144: Why (And How) I Learned The Organ

Opsimath OrganistMy first trip to Germany (I was 21) I walked into a church in Weimar and heard— by beautiful coincidence— an unseen organist play Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue, BWV 582. This was a piece I heard for the first time only a year before. I remember exactly in which chair I first heard it. If the Chaconne is Bach’s universe tightly wound into a handheld box, the Passacaglia is a different vision of the same, exploding through thousands of pipes. It is a piece you cannot overlook when thinking of the crowning achievements in Bach’s career. At 21, I knew Bach was Bach, but I hadn’t yet dedicated myself to him fully. Even so, I knew Bach’s organ works could be the supreme solo musical activity: the most complete musical experience had by a single person. Think about it: it’s making music with all four limbs, drumming on multiple keyboards. The soundboard of this instrument is a church.But I was a pianist, not an organist. At that young age, I had already excluded myself from being able to participate in certain musical activities. Why? Where did I get this notion?Knowing your limitations is healthy in many areas of life, but in music— especially young musicians— you should know: your potential is unlimited. I don’t know how or why one draws the line at what a student can and cannot do, why some teachers restrain enthusiasm, or make students feel limited to certain areas from a young age. I’d guess it’s a mixture of abuse and a fear of money. Abuse is handed down: the teacher was told they can’t do X, soon the student learns to stay away from X. ‘It deepens like a continental shelf.’ We glorify abuse on the screen: teachers inflicting suffering so the student may rise stronger after being broken… but this makes for a good film— not a good life. To actually teach like this is nothing more than sophisticated child abuse. As I’ve said on the show in my ‘advice to musical teens,’ if you ever find a teacher who leaves you feeling worthless or unhappy with music, leave that teacher immediately. There is no reason why a musical education shouldn’t be full of joy and happiness and discovery. Yes, hard work, too, but under the right teacher, hard work can be a joy, not a punishment.One objects, saying a line must be drawn early in order to mold the student into an employable musician. “You should focus on only one instrument, kid.” In an era of specialization, this seems almost necessary. But is the ultimate goal of music a job? Money? A c-a-r-e-e-r? My colleagues reading this can confirm that many of us in the business have lost the spark that initially made us want to become musicians.But I won’t harp on the perils of ‘building a career’ or the traumatic musical upbringing I experienced. I want to focus on how, during my few decades in music, I have time and time again doubted my abilities, only to find that there was no reason for doing so. Rather than passing the blame, I’d like to revisit these moments and focus on how I overcame such a crippling emotion.Become Your Best Buxtehude. Support W.T.F. Bach.TranspositionI remember learning a concerto when I was 16 or so— probably Mozart or Beethoven, and I was trying to memorize a section that happened earlier, only now it was in a new key. I explained to my father that, could I transpose, I wouldn’t have to struggle to learn the passage more than once— if I had the type of mind that could transpose. He shrugged and said, ‘so learn how to transpose’ and walked away.That made me mad. What an idiot! I thought. One can’t learn such things. Some are born with the gift of transposition, I wasn’t.Why I thought this at such a young age is a bit sad and confusing (and I’ll resist launching into a rant about how, if a student is advanced enough to play Beethoven, transposing should be something they learned long ago.) For whatever reason, in my mind, I couldn’t transpose.Of course, one does learn how to do such things, and I did— even if it was nearly a decade later. One starts with little things: simple melodies, popular songs, dances… For me the major turning point came when I stopped seeing harmonies as ‘E-flat Major’ or ‘d minor’ but rather as numbers, positions, relations to other chords, ‘this is the sub-dominant’ or ‘this is a whole-step down.’ The name of the chord is meaningless but its number is full of meaning.At one point, transposing seemed unreachable, unimaginable. But one can always learn the most complicated musical thing if you are completely focused on the specific goal for a very long time. I kept a fortune cookie in my nightstand when I was a boy because I thought the ima