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Great Books That Have Changed Our Musical Lives
A friend of mine asked me, recently, what books have truly and deeply
influenced my music
in my life and, amongst other titles, I sang him the praises of
Shinryu Suzuki's book called,
"Zen Mind , Beginners' Mind".
Though not as famous a D T Suzuki who was the great popularizer of
Japanese Zen Buddhism in the
west, I prefer Shunryu Suzuki, the head of the San Francisco Zen
Center who
wrote perhaps the best single book on practicing a musical instrument,
"Zen Mind, Beginners' Mind".
He never actually wrote a book and certainly not on praciticing a
musical instrument.....he was too zen for that...lol,
but his students recorded his answers to a public question and answer
seminar where everyone asked him how
he was able to master meditating successfully considering that it is so
difficult to still the human mind when
trying to do such an extremely simple, non-intellectual and repetitive
practice.
If you take that book and substitute the word 'Zazen' (the Buddhistic
practice of
meditating only on your breath and how we breathe, in and out) and put
musical "practice", it's an incredibly
wise book about how to still the mind so that one can play something
over and over
and over until one's technique improves significantly.
I'd try to paraphrase his philosophy and his understanding of how to
get around the projecting and over identifying/attached nature of the
human mind, particularly
viz a vis the practice of repetitive musical playing but I just
wouldn't come close to
how profound that book is.
I actually ritualistically purchase a copy of it and give it as a
present to all of my advanced students
when they first develop the desire to really woodshed their instrument
deeply and are having troubles
stilling their minds doing so.
It was my bible when I finally was able to master double stroke bouncing
exercises on trapset many years ago
At that time, I had a practice pad on a stand with two identical
drumsticks in every single room of the house
(including the kitchen and the bathroom) so that if I ever looked down,
I could just pick the sticks up and continue
practicing.
I can't more highly recommend it. It has changed my life and the life
of dozens of my really good students over the
last three decades.