As a guitar player I can't even imagine relearning a lifetime of experience from scratch again, much less learning to walk and do ordinary things you take for granted. Brains are amazingly plastic, but usually not at age 75. It take incredible will power to get back to this point.
Without video it might have been impossible to recreate her unusual technique.
It's not fun. I had a small stroke while in a music lesson. Instructor was very confused as to why I suddenly couldn't play or follow any instructions.
Programming has been this weird mix where I would see a simple problem. Say a fibonacci sequence. Something I could do in my sleep.
I would look at it. Understand that I can solve this in seconds. Then it would take me a week to muddle through it, badly.
So I know how to program just fine, but I somehow I can't actually do it. So it's been relearning things I think I know how to do.
The saving grace is people would often ask how to approach a difficult problem and I could still quickly figure out what the issue is, and what approach to take to resolve it. So I was very helpful to others, but I couldn't do the work I suggested.
Reminds me of this story from This American Life that they replayed recently about a retired physicist diagnosed with Alzheimer's who loses the ability to read a clock:
What you're describing fits well with the description of declarative
versus imperative knowledge [1], the subject of a recent thread
here. Perhaps your experience suggests they are encoded by different
neurological structures! I hope you continue to recover.
[1] example: knowing what a square root is, and all the common roots,
but not knowing Newtons method or any trick for finding them.
I mean, it's not really like he started from scratch. He had to redevelop muscle memory, sure, but much of guitar playing is knowing what will sound good and that doesn't go away even if you lose the whole arm...
> As a guitar player I can't even imagine relearning a lifetime of experience from scratch again
Then you should remember, if you practiced an hour everyday, it took you less than a month to learn to play guitar and less than a few to be proficient (especially with folk music as opposed to classical or jazz). Guitar is among the easiest instruments to learn. What is exceptional about Mitchell is that she probably lost fine motor control entirely, and no doubt with great effort and determination, created new neural pathways in her brain in order to duplicate the fine motor control she once had. Learning to play guitar is not all that impressive, but reconfiguring the brain to bypass permanent brain damage truly is.
It's incredibly easy to learn the four guitar chords and a few plucking techniques to play some pop music, like 3 days for strumming chords and a month or two for something like Green Day's "Good Riddance."
Playing at Joni Mitchell's level with all of her alternate tunings is something that fewer than 0.01% of guitar players will ever achieve regardless of the hours invested.
I don’t know if you’re a guitar player or not, but I am and I disagree with just about everything you said. It also seems like you didn’t read the article.
Dave Mustaine (Megadeth) writes about a kinda similar experience. He fell asleep with his arm hanging over the back of a chair. This pinched a nerve and caused permanent damage, such that he was no longer able to play. IIRC, he needed surgery to get any muscular control at all, and then needed to relearn to play.
Mustaine's damage was probably less profound, but I think the fine control needed for the kind of thing he does is rather more extreme than Mitchell's.
On January 7th, 2002, while at the [drug rehab] hospital, I sat on a chair which I hung my arm over the back of. The hard edge along the top of the seat back cut off the circulation to my radial ulnar nerve. After approximately two hours I woke up and my left hand was numb. I went to the nurse's station and they said it was the hair-tie I had on my wrist. I wish. I had to go into town to see a specialist and he said that I would be lucky if I ever gained even 80% of the use of my arm again. This was unacceptable for me, so I left the rehab, against medical advice and when home to Scottsdale, Az. to get my arm checked out by a city doctor. My Dr. Rahj Singh, a expert in nerve damage, spinal damage, etc. said that I may get 100% use of my arm, but that I would never play the same. He then prescribed the braces you see [here]: Photo#1, Photo#2, Photo#3. I then proceeded to Nathan Koch for physical therapy for 4 months of sessions, three times a week, 1-1.5 hours a day. After I finally got my feeling back in my hand, I realized that I could not even hold a feather in that hand and started a grueling 1-year weight-training program. 13 months after I hurt myself, a personal assistant that had worked for me died in hospice of drug damage, and I was asked to play. It was the first time I had held a guitar since November 17, 2001. Since then, I have completely healed and started taking lessons intermittently to re-learn my trade. After an additional 5 months I decided that I was going to play again, but that is another story.
Physical nerve damage can be hard but brain damage can fuck perception of limbs entirely, not just fine control. That said music is not just about gesture and technique, higher abstraction about rhythm and harmonic patterns are not related to biomechanics. That may help relearning.
Wow. I had no idea that was something that could happen. I would have expected you to wake up before damaging yourself like that - sort of like falling asleep in the bath tub.
I've heard it called Drunk's Palsy (long term effects) or Saturday Night Palsy (shorter term, less severe). Falling asleep in such a way that circulation is cut off to an area, causing damage that normally your body would move to prevent. Drugs and alcohol impede that input to the brain so you don't toss and turn as much, I guess.
One day last year I noticed I couldn't feel part of my leg after my wife had sat in my lap for a few minutes earlier in the night. It freaked me out as I still had no feeling in it the next day. The doctor told me it was pinched and would regrow over time. It took about a month to get full feeling back.
I know this gets said a lot. But this is another example why I keep coming back to HN, I love all the tech talk for sure, but every once in a while, something sweet and inspirational like this gets slipped in and sometimes is just what I needed at the end of a long week.
I tend to experience this as well. For some reason HN on the weekends has way more interesting and varied topics. The weekday crowd either comes here for more mundane topics, or marketers flood the submission queue, I can't tell which. But I love opening up HN on Saturday mornings and finding some strange retro computing topic.
A similar phenomenon also happens if you open up HN before the east coast of north america wakes up on a weekday. The topics tend to be more varied.
Joni Mitchell's music is precious to me. There is something about her lyrics--poetic but folksy--that is so disarming and enchanting. Her songs always catch you off-guard. A friend introduced me to her album "Hejira" years ago, and it's given me so much comfort in dark times, and so much joy in light times. She's a once-in-a-generation kind of artist, just consistently brilliant.
Some entrypoints, if I may (and please reply with your favorites):
- Refuge of the roads - Hejira
- Blue motel room - Hejira
- You turn me on, I'm a radio - For the roses
- Edith and the kingpin - The hissing of summer lawns
Joni Mitchell's story and Pat Martino's story are remarkably similar (brain aneurysm). The question is, did they regain access to the part of their brain that allowed them to play guitar, or did they really re-learn?
In Martino's case, after his full amnesia, he was able to retrieve his unique playing style, but was that because he learned by listening to his recordings (just like Joni did), or because the style never left him but was somehow locked?
Part of it was from listening to his own recordings, part of it was from discovering it inside his brain again. As Pat's aneurysm grew over time, it's likely that his brain had already somewhat remodeled to accommodate it. IIRC, in a TV show about it, they talked with one of his friends/students whom he would play guitar duos with. His friend was playing for Pat after the aneurysm (Pat wasn't back to playing yet) and the guy hit a wrong chord and Pat suddenly said "No, D minor 9th" and grabbed the guitar and played the right chord.
Pat also tells a similar story about meeting Joe Pesci backstage and knowing him only from movies until Joe tells him, "I can tell you what you used to drink at Smalls' Paradise in the '60s". Video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niUwDegpYyo
Kind of interesting to imagine the motivation for the former, it's surely different to that which achieved it in the first place: 'I want to be who I was' or something, rather than 'this expresses who I am' or 'I like this sound' or whatever.
In February 2005, Collins was hospitalised after two cerebral haemorrhages which resulted in aphasia, and he needed months to recover. He resumed his musical career in 2007. A documentary film on his recovery, The Possibilities Are Endless, was released in 2014.
‘Martino Unstrung’ is a documentary about him and talks a lot about what he was like leading up to and after the aneurysm was discovered. A great look into one of the giants of jazz guitar but also fascinating to learn the things he could remember and what he couldn’t, personality changes, etc.
There's a very interesting Brazilian case: Herbert Vianna, singer of the band "Paralamas do Sucesso" crashed his ultra-light aircraft and had some brain damage. He can't walk anymore, after the accident he couldn't speak Portuguese but could speak English. He had to relearn who he was and quickly came become to the successful artist he always was. He even recovered hos political views.
Joni Mitchell is a treasure. I have a thought exercise I sometimes use for popular musicians: "Will they still be popular 100 or 200 years from now, like Mozart or Bach are today?" Pink Floyd: yes, Joni Mitchell: yes.
My love of Joni's music goes back to high school in America, but as a working class young man the 70's it was best to keep it a quiet if you didn't want people to think you were gay. Tough guys listened to Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, then the Sex Pistols.
I hope she's still popular. She's a genuine genius, the music is astounding, and as a personality she's a force of nature.
But I have a theory that you're not destined for immortality until at least three generations love your work. Pink Floyd and maybe Kate Bush seem to be there, but I'm not sure Joni is yet.
I'm afraid you are right. Sadly, that means many brilliant musicians like Tom Waits are destined to fade into obscurity. I'm sure Tom Waits will live on, but fewer people will know his brilliance.
When was the last time you even heard Elvis anywhere? What male singer can you name from the 1940s other than Sinatra? When was the last time you heard anything from Bing Crosby other than Christmas songs?
And they were gigantic relative to anybody in the last 40 years short of maybe Michael Jackson.
I watched the Kennedy Center Honors show for her. Even though I've known about her forever, I was blown away by how great those songs are, even when performed by someone else. Maybe even "especially performed by someone else."
Now I have the super-high-fidelity digital version of Blue. Along with an outboard D/A converter to take advantage of it.
I love her best albums, like Blue and Hejira. Sadly, I don't listen to her much anymore since I listen to all my music on Spotify and she pulled all her albums from the platform, because Joe Rogan (or something). Disappointing.
Provided to YouTube by National Digital Aggregator LLC
Самолёт · Джуна 2,220 views ℗ 2020 Released on: 2017-04-14 Auto-generated by YouTube.
It's fair to say I've discovered more new music this year than all previous years of my life. It's strange to think I live in a world where I could listen to music for the rest of my life and never listen to the same song twice
Readit News
Without video it might have been impossible to recreate her unusual technique.
Programming has been this weird mix where I would see a simple problem. Say a fibonacci sequence. Something I could do in my sleep.
I would look at it. Understand that I can solve this in seconds. Then it would take me a week to muddle through it, badly.
So I know how to program just fine, but I somehow I can't actually do it. So it's been relearning things I think I know how to do.
The saving grace is people would often ask how to approach a difficult problem and I could still quickly figure out what the issue is, and what approach to take to resolve it. So I was very helpful to others, but I couldn't do the work I suggested.
Weird stuff.
https://www.thisamericanlife.org/583/itll-make-sense-when-yo...
What is interesting is he is able to analyze why he has difficulty reading a clock. (As he explains, it's a surprisingly difficult problem.)
Fascinating and a bit heartbreaking. I'm happy to hear you're coping and recovering. Best of luck!
[1] example: knowing what a square root is, and all the common roots, but not knowing Newtons method or any trick for finding them.
Deleted Comment
Then you should remember, if you practiced an hour everyday, it took you less than a month to learn to play guitar and less than a few to be proficient (especially with folk music as opposed to classical or jazz). Guitar is among the easiest instruments to learn. What is exceptional about Mitchell is that she probably lost fine motor control entirely, and no doubt with great effort and determination, created new neural pathways in her brain in order to duplicate the fine motor control she once had. Learning to play guitar is not all that impressive, but reconfiguring the brain to bypass permanent brain damage truly is.
Playing at Joni Mitchell's level with all of her alternate tunings is something that fewer than 0.01% of guitar players will ever achieve regardless of the hours invested.
Mustaine's damage was probably less profound, but I think the fine control needed for the kind of thing he does is rather more extreme than Mitchell's.
ETA: here's a lousy article on it, from a music industry rag. He talks about it in much more detail in his autobiography. Below is a quote from https://blabbermouth.net/news/megadeth-s-dave-mustaine-how-i...
On January 7th, 2002, while at the [drug rehab] hospital, I sat on a chair which I hung my arm over the back of. The hard edge along the top of the seat back cut off the circulation to my radial ulnar nerve. After approximately two hours I woke up and my left hand was numb. I went to the nurse's station and they said it was the hair-tie I had on my wrist. I wish. I had to go into town to see a specialist and he said that I would be lucky if I ever gained even 80% of the use of my arm again. This was unacceptable for me, so I left the rehab, against medical advice and when home to Scottsdale, Az. to get my arm checked out by a city doctor. My Dr. Rahj Singh, a expert in nerve damage, spinal damage, etc. said that I may get 100% use of my arm, but that I would never play the same. He then prescribed the braces you see [here]: Photo#1, Photo#2, Photo#3. I then proceeded to Nathan Koch for physical therapy for 4 months of sessions, three times a week, 1-1.5 hours a day. After I finally got my feeling back in my hand, I realized that I could not even hold a feather in that hand and started a grueling 1-year weight-training program. 13 months after I hurt myself, a personal assistant that had worked for me died in hospice of drug damage, and I was asked to play. It was the first time I had held a guitar since November 17, 2001. Since then, I have completely healed and started taking lessons intermittently to re-learn my trade. After an additional 5 months I decided that I was going to play again, but that is another story.
https://pitchfork.com/features/article/9745-the-sad-and-beau...
Deleted Comment
A similar phenomenon also happens if you open up HN before the east coast of north america wakes up on a weekday. The topics tend to be more varied.
I live in the UK and I definitely find HN more interesting in the morning than the afternoon. It's as much a morning ritual as coffee at this point.
Some entrypoints, if I may (and please reply with your favorites):
- Refuge of the roads - Hejira
- Blue motel room - Hejira
- You turn me on, I'm a radio - For the roses
- Edith and the kingpin - The hissing of summer lawns
In Martino's case, after his full amnesia, he was able to retrieve his unique playing style, but was that because he learned by listening to his recordings (just like Joni did), or because the style never left him but was somehow locked?
Pat also tells a similar story about meeting Joe Pesci backstage and knowing him only from movies until Joe tells him, "I can tell you what you used to drink at Smalls' Paradise in the '60s". Video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niUwDegpYyo
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Young#Health_condition_an...
I just saw this incredible video [1] last week about him and "the greatest solo ever recorded."
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yj93v9j2A4A
In February 2005, Collins was hospitalised after two cerebral haemorrhages which resulted in aphasia, and he needed months to recover. He resumed his musical career in 2007. A documentary film on his recovery, The Possibilities Are Endless, was released in 2014.
Afterwards she could still sing but had lost the ability to write songs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NotxdCS9xm0
(odd in the sense of semi private recordings)
My love of Joni's music goes back to high school in America, but as a working class young man the 70's it was best to keep it a quiet if you didn't want people to think you were gay. Tough guys listened to Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, then the Sex Pistols.
But I have a theory that you're not destined for immortality until at least three generations love your work. Pink Floyd and maybe Kate Bush seem to be there, but I'm not sure Joni is yet.
When was the last time you even heard Elvis anywhere? What male singer can you name from the 1940s other than Sinatra? When was the last time you heard anything from Bing Crosby other than Christmas songs?
And they were gigantic relative to anybody in the last 40 years short of maybe Michael Jackson.
Now I have the super-high-fidelity digital version of Blue. Along with an outboard D/A converter to take advantage of it.
YouTube is doing something amazing which is auto uploading music from all over the world in partnership with aggregators. For example:
Самолёт - Джуна https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgeZtWT2gz8
Provided to YouTube by National Digital Aggregator LLC
Самолёт · Джуна 2,220 views ℗ 2020 Released on: 2017-04-14 Auto-generated by YouTube.
It's fair to say I've discovered more new music this year than all previous years of my life. It's strange to think I live in a world where I could listen to music for the rest of my life and never listen to the same song twice
Deleted Comment