Tuesday, September 06, 2005

À La Recherche des Temps Perdu

FullerMusic has a great post up about an experience that I think is shared by more than just a few of us:

"It's a strange, occasionally eery and consistent flashbacking (best verb I can think of) that happens nearly every time I practice the piano. These are astonishing, out-of-the-blue, instant transportations to forgotten moments ... (as a 9-year-old walking past a swing ... as a 28-year-old sitting a certain way in a certain house ...) Mundane and tiny they often are, yet they are perfect recollections. Little virtual realities that arrive with an absolute suddenness."

It is a strange experience! Perhaps the piano (or any instrument one has devoted substantial time to learning) is such a profound vehicle for self-expression it is inescapably part of the very machinery of rememberance and memory. Also worth revisiting is a post by Pliable on music and Alzheimers.

Somewhere along this thread (between my earlier post and Carthy's) are intersections with a very interesting post by Emejota (La Idea del Norte) on the production of sonic images and tacticity --thru an interesting reading of a scene from one of Gould's home movies. It's a post that, if you read Spanish, is worth pouring over more than once:

"Lo más chocante de la escena, lo que deja perplejo al espectador, es que en ningún momento se ha producido una nota falsa o un error que justificara los sucesivos parones y el evidente gesto de contrariedad del pianista. ¿Qué ha pasado entonces? Lo que ha pasado es que Gould no había conseguido enfocar la imagen sonora de la música sobre el teclado."

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