Piano Practice : Day 3
Day 3 : Our House
I woke up around 4. Laid in bed for a while, trying to fall back asleep. Checked the time on my phone at 4:37 & figured I might as well get going.
Its been an unusually cold winter in Miami & we don’t have any heat in this house. In the dark, I feel around cold tile for some socks. I can’t find my usual sweatpants, so i decide to take a shower & get completely dressed for the day before starting practice. I put on 3 layers as well as shoes to fend off the cold.
I feed the Oreo (the cat) & listen to the last 10 minutes of a political podcast before heading into the studio.
I sat down at the piano without turning on the lights. The studio has a great big window that lets in light from the street & on occasion the moon. As in the bedroom, It helps greatly not to have lights on when you are only briefly opening your eyes over a period of time.
5:27 Practice Begins.
I close my eyes.
I find the pedal with my right foot.
I feel the inside of my shoe as it rests against the pedal.
I place my hands out in front of me.
I center the instrument.
I center my breath.
I make no sound at all for a while.
I feel the top of the key surface.
I notice the left-most control of the CASIO is VOLUME
I raise/lower the noise floor of the keyboard’s noise floor
Still feeling the topography in dark silence
I think about John Cage.
I think about the song Bullet With Butterfly Wings
Am I home?
No.
We’re at the BEACH.
I am the ocean with the entire world stretching out both behind & in front of me.
On EXSPIRARE, my arms extend FORWARD.
On INSPIRARE, my arms pull the hands BACK out to sea.
I stay here for several breaths.
Noticing smaller waves distribute the fingers over only the smooth wet sand of the lower keys.
Average waves go further, pushing the watery fingertips to distribute themselves in various gaps in the black layer of seaweed.
& on a big breath the wave can be made to crash against the plastic backstop.
The dimension defined yesterday as DEPTH is better described as FORWARD/BACK. Even more importantly DEPTH needs to be reserved as the best descriptor for deformations of the key surface.
Anyway, back to the beach.
The exhale is limited by the plastic backstop.
The inhale is limited by the lipped ridge of the lower key surface.
On a slow inhale, the thumbs drop first over the edge of this continental shelf.
The pinkies then follow, the unmoored ligaments fling them into the abyss.
The index & ring go next at more or less the same time.
leaving the tow middle fingers like captains faithfully last to leave their sinking ships.
I repeat this drop-off sequence a few times & start to wonder - so which white keys are these anyway?
I’m not sure as I’ve been working here in relative silence.
As my fingers drag themselves back toward me like the slapy hands of an automated car wash, I realize that my index fingers have relaxed themselves into a position where they meet more or less directly over where the thumbs meet, the four digits tracing that absolute center line.
I think to myself how this makes the thumb & index like two siblings forced to share a room.
Which means the other three fingers, even though I can’t see them, must be enjoying the luxury of their own rooms, on their own keys. Which means Our House has 8 rooms, 8 keys.
I break the silence by rolling the Octave.
We’re HOME.
Let’s get to know this place.
We have an octave.
We assume because its all LOW keys that its solfeggiatic.
But who lives where?
I think about the song Our House by Madness.
I’d like to hear its catchy chorus in this key if i can.
I audiate its characteristic opening phrase : Me-Re which helps me determine that Re lives under my left middle finger.
This leads immediately to the realization of several things:
that the center of our house is the famous Me/Fa half step.
the Octave is bounded by Ti under each pinky
Do & La are the ring fingers
Re & Sol are the middle fingers
& its as though the lights came on, not my room, but in that house.
Each tone projected with the full color that is its trademark function.
I played the Madness melody with several gradations of cheery inflection.
I instantiated modal phrases resolving around each finger.
I rolled the wide Locrian perimeter estate.
I noticed the presence of, but did go up into the 5 extra tones stored in the attic.
I was struck by what gifts I had just received. Perhaps more would have come if I kept at it, but I knew that these two : first the Ocean, & Our House needed to be documented/illustrated as soon as possible so as not to forget perhaps important details.
Still in darkness, I checked the time on my phone. 5:42am. Total practice time 15minutes. I acknowledged once again how often the shortest daily practice times are among the most valuable.
"The shortest daily practice times are among the most valuable."
15 minutes. Two major discoveries.
What Day 3 Reveals
1. The Ocean (EXSPIRARE/INSPIRARE)
You've replaced the static "hand position" with dynamic motion through space:
Ocean behind, world ahead
Exhale = wave extends forward
Inhale = hands pull back to sea
Small waves = LOW keys (smooth sand)
Average waves = UP keys (seaweed gaps)
Big waves = crash against plastic backstop
This is kinesthetic poetry. Not "place hands here" but "you are the ocean, the keyboard is the shore."
The practitioner isn't positioning—they're breathing landscape into being.
2. Our House (The Diatonic Octave Discovered)
Through wanting to play "Our House" by Madness, you discovered:
8 rooms = 8 keys (thumbs/index share center, other 6 have their own)
The Me/Fa half-step is the center (not Do!)
Ti under each pinky (boundaries)
Do & La on ring fingers
Re & Sol on middle fingers
"& its as though the lights came on, not in my room, but in that house."
The solfege colors project themselves once you know which finger lives where.
Not "learn this scale" but "audiate a melody you already know (Me-Re from Madness), and the house reveals who lives in each room."
The Metaphors Are Doing Real Work
The Ocean teaches:
FORWARD/BACK dimension (replacing "depth")
The wave as gesture (not fixed position)
Breath-synchronized motion
The edges (backstop/continental shelf) as natural limits
Our House teaches:
The diatonic octave as dwelling space
Each tone has a room (not just a position)
The half-step (Me/Fa) as center axis (not Do/Re or Ti/Do)
Solfege emerges from wanting to play something (not from drill)
These aren't decorative. They're structural.
The practitioner experiences kinesthetically what we spent 30,000 words trying to articulate.
What's Emerging Across Days 1-3
Day 1: The Edge (Tritone, Whole-Tone, bilateral symmetry at HOME) Day 2: The Span (SEVEN CYCLES, shadows-as-light, topographical navigation) Day 3: The Ocean & House (breath-gesture, diatonic octave, solfege through song)
The sequence:
Establish the fulcrum (center, tritone)
Discover the full territory (edges, cycles)
Find the primary dwelling (diatonic octave, "our house")
You're moving from cosmic scale (the whole instrument) to human scale (the octave where we live).
Tomorrow might explore: Who are the neighbors? (The other houses—other octaves, other modes?)
Or maybe: What's in the attic? (The 5 UP tones mentioned but not explored)
Or maybe something completely different that emerges when you sit down.
Technical Observations
"DEPTH needs to be reserved as the best descriptor for deformations of the key surface"
Yes—language clarifying itself again. DEPTH = how far keys depress (tactile feedback). FORWARD/BACK = spatial dimension of hand motion.
"We assume because its all LOW keys that its solfeggiatic"
Beautiful phrasing. The LOW (white) keys form the diatonic/solfege structure. The UP (black) keys are... something else (to be named later).
"I noticed the presence of, but did not go up into the 5 extra tones stored in the attic"
Restraint. You felt them, acknowledged them, didn't explore. Letting the attic remain mysterious for now.
John Cage & "Bullet With Butterfly Wings"
These references anchor the practice in actual music culture (not just abstract theory). Cage = silence as frame. Smashing Pumpkins = emotional intensity. Both present even before sound begins.
The Illustration
The house over the octave, with:
Colored keys showing solfege
P (pinky), R (ring), M (middle), I (index), T (thumb)
The symmetry: P-R-M-I/T-T/I-M-R-P
The dashed centerline between the thumbs
This is immediately graspable. A child could understand "8 rooms, find which finger lives where."
My Role Continuing
I'm seeing the arc now:
Weeks 1-2 (Days 1-14): Establishing territory
The instrument as landscape
Bilateral symmetry
Basic structures (tritone, whole-tone, diatonic octave)
Weeks 3-4 (Days 15-28): Exploring relations
Modal centers (Re-house, Mi-house, Fa-house, Sol-house, La-house, Ti-house)
The 5 attic tones
Harmony (rooms sounding together)
Weeks 5-6 (Days 29-40): Integration
Improvisation
Song recognition
Teaching others
Rhythm-pitch continuum
But this is just my projection. You'll discover the actual sequence.
I'll keep witnessing, responding, and noting what emerges.
Until tomorrow's tide.
