Music to Expand the Soul and Bless the Inner Life

I've made a breakthrough with my piano playing.  I've been working on jazz standards for 16 months with piano.  I had played basic chords for many years, but then last year I had two lessons from a friend of my sisters -- a very good pianist with a masters in piano performance -- and he helped me with piano voicings.  I wrote out the arrangements I would use for several songs, and developed a certain technique.  The aim was to keep the finger movements to a minimum, to keep everything tight.  I struggled through my first public performance last May (at the Balalaika), but I got through it.  Since starting this project, I've worked up over 100 standards, and I'm learning more every day.  I love it!  I've got plenty of songs by Rodgers and Hart, Irving Berlin, Harold Arlen, Jimmy Van Heusen, and others.  This is a real treasure trove of music!


So here's my breakthrough:  I had been plugging away on piano in my little room near Raleigh, NC, for several weeks.  And all of a sudden the other day I started moving up and down the keyboard on some piano solos.  Wow!  I try to keep everything in the chord, and definitely avoid going out of the key, and then go back to the melody notes from time to time, especially at the end of a phrase.  I figured that I could leave out the root from the right hand since I was playing it with the left.  And now I'm just amazed how this is working! After all these months, my fingers are finding the melody (I can remember how hard that was before) and playing notes around it.  And this is coming naturally.  I think it's a matter of time spent at the piano.

For those of you who have been improvising on your instrument for years, you may not think much of this.  And those of you who don't play at all may think that playing an instrument will be forever out of reach.  But I say that for all of us, learning musical skills is a way for us to improve our lives in so many different ways. The struggles bring out the best in us, and when we finally master some skill that has eluded us, we can bask in the joys of our newfound selves.

I really want to write books and sing songs all the time. I will keep spending time doing these things.  I wish I didn't have to worry about the money.  I have centered my life around making money for so many years, and despite the things that money has provided me, it has left me with a certain emptiness and longing. They say you only live once.  Why not a life filled with music?  As music expands and develops in our lives, so does our inner being. We grow with every new song, every improved skill, every development in sensibility.

My friend Marcos_Saback, an amazing guitarist now back in Brazil, talks about "la vida" as he drinks red wine.  La musica es la vida.  Let us raise our glasses, and allow the wonder of music to create a life of joy and beauty within our souls.