Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.00.1405211001480.24771@panix2.panix.com>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>
To: Cyb <cybermind@listserv.wvu.edu>, Wryting-L <WRYTING-L@listserv.wvu.edu>
Subject: Qin Again
Date: Wed, 21 May 2014 10:03:43 -0400 (EDT)
Qin Again http://www.alansondheim.org/qintune5.mp3 http://www.alansondheim.org/qintune6.mp3 These were more difficult to me and on occasion I'm missing the note or harmonic, but not to any great extent, I think whenever I hear what I record, the faults resonate more than the rest, which almost disappears into the background, the faults appear like stumbling blocks, but also signify the body itself, for example, here I was out of tune, the fingers slipping or the position forgotten, or, here, the harmonic touch was slightly off, the higher ones are so unforgiving, and this is again my fingers off or sliding on the side of the string which is suspended taut above the board, so it comes down to hands, memory, confusion, mislaid left or right hand positions, something amiss, not to be taken lightly but hopefully for others who have just come to the pieces, the background will become foreground, the errors slurred over, the music emerging, and so much more difficult on these instruments without the easy convenience of frets that place the fingers just so for you, on the other hand or fingers, allowing for little deviation, the qin, guqin, ch'in, is more than that, encompassing the world between the upper and lower surfaces, the pillar of earth and the pillar of heaven holding both in harmony, and on mine, the hui position markers slightly out of skew, perhaps I am living the year of fourteen months, perhaps my qin has come from another time or another qin altogether, perhaps someone else is playing when I had murmured, mine. heaven, earth, dragon pond, pool, goose, dragon, phoenix