The Aesthetic

Two nights ago while playing scales I noted how clangy they sounded. I'd remembered times before when I'd been able to achieve some relatively impressive cantabile and I was quite depressed at my regression. Soon after it dawn on me (not for the first time, it seemed) that I really should play my scales with the same grace I would a piece or song. I began to realise that anything worth playing is worth playing well. Or, put another way: nothing I play should ever be treated as a "throw away" when it comes to practising tonal quality. Everything—every exercise—is a proving ground for tonality.

Legato, legato, legato!

So the next day (Sunday) I practised mainly scales, and I played them as though I were playing a song. And something happened. I began to notice a whole other dimension to my playing. I was playing with such a light touch and with graceful motions. I even closed my eyes and visualized the keyboard as I played C, D, and G harmonic minor scales in contrary motion. I can't even visualize scales in parallel motion! But it began to happen then, and then even today.

So it came to me today that I really have within my hands and fingers all the control necessary to make anything I play have a decently fluid sound. So if I'm ever playing and it sounds clangy, it's because I want it to. Consequently, I have no excuse ever to have anything sound that way again. So I must take care that it doesn't. 

Such is the aesthetic, the dance of the fingers upon the keys. Kevin J. Zhu has inspired me, because he has a built-in aesthetic that is quite prodigious. He progresses way too fast for me to get a true feel for the time it takes a mortal to get to each level, though. But still, he inspires, and I learn from him.