the long line

One thing i've always been grateful for, and in fact become more and more grateful for the more i hear about other people's experiences, is that fact that i had a really good music education, one which actually taught me how to appreciate music as opposed to simply passing exams. And one of the things i'll always remember being taught, is how to listen for the long line.

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YH talked about it a lot -- the fact that a piece of music has a narrative arc, just like a piece of writing, and that even as you're shaping each phrase and making sure the details are in place, you need to have in mind that long line, so that your playing has direction and coherence. Years after i stopped taking piano lessons, i found out the reason for her obsession with the long line: her teacher had passed it on to her. YH was taught by Ron Turini, one of very few people whom Vladimir Horowitz actually acknowledged as his students, and apparently, Horowitz and the other old masters like him had a thing for long lines. And passed that thing down to their students, who passed it down to their students, who passed it down ...... And so it goes. (And that line of succession, is a pretty cool example of a long line in itself.)

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i think it's partly because of what YH taught me, that i tend to listen for long lines not just in music, but in life as well. It's a habit of thought which i think can be very useful. It prevents myopia, and helps to put things in perspective. You see events and occurrences not just discretely, but also as part of a larger whole. Which is an incredibly useful skill to pick up from one's childhood piano lessons.

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