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Joe Townley had youthful aspirations of becoming a concert pianist when he suffered an injury that changed his life. After walking away from the piano for nineteen years, he has returned with a renewed determination to pick up where he left off and go beyond.
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Q. As a teen you had dreams of becoming a concert pianist. What interrupted that dream? A. I started piano at age 10 and progressed rapidly, winning competitions when I was a teen. I had aspirations of becoming a concert pianist until a dramatic moment changed everything. I was practicing Polanc's Toccata and the final note is the lowest key on the piano. With great gusto and a miscalculation, I struck the block of wood on the piano rather than the low a. I heard a crunch and my finger went numb. The result was nerve damage but I went on to earn a Bachelors and Masters Degree in Music. After 12 years of coping with the recurring finger problem, I decided it was pointless to continue in music and I turned to a career in writing. I stopped playing the piano for 19 years. Q. What inspired you to return to the piano? A. I was motivated by the publication of my first novel in 2000. Writing and playing the piano are two artistic mediums that I love. I was also inspired by pianist Janice Weber who is a novelist. She premiered the original edition of Liszt's Transcendental Etudes and has also published several popular novels. The fact that she has successfully combined piano and writing intrigued me. I wondered if I could do the same after being away from the piano for so long. At first it was horrible! I couldn't get a c scale out correctly. But considering how the laws of nature work, I knew it was a matter of time and perseverance. Regular practice every day, no matter how busy you are, is very important. Time and consistency have been the two keys to my success. No matter how busy I am, I manage to practice at least a half-hour each day. On a normal day I practice one to two hours. Q. What are your thoughts about scales? A. In my opinion, scales are absolutely indispensable to any pianist wanting to build a solid technique. My approach is to treat each scale like an individual piece of music. I find the nuances in each one and get a feel for how each lays under the fingers, since each possess a different configuration. I start slowly, concentrating on making sure each tone sounds even, the fingers are comfortable when I pass the thumb under them, and trying different fingerings for each scale to see which works best for me. Two years later, I still start every practice session with fifteen to thirty minutes of rigorous scale practice. Q. What was your most difficult problem to overcome? A. Psychologically convincing myself that even after 19 years, and at my current age, I still have something musically to offer the world. Two things hamper us; the technique to do what we want to do and a lack of faith in our ability. Maturity brings with it a new outlook. We no longer have the pressure of preparing for competitions and public performances so our approach is different; more relaxed and with a new sense of interpretation that can only come with experience. Q. Has your return to playing the piano influenced your work as a writer? A. Each medium exercises the mind. But playing the piano has helped sharpen my brain in ways I never thought possible. My reflexes are that of a teenager. I can catch an object mid-air a split-second after it has dropped. Definitely, resuming the piano has contributed to that ability. For me, playing the piano takes twice the concentration of writing. Language is a natural means of expression that we all possess, but the language of music is an acquired skill. It takes talent, aptitude and years of training to express music in a meaningful way, something not all of us are geared to do. Even though I work twice as hard when it comes to playing, I find that music, inevitably, is more spiritually fulfilling to me than writing, at least in the short run, since it's the immediacy of the moment-the few precious minutes when the tones are actually produced and then lost forever-that we're talking about. |
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