Just saying hi, mostly to myself, as I am probably the only live human whose eyes have crossed these web pages. I have not had the time needed to focus on this part of my web universe. Piano playing, studying, learning, and formulating coherent thoughts on the matter are all time-consuming pursuits. Part of my inspiration for creating this site was to document the hive of mental machinations that underlie the act of playing piano. So much code and mechanical translation, converting dots into acts and acts into sounds, the results themselves not even final.
Over on one of my other web sites I recently quoted Julian Jaynes on this matter:
“Here a complex array of various tasks is accomplished all at once with scarcely any consciousness of them whatever: two different lines of near hieroglyphics to be read at once, the right hand guided to one and the left to the other; ten fingers assigned to various tasks, the fingering solving various motor problems without any awareness, and the mind interpreting sharps and flats and naturals into black and white keys, obeying the timing of whole or quarter or sixteenth notes and rests and trills, one hand perhaps in three beats to a measure while the other plays four, while the feet are softening or slurring or holding various other notes.”
Jaynes used the pianist as an example, to illustrate the difference between consciousness and awareness. I think it is generally cliché for non-musicians to use musical metaphors, but in this case I can accept that that the internals of piano-playing open a window into understanding what consciousness is. As can other acts performed most successfully without the intrusion of awareness.
