Something Like Silence

I’ve written elsewhere about the surprisingly endless flow of traffic outside my window, but today I awoke to… nothing! Blissful silence. I had noticed there was going to be a half marathon going past the building but hadn’t gone so far as to think that would actually close the four lane arterial road. Amazing to be able to experience this one moment of the Cité without cars and sirens (although there is the occasional offical motorbike). I feel like I’m swimming, bathing in silence. Like it’s this thick and viscous blanket of nothingness.

Yesterday the ceasless high romantic piano practice* from the studio above pushes me to a point of total madness. It rains all day and every time I think I can try and escape the unasked for concert the rain gets heavier. Eventually I can’t stand it anymore and I take a long, wet and aimless walk through the Saturday night crowds of the Marais, watching Parisians do their thing — eat, drink, smoke — in plastic tents at the front of bars. I have no desire to do anything of these things. I would like to either listen to music of my choice, or make some. When I return, piano person, is still going. I put on earplugs and headphones and attempt to watch documentaries about conspiracies. 

While it may seem like it, I’m not writing this just to complain but rather to try and thrash out the conundrum of sound in shared spaces. I totally appreciate that my neighbour above is here to practice their art. So they are just doing what they do. (Did I mention they have been predominantly practicing the same 2 pieces for the entire time?) I realise that the acoustics are such that this playing is mainly only heard in my studio so maybe no one else is as bothered by it. But there are also other practice rooms on other floors and at some later date, some poor person will place Post-it notes on the practice room on floor four. They try to politely say that the person’s music is good, but so constant that it is like the war zone that they have come from, and it is driving them crazy.

The comparison is a little shocking. I haven’t come from a war zone so I’m trying to just suck it up. But it does make me ponder the term classical can[n]on. I can’t lose the sense of cultural hierarchies at play. If I said I had to use speakers to do my art in stead of considerately using headphones — if I were blasting my amplified compositions — I’m sure this would not be acceptable. But traditional instruments, no matter how forte they are being played, are acceptable. 

But for now, it’s so quiet I can hear my fridge. I’ve never heard my fridge in the two months I’ve been here. And I hear what sounds like lost lorikeets? Even the pigeons are enjoying the quiet. 

Finally, as the runners start to appear, the silence is broken by the enthusiastic shouting of an encouraging crowd – “Allez, Allez, Allez!”. Later a woman with loud hailer amplifies the cry and blasts a siren. It was sweet while it lasted. 

* Piano practice with accompanying traffic. I don’t mean disrespect to the person practicing, just illustrating the porousness of the building. Did I mention that before this, of all genres of music, classical piano was already my least favourite. Oh and can someone put me out of my misery and tell me what piece of music this is? I can’t bring myself to listen to hours of Chopin? or Schumann? or whatever, to identify it. Maybe that would give me some closure.