An Antidote to Depression

Releases of stress and gloom through music

Luckily, this worked today. On an afternoon when most seemed lost: time, inertia, esteem, plans, results, rewards, I did what I have often done - challenging myself in the friendliest of spirits to play and record a song. What I approved today was the second round of trying to get this recorded; the first almost worked, but there were too many false starts and breakdowns followed by more tension and even a sense of defeat. Put it away. After dinner I realized how important it was to having eaten something good and thought to play again.

This is not necessarily the same as avoiding food before a concert where adrenaline and who knows what other chemicals carry one through. This is about being in a happier relaxed state where I warm to the music. After the first round I thought perhaps that this was the last of it for the day. Luckily, the second wave came around sometime after dessert. “C’mon, let’s try it again,” I heard myself suggest.

I was inspired to use a 50mm Nikon lens and a DSLR - something with such close focus as to offer almost a third dimension, as if you were hovering over my hands while I played. In fact, I was hovering over my hands. I had chosen this particular Gershwin song, as I’ve recently been recording others of his songbook and even practicing some Gershwin solo music from the printed score. My sight reading has always been an impediment. It has slowed down learning and acquiring. My ears (really my inner ears) have long made up for this practical hindrance, and I have, as a result, committed over a hundred classic songs to memory as solos. Beyond that, given my job as an accompanist, I sometimes get to improvise for hours a day. That’s endless material, really.

The particular song in this video is George and Ira Gershwin’s Embraceable You written in 1928 during their great Broadway period. I must have figured out its intricacies in the late 80s or early 90s, but I made it sound a little more refined in the last couple of years - particularly when I needed all the material I could muster for classical ballet classes which were now pouring into my schedule.

Regarding mood and depression though - what a gift! It not only offers a small sense of achievement when the playing works, but it instils order and calm. It’s structure come alive. It’s color in motion. It’s communication with you. To me it is everything.

The day ended in a better place.