La Bene Vita

Bradykinesia: Effects on Piano Practice

As as musician, one of my biggest struggles due to Parkinson's Disease is the ability to play or sing quickly - aka, vocal or instrumental agility. After tremor, this was one of the earliest symptoms I noticed: I could no longer strum fast-paced rhythm guitar patterns at full tempo for more than a couple measures before my battery ran out.

The summer of 2021, I helped lead outdoor worship in the wake of COVID, and on a few occasions, my guitar was the only instrument. I recall trying to strum a quick rhythm guitar pattern on an up-tempo song I've played for years and giving Aaron, the music director, an exasperated look before dropping the rhythm to a half-tempo pattern.

Levodopa has restored much of the mobility PD stole, but musical agility is still holding out on me.

Don't get me wrong; I'm grateful for the medication. I can practice any instrument at slower tempos for hours and make good progress. Since all songs, even (especially) quick-paced pieces, should be practiced slowly before gradually speeding up, I've been able to practice a lot in the last year and a half since diagnosis and treatment, and that's encouraging. My soul is getting fed again by the music I love so much, and I'll take it.

But at some point, I need to kick things up a notch if I want to regain the agility to play fast.

So a few days ago,  Sunday evening, I tried speeding up a few short Bergmüller pieces to allegro. I played for maybe ten or twenty minutes, then crashed. I couldn't do anything. I hopped on the exercise bike because that often helps - apparently,  it triggers dopamine production - but I could NOT rotate my feet faster than they wanted to rotate, period. So I just sat there biking at a super slow speed for an hour in front of the TV until bedtime.

At the time, I thought maybe I was experiencing a bad off episode due to my weekend getaway trip with the girls, or the time change, or both. But Monday morning I tried again, and that was worse. I lasted maybe five minutes. So, probably not the road trip. I just have a time limit on agile playing.

Note to self: musical agility requires more dopamine.

Yesterday was Tuesday,  and I'm a glutton for punishment, so I gave it another go, and this time, I documented the whole session by video. My phone camera kept timing out, so I started and stopped before and after each run of an individual piece or passage.

And that's how I happened to catch on video the exact moment my battery ran out. After the bradykinesia kicked in, I took a brief, difficult shower, then I lay down on the bed with the doggies and read clickbait articles on my phone until I could move again at 1:30ish.

Timeline:
8:00 am - morning Levodopa*
10:00ish am - 60 min on stationary bike
11:30 am - late morning Levodopa*
11:33 am - started practicing piano
12:08 pm - video 1 of 2 (the bottom one below)
12:11 pm - video 2 of 2 (the top one below)

*carbidopa/levodopa 25/100 x 2 both times



For comparison, I played it like this three minutes earlier: