Bach to the Future

Is it possible to keep two independent melodies, or maybe even three or four, going in our heads at the same time? And, if it is possible, is it advisable? That is, can maintaining the integrity of each actually help to lift us out of the daily muddle? I think so. Unless, that is, I’m confused. Or maybe just eager to re-unite with my younger, more agile self.

While we might think anyone who “hears voices” is likely just nuts, we wouldn’t dare say that about someone like Johann Sebastian Bach, who made it his life’s work to set one kind of idea against another (and another and another) and achieve almost perpetual pleasure. Borrowing an expression from a different kind of music, I say: “Props to him.” This was no easy thing to pull off. Still isn’t, actually…which is why I think I might have another go ‘round with the whole enterprise.

What Bach pretty much invented, at least in music, was Counterpoint. This is putting one thing side by side with another for enjoyment, requiring both elements to be balanced — talking to one another, really. In a way, it’s kind of like a marriage, isn’t it?  Some even call him a “Contrapuntist.” That gets problematic, for me anyway, because it sounds like ol’ Bach might be out there on the football field, swinging his foot and wondering how to keep his wig on. Not to mention trying to figure out which end is which.

I met someone today at the gym, an amateur musician, who said she’s actually had a crush on Bach ever since she was little. I wouldn’t go that far exactly, but it’s true that he and I go way back; I was in high school when my piano teacher first introduced me to The Well-Tempered Clavier. I became absorbed by trying to figure out those Preludes and Fugues—paired together as they are like lovers in the park. At first, with the Prelude, you think you’ll be sitting pretty; then the Fugue, with all its lines criss-crossing, really gives you a run for your money. You’re best off practicing just a few measures at a time to ward off total frustration. The rewards can be pretty great, though: amazingly rich landscapes of sound, coming from your own fingers.

This all came back to me last week when I listened to an interview on the Diane Rheme show with the concert pianist Simone Dinnerstein. You can listen to it here,  She was talking about a new project called “Bach-packing”: going into elementary schools, often with a transportable keyboard, to show kids a little bit about the King of Counterpoint. She starts off the session by dividing the class into two sections and asking one group to sing “Twinkle, Twinkle” while the other group does “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.”  They always get a big kick out of the result, hearing how each song becomes more interesting when the other is set against it. Then out comes an Invention, and before you know it they’re saying, “Bring It, Bach!” Well, maybe anyway.

Prompted by her, I finally got around to unpacking the box of music that’s been sitting beside the piano since we moved in half a year ago. Since it contains most of my own books – works of the standard classical giants, some in that lovely blue Urtext—as well as much of the Suzuki repertoire for cello (two sons) plus a whole bunch of piano sheet music at different levels (one daughter) and a few three ring binders in which copious notes were taken by an attending mother (me), this is indeed a box to be reckoned with.  And, wouldn’t you know, my well-worn Well-Tempered Clavier — the one with the fingerings and other notations from a variety of teachers through the years, the one I had to ask my friends at Collective Copies to re-bind for me – well, it did not emerge from that box. Trying to be reassuring, my husband said, “It’s definitely somewhere in this house!”  Right, and so is that little diamond that dropped out of my engagement ring. Fortunately, I found a brand new copy of the book down at the music store, which I will happily return if the genuine one appears soon.

Now, about the younger self I might be hoping to re-unite with….Maybe I’ll find that person when I sit back down on the piano bench for a while. More likely, with sometimes uncertain hands, I will try to just listen carefully for the different strands of melodies, not to say ages exactly: how they weave through one another to make a kind of tapestry of many colors.