots of ways to talk about it.

If we grew up listening to harmonic music, we have absorbed unconsciously the way these chords evoke relaxation, a little bit of tension, a lot of tension. As we listening, our muscles and nerve ends take that little journey without us being consciously aware of it. So as I play this piece again, let's bring the drama inside our body out in our body—one posture for fully relaxed, another for slightly tense, a third for very tense, a kind of posture you couldn't hold for very long. Feel the way your breath follows the drama and discover why this music both emotionally and literally moves us. 

It is quite a revelation. Find a recording and do it yourself in the privacy of your own home.

So when I played it yesterday for Jim (see last post), I thought of it as exactly what he was going through in his final moments of life. Imagining death as a return to the cosmic womb, free from the tensions and releases of this earthly life. There is a push-pull to the process, the other world calling and this world holding on, reluctant to wholly let go. Bach's little piece playing and re-playing that drama, before finally arriving at the final chord and announcing. "Now." 

Thinking like that, each moment of tension and release in our own lives is like a rehearsal for the Final Act. Each time we can let go of all that tangles us up and find the solid ground of our true self and true calling and true capacity to wholly love and bless and give thanks is practice for the grand drama waiting us all. And music can be a part of the rehearsal. Not just Bach, of course. All of it.

Happy listening.