I was watching Ronnie McCoury in his new Homespun video recently. I was struck by the way his playing seemed so effortless, despite the fact that there was hard-driving music coming out of his Gilchrist. All these notes are pouring out of that mandolin, but he just sits there above it, looking down serenely, seeming to be totally disconnected from the instrument, as if he's watching somebody else playing it. He has this enigmatic little smile on his face as he watches his fingers pump out those downstrokes and double-time shuffles and tremolos. Then I watched a tape of Bill Monroe playing. Same thing! If anything, the sense of effortlessness seemed even more pronounced. His hands looked like my 98-year-old grandmother's before she died: clear. That's how some old people's hands look to me, as if they're turning translucent. But Bill's fingers are powerful, and they're floating over the fingerboard of that old Gibson, as only his fingers can float. And he has that same Buddha-like serenity as he picks, seeming to be detached from his own hands. I humbly suggest that this is Taoism-in-action.
I take that phrase from Benjamin Hoff's introduction to Taoism, called The Tao of Pooh, published by Dutton. Much to my surprise, this little book is one of the most helpful and clear introductions to Taoism that I've found (and quite deep, too). According to Hoff, the Chinese word for this phenomenon I'm describing is "Wu Wei." He translates "Wu Wei" literally as "without doing, causing, or making," and he paraphrases that as "without meddlesome, combative, or egotistical effort." It's like water flowing over rocks, he says. I will quote him a little further:
"When we learn to work with our own Inner Nature, and with the natural laws operating around us, we reach the level of Wu Wei. Then we work with the natural order of things and operate on the principle of minimal effort. Since the natural world follows that principle, it does not make mistakes. Mistakes are made--or imagined--by man, the creature with the overloaded Brain who separates himself from the supporting network of natural laws by interfering and trying too hard" (p. 69).
Like much of Taoism, this strikes our Western minds as paradoxical. How can action exist "without doing"? How can we play music without making? I've been playing the mandolin for about 25 years. I've worked so hard at it. I've practiced and worked and sweated. I've contorted my body to wrestle music out of this little box. Oh no! I am indeed "the creature with the overloaded Brain"! I have interfered with natural laws. I have tried too hard. But that's not how I want to play the mandolin! I want to "work with the natural order of things and operate on the principal of minimal effort." That's what I'm seeing Ronnie McCoury and Bill Monroe do in those videotapes. That's what I see almost all of the musicians I admire do. Occasionally, but rarely, I see myself do that. How can I learn to do this constantly? How can I work with my own Inner Nature and reach the level of apparent effortlessness that I see my masters achieve? I think the answer is in my brain, in my muscles, in my breathing, in my arms, in my shoulders, in my right hand, in my left hand, in my spirit. Oh, is that all, my mocking inner voice asks.
I recently saw another video. It's from this summer's reunion concert with the band I was in over 20 years ago. We all got together for one short afternoon of practice, then played a show to about 200 relatives and friends the next day. A few songs into the show, I kicked off "Stoney Creek." I was so happy with what I saw on the video! I was playing the notes smoothly. My right hand was relaxed and fluid. I played the notes like water flowing over a rock. I looked down at my mandolin serenely, as if I were detached from it, an enigmatic smile on my face. . . (Was it only I who knew that about 25 years of work had gone into achieving that Wu Wei moment?)
Next time, I will try to talk about some of the actual mechanics of that kind of seeming effortlessness. How can all our work lead us to Wu Wei?
© 1999 John Bird
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