God Plays Piano

Godsmacked by Glenn Gould

Photo by Dolo Iglesias on Unsplash

My brother is a pianist and orchestra conductor (check out his Substack on music and conductors). Watching him conduct an orchestra is a spiritual experience. But even if I close my eyes, I am transported by the music. Whether Rachmaninoff or Gershwin, I am reminded that we are vessels for the infinite creative genius of the Cosmos.

In all traditions, music is considered the song of spirit. It’s a language that transcends any religious barrier or concept of the Divine. It is universal. Whether we are listening to Native American flutes or harpsichord, Aretha Franklin or Tom Waits, we are tuning into the music of the spheres.

I once heard that there is a chord called “The God Chord,” the harmonies of which rise in a kind of exalted prayer. I suspect it’s the “secret chord” Leonard Cohen describes in “Hallelujah,” and mirrors in the melody of the lines of the stanza.

Now I've heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you dont really care for music, do you?
It goes like this, the fourth, the fifth
The minor falls, the major lifts
The baffled king composing Hallelujah

I’m no musician, but when I listen to that song, I am transported. Maybe it’s to Heaven, maybe it’s to the infinite void, but in any case, it’s transcendent. The music says things I cannot hear without it.

The other night, I was lost down the Internet rabbit hole and stumbled across a video of the great pianist, Glenn Gould, playing Bach, his specialty. Somehow, in all my years of being daily exposed to classical music, I never had the privilege of seeing or hearing Glenn Gould.

I will only say this: Watching Gould play was watching God play piano. Notice I did not say “like” God. I said God. There was literally no person there; the player and the piano and the music were one. Gould was being played by the music. It was almost as if - no, not almost - it was music as the voice of the Sublime Mystery being funneled through hands onto keys. There was no subject-object: there was only the process of music happening.

I was Godsmacked.

I spent three more hours scrolling through YouTube, watching every Glenn Gould video I could find, lost in reverie.

I can think of only a handful of other times in which I had a similar experience. Watching Baryshnikov dance the first time; gazing at my beloved Juniper tree (see my post A Radical Rethinking of Prayer); the birth of my son. These are the peak experiences, of course. But any time we witness something or someone un-self-consciously doing itself, we are experiencing God/Spirit/Source/The Infinite/Ultimate. Unfiltered.

I don’t want to say more about the experience, but I want to share Gould’s/God’s music with you. Maybe you, too, will be Godsmacked.

Enjoy.