One Hand
Clapping:
The Taoe of Music
WholeArts and
The Psychic Internet is proud to present the
"Preface" and "Part One" of this
remarkable book by Daniel d'Quincy. "One Hand
Clapping: The Tao of Music," originally published by
WholeArts in 1991, is a book-length essay on the
performance of music from the perspective of Eastern
philosophy and religion. Mr. d'Quincy is a noted
composer, musician, author, inventor, educator, speaker,
and photographer. Please visit his unique music sites at WholeArts: syNThony, and the WholeArts Online Music Conservatory.
Page 22
Chapter Three
If you are like
most people, and if you agree not to belabor and
prejudice the issue with pre-conceived philosophical or
scientific notions, there is at first no difficulty.
Nothing is simpler than to call to mind our own direct
apprehension of ourselves. All of us have a direct
experience of our own identity when we say the word
“I,” as in, for example, “I am asking the
question.” What could be more direct than the
experience of being the subject of the sentence,
“I am”?
In Zen, there is
nothing more direct. “And, so,” says the Zen
Master, “there is no problem. You’ve answered
the question. Why are you still here?” Sending
seekers away from the doors of the temple is practically
a high art in the world of Zen.
But we persist,
for there does seem to be a problem in it – perhaps
many problems. We want to say more. After the subject and
the verb, we feel entitled to a predicate. For example,
we may need to qualify the answer by saying, “I am
asking the question, and I am a musician. Moreover, I am
a musician with stage fright. This means that I am one
minute filled with the desire to pour out my heart in my
music, and the next minute paralyzed with fear that
somebody will hear me and judge me. How can I show what I
really am, what I really feel, when I am shaking from the
knees up?” Not only a problem, but also a very
formidable one for a musician.[1]
Suddenly,
whomever it was that we meant by the word “I”
has split into pieces. There is the part that feels the
stage fright and the part that wants not to feel it. As
the composite of these two parts, conflict is created,
because the individual wants to bring one part to bear on
another part, vanquishing it if necessary – as if
“to lift himself up by his own bootstraps”
(strictly speaking a physical impossibility). Still, hope
springs eternal that a new and better “I” will
supplant the old and defective “I.” In that
victory, it is hoped, some new integrity will be
established – the new and improved “I”
being not fragmented, but whole.
Our meditation on
the subject has already reaped some rewards. Direct and
close observation has at least alerted us to the depth of
the question. It has revealed the implicit conflicts that
exist within us under the rubric of our supposedly
singular identity. Inevitably, our meditation raises a
host of new questions about conflict and how to deal with
it.
But the Zen
Master is likely to interrupt, and say that we have only
evaded the original question with our qualification and
problem. It’s true that our reply begs another
question: “Who is feeling my stage fright?” And
another: “Who is that doesn’t want to feel
it?” But these questions are substantially the same
as the first. The Zen Master implies that our problem as
we perceive it, perhaps all problems, can be traced to
the same sort of evasion. In any case, our answer is not
regarded as satisfactory.
Remember that we
are trying to be very direct in our observations, not
allowing theory to come into the question in any way.
Since this is a meditation of sorts, and since we are
each of us alone in doing it, there is no possibility of
basing our answer on what we have read, or heard from any
kind of expert authority. If your identity is really
there, touch it now. Listen to it. Smell it if you can.
Feel your lungs breathing, the stomach digesting. Listen
to the circulation of your blood. Is your identity in
your physical presence? Where are you?[2]
[1] The reader can substitute any one of
numerous variations. For example, “I am a musician
who wants to play the music that moves me, but I am also
a musician who loves fame and money, and people want to
hear the music that moves them.”
|
