Seven or eight years ago, I met with an editor to discuss a novel I was working on at the time. It was about an aging rock singer who pushes everybody he is close to out of his life to chase his dream of returning to the top of the charts only to realize that success hardly matters if you have to do alone.I told the editor what my novel was about and before he even looked at it, he told me I needed to read The Wind in the Wheat by Reed Arvin. He told me it was out of print, but I tracked down a copy and was blown away by what I read.
The book is about a piano player named Andrew Miracle who has a gift that people want him to share with the world, when in reality, he knows that his piano playing only hits its stride when he is playing in the context of a worship service. I want to share a few paragraphs from the book that moved me greatly, hoping it will move you too. I'm not even going to set the scene for you. It's not necessary:
There is a great divide between good playing and great playing. The worst musicians are unaware that this distance exists, and they fumble their way through magnificent literature, oblivious. Most players sense this divide, however, and they know which side of it they are on. A few of these determine to struggle their whole musical lives to reach the side of greatness by practicing and working harder and harder. They end up impressing their friends and colleagues with their machine-like mastery of difficult pieces. But they know that they are not great. They know it because for a few moments, moments they will remember and cling to for the rest of their lives, they have actually crossed that divide. For a shining moment they understood, and they wept and played and believed in their greatness. But they were cast out again, and no amount of struggling would bring them back across.
No one crosses the divide by struggling, and no one passes through it by practice. There is only one bridge across. It is the bridge of abandonment, and it is built of helplessness, and of courage. Great playing is given over to the music utterly and completely. It is abandoned and willing. It is calm and it is shrieking. It is weeping and laughter, and more than anything else, it is love.
That night Andrew closed his eyes and began to play. He gave himself over to his gift, and let one note follow another. He let whatever music roamed within him play itself out, go where it would go, with no thought to cloud or filter. It was soft, and it hurt; it was loud and impregnable, like a fortress. It was the proud dance of a peasant girl. It was his father, dead. It was the wind, for a frightening moment, blowing up the skirt of a classmate in fifth grade. It was drought. It was his first kiss. For a full half-hour Andrew road the piano like a horse. He cajoled it and caressed it and pushed through it because it fought him, and he would not be denied its secrets.
