| A Vacuum, Michael Sachs, and a Bissell Carpet Cleaner
My family spent the Christmas holiday in Tucson. I had some rehearsals for a New Year’s Eve job with my orchestra in Chandler, so I took the opportunity of having a quiet house to clean the carpets. My Christmas gift (the new Michael Sachs CD) was in the mail when I arrived, so I listened to the entire disk several times on my iPod as I was doing my cleaning job.
Who knows why my mind spins in the way that it does, but I thought I would share this interesting comparison to the trumpet that I experienced while I was cleaning carpets.
While preparing the first room I removed all of the furniture and clutter and vacuumed it extremely well. There’s a certain rhythm that is familiar when vacuuming, a common speed and pass distance, and a general idea of how long it takes to vacuum a room. All the time that I was doing this prep work, I was marveling at how great Michael sounded on this CD. Wow!
Next, I got out our new Bissell carpet cleaner (with a container for hot water and another container with the cleaning fluid). This thing has lots of bells and whistles, and the first thing that I noticed were the indicator lights as I pulled the cleaner across the carpet. There were eight lights that went from “Too Fast” to “Best Cleaning”. As I got into the rhythm of the Bissell cleaner, I realized that I was used to the vacuum and I was often in the “Too Fast” range. To arrive at the light that said “Best Cleaning” felt painfully slow to me.
As I looked at the first pass (soap and then rinse), I realized how long it was going to take to complete the entire room. What had taken 15 minutes to vacuum was going to take hours with the Bissell cleaner.
How many of us listen to music and prepare for lessons / concerts at vacuum speed, and then wonder why our performances lack the sparkle that Michael Sachs has in every piece he plays. I feel like Michael has spent his preparation time at the "Best Cleaning" setting while I’m constantly moving along at the "Too Fast" setting! Allowing the music to penetrate so that it is mastered simply can’t be done at the speed that most of us dedicate to practice and listening.
As I continued running the Bissell across the floor, I noticed the "Flow Indicator" that was spinning as the water was exchanging through the carpet and back into the machine. When the indicator stopped spinning it was time to change the water. During one cleaning pass after I had just changed the water (with the soap dial on the medium traffic setting), the Flow Indicator stopped spinning. I thought to myself, "That’s impossible! I just changed the water!" Well this machine was very SMART. When the cleaning fluid container was empty, it had logic built in to shut the water flow off. Man, that took me forever to figure out (I’m not one to read manuals). Once I understood the dual function of this flow indicator, I could keep track of both water changes and cleaning fluid changes with a simple glance of the indicator.
How often do young players arrive at a good sound and use this as the benchmark for their progress (it sounds just like their favorite recording from behind the bell)? Unfortunately, it may simply be a loud sound that doesn’t really project (forgot to put the soap into the machine). Or it could be a great sound that requires far too much effort to generate (not very efficient) – (adding water and cleaning fluid all the time to make sure it’s full wasting lots of trips back and forth to the kitchen).
The players that really understand how to listen to the sound (i.e. a vibrant, colorful, resonant sound) have figured out how that dual-function flow indicator works. They know they’re getting clean carpets, because they know how the machine works (i.e. they’re carrying a great sound into every piece and really making music).
Knowing where the heavy traffic areas are and spending extra time with spots assures the carpet are truly clean, just like a thorough understanding of the literature and adequate time addressing technical passages in the practice room will allow the performer to simply make music.
I feel like I’ve made the jump from vacuum to Bissell cleaner in my playing. Now I’m working to get into the “Best Cleaning” mode! I read so many posts (and I’ve written a fair number myself) trying to understand how someone can get the carpets so clean with a vacuum. Many times the answers that come back are related to specifics about a Bissell carpet cleaner and the miscommunication begins.
Coming at the music with a brilliant, vibrant, colorful sound first, coupled with thorough preparation, complete listening, and sufficient time allowing the material to be absorbed by the player will lead to a musical product worth listening to. You may think you can get there with 20 minutes and a vacuum, but you’ll just be touching the surface.
Who would have guessed I’d be comparing Michael Sachs to a vacuum cleaner and a Bissell carpet cleaner? I thought it was a very interesting analogy, though! |