I've been moved or influenced by a lot of things
that I have seen or heard or read, so that my
work over time has been, at least in its framework
or in its initial inspiration, inspired by and
guided by some bigger and broader concepts. For
our upcoming episode, I invited American composer
and record label executive Sean Hickey to discuss
his monumental piano cycle, Sapiens, a brief
history of humankind for solo piano. In, I believe,
early 2018, I read the book of the same name
by Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens, A Brief History
of Humankind, and brilliant writer and someone
that I at least can draw a lot from in nearly
everything that he's written. For me, I read
it and I had no idea what was to come next, but
I just felt that it was imperative for me that
in some way I was going to fashion a piece of
music out of the inspiration that I found in
this book. When I really kind of embrace the
idea of the piano as this sort of meta instrument,
and I imagine the piano as sort of a voyeur or
witness to history at the birth of music. From
imagined orders to artificial intelligence, this
conversation asks a timeless question. What does
it mean to remain human? I choose to live in
a world where I think there are better days are
ahead of us. And even if I have absolutely no
influence on any of that, other than the fact
that I can... contribute to the world and model
a piece of music, then I want to be the one to
do that. Join us tomorrow, Tuesday, February
24th at 8pm Eastern Time on our YouTube channel.
The audio version will also drop at the same
time on your favorite podcast platforms. See
you tomorrow.