Rick Seaholm Kinētikos is the Greek root for kinetic, cinema, and other words about motion. For someone whose life is affected by Parkinson’s Disease, a few other words come just as quickly to mind, words representative of when that motion is flawed.
Bradykinesia prefaces that “motion” with “slow” or “heavy”, and is characterized by, what I like to describe as, a disconnect between the brain’s command to some other body part and the resultant motion.
First thing in the morning, that’s seen, perhaps, as a creakiness of the joints as we plod down the stairs to take our first pills of the day, a feeling that we are a few decades older. But, as the day progresses and expectations speed up, bradykinesia consumes me in ways that I would not have been able to describe to a younger me. Pre-diagnosis I first came to terms with what I may be facing over a bowl of chips and salsa at a Mexican restaurant on the coast of Maine. I held a tortilla chip in my right hand, fully intending to dip it in, but my hand simply would not cooperate. My brain was shouting and the signal wasn’t getting through. I fought back tears knowing something wasn’t right.
Dyskinesia, as you would likely guess, is an “ill” or “bad” motion, a lurching and writhing characteristic of people with Parkinson’s, but interestingly not of the disease itself. Rather, it is an unfortunate byproduct of the medicine nearly all of us take multiple times a day.
Over the past year, I’ve begun to explore a compositional style that attempts to illustrate the characteristics of living with Parkinson’s Disease through word painting and leitmotif. When it became clear that I would likely not be able to play piano as I had pre-diagnosis, I determined to use my love of playing as a therapy unto itself. By following that judgement-free philosophy, a new style emerged.
“Kinetikos” began as an acoustic improvisation on a repetitive theme that periodically breaks free from itself, only to be pulled back in by the repeated figure. As I worked with and lived with these themes for a week or so, I hadn’t realized that it was a day-in-the-life exercise for my life right now. I then began to hone it in to something more polished. I chose to retain the entire improvisation, rather than clean up any awkward lurches of the melody as it had come to me. Instead I transcribed my initial scratch-recording note-for-note, adjusted the instrumentation and developed it into what you hear today.
Parkinson’s Awareness Month Fundraiser
In recognition of Parkinson’s Awareness Month, all proceeds will go toward organizations I hold dear who work directly for people with Parkinson’s. You’ve got two options (you know which one I hope you’ll select.)