Ink Tea Stone Leaf

An underrated pleasure is having a few hours to yourself at home on a sunny day, in which you discover the presence of mind to do nothing except lie on the couch and listen to piano music. You may fantasize about your own fingers possessing the training and dexterity to produce intricate chords and arpeggios in expressive time. You may enjoy a hot beverage, or a cold one, per your taste. You don’t really have to do anything while you’re listening, but the beverage might be nice is all.

If this sounds like a good time to you, we are simpatico. Like-minded are we, and my hope is that in this spirit of accord you will not be overly skeptical when I tell you the name of my favorite album for these purposes. I speak of Piano Collections: Final Fantasy IX, a set of songs I purchased from iTunes over two decades ago, which I have gone to great lengths to preserve on my hard drive ever since*. A morning or an afternoon with this collection is about as good as it gets for me. I am so laden with wonderful music in my home that I may go great lengths of time without hearing it, but when I do, there’s no question that it is perfectly in sync with whatever mood I have.

How did this album move me? It inspired some of the earliest poems I ever posted online, sixteen or so years ago. At least once I actually attempted to write lyrics for one of these cherished melodies, and though I made a hash of it, the evidence is eternal:

Untimed Regret

All I have done
And all that I will do
Is a dream that I cannot sleep my way through;
Though I hear the song,
I know I cannot sing
As I listen to hear the bell ring

Deep in my soul
In the heart of myself
I can feel the unreal tales that I tell;
When I fall asleep
Who knows what I will say?
As my spirit is carried away.

Certainly, I could do better than that today. In fact, I’m thinking of trying just now, but that is for another blog post. The point is, that it meant enough for me to try, even when I didn’t really know what I was doing. Scansion is a marvelous thing.

The music of the Final Fantasy series of video games, particularly the first ten or so entries in which composition was largely the sole responsibility of Nobuo Uematsu, is justly regarded as among the greatest bodies of work in that medium. While games have drifted over the decades toward a more ambient, atmospheric (or less kindly, amorphous) musical approach, Uematsu’s melodic richness spoke to the creative possibilities of limited means, and elevated everything with which it was associated.

It’s a matter of debate whether the score of Final Fantasy IX (2000) represents Uematsu’s best work, but the sheer volume of melody he provided for that game is superlative. In a game that was among the most graphically impressive yet developed on home consoles, players traversed an entire world of locations, from fantastical cities to elemental wilderness and surreal magical landscapes, where musicality defined the mood and character of each settings as much as the colorfully painted backgrounds. The sophistication of the available technology allowed for the realistic emulation of a wider variety of instruments, and more complex arrangements (handled by Shiro Hamaguchi) to accommodate them. Whatever has been accomplished since the turn of the century, the original soundtrack of FFIX remains a landmark.

Simplifying these select arrangements for the two hands of a pianist does nothing to reduce their power to evoke places and moments from this classic modern fairy tale. They are contemplative and colorful instruments of emotion, and if the power of those emotions is derived in part from nostalgia, it is also derived from a superbly confident melodicism and depth. I make no claim that this is the greatest set of compositions for piano, or the best performed or recorded album of piano music. My only claim is that when I have it on I don’t need anything else. I could listen to it for the rest of my life and never love it any less. I knew that back then, and I don’t see myself forgetting any time soon.

Piano Fantasy #9

A piece on the piano plays, soft and unassuming,
Unforgettable,
It means so much to me

A little louder now,
Now soft once more,
Unforgettable,
Sorrow speaks to me

It means so much to me,
And to a precious few who've heard it
It speaks without words;
Listen, unforgettable

*Whatever digital protections Apple had in place circa 2005 to prevent me from moving these files off the computer I originally downloaded them from, I say with satisfaction that they did not make things nearly difficult enough.