GG: On musical abilities...

["Joseph Podlesnik" <veronese@jerseycape.com>]

To those of you on this list that play the piano: 

I envy you. 

I am not a musician. (Rather, I am a visual artist who wishes he was a
musician.) Years ago, I tried teaching myself the first few bars of
Chopin's "Funeral March" from Sonata 5? in B flat minor, but didn't get
very far. Later, I was so moved by the brilliance and life of GG's early
Mozart sonatas recordings that I tried teaching myself some of those, too.
"Noble attempts" is how I would describe my efforts. My life long goal,
some day, - perhaps in a second life? - would be to play a full-fledged
fugue. I appreciate anyone who can play the piano fluently.

What it is about my longing for music? Could it be the fact that some
musical works move me to tears? (To be sure, there is a powerful emotional
component at work here.) On the other hand, I have been studying paintings
seriously for 14 years, and I have yet to cry at the sight of a powerful
work of visual art. Instead, I experience what seems to be a deep feeling
of organization and completeness (could this be the inner "ecstasy" which
GG spoke about?)

-- Joseph Podlesnik