My musical safari had its own share of adventures. My first teacher didn’t teach me much, so I moved on without much progress. However, the second teacher was different. I had a collection of Albert Piano Lessons books, and when I showed them to him, he was quite impressed. He not only used these books to teach me but also adopted them as a reference for his other students. This teacher taught me how to read musical notes, something that seemed complicated at first, but eventually, like learning any language, it became second nature.

In Western notation, there are so many elements to keep track of: time signatures, bass or treble clefs, note values, tempo, dynamics (how loudly or softly to play), legato (smooth playing), staccato (detached notes), and more. At first glance, it felt overwhelming. But with practice, just a glance at the sheet music would guide my fingers automatically to the right notes, dynamics, and tempo. It was a matter of muscle memory and mental recall working in harmony.

For me, though, things were a bit different. I had to rely heavily on memorization right from the beginning. With my limited vision, recalling and playing music became a challenge, especially when it came to maintaining tempo and rhythm. The recall and the action needed to be instantaneous, and that’s where things would sometimes get tricky.

During the early stages with my second teacher, we managed by enlarging the pages of my sheet music to the largest possible size. This allowed me to read the notes while sitting at the piano. But by the time I restarted learning, my vision had deteriorated significantly, and we had to come up with alternative methods to notate and play the music.

When I began learning with my third teacher, a young and energetic boy, we devised a system using the letters A to G to represent the notes. For dynamics and other musical expressions, we had to invent our own codes and symbols. It was an evolving process, and we constantly innovated as we progressed. He was quick to teach me the theoretical aspects, but when it came to practical learning, he took a different approach. He decided to teach me songs without breaking them down into the typical step-by-step method, which made things difficult, especially when both hands were playing different notes at different tempos.

I had to rely on listening to the music and memorizing it. We worked on small sections during practical sessions, then I would refer to the notes and gradually piece everything together. It took time, but this process allowed me to slowly memorize entire songs and play them without having to refer back to the sheet music.

Continued in 207. Memory Is A Means - Part 2