These types of experiences are very important. When a person applies for academic jobs, it is expected that they participate in at LEAST one experience such as this. Many people have heard of the famous Aspen Music Festival and Tanglewood. Many composers, conductors, and performers have their professorships at prestigious institutions because of these experiences.
This blog will take you through my journey of raising money and writing a piece of music for this festival. Not a lot of people really appreciate the issues that composers and musicians face and I think it's going to be a good exercise in how the arts are going to have to work in this new economy. Some days, I will discuss the piece I am writing. On other occasions, I will talk about pedagogical issues that are related to music.
To conclude this post, I would like to include a piece of writing I once did on the value of art:
As a composer, people and their reactions to my chosen profession frequently shock me. I imagine that people in the fine arts frequently experience similar reactions. Elizabeth Gilbert's talk from 2009, found on TED, on nurturing creativity helps me negotiate these reactions. Is there a possibility that my next job may involve saying, "Would you like an apple pie with that?" Yes, but reaction to that possibility will find me drinking gin by the bottle at 9 am every morning.
Gilbert raises the notion of the Daemon from Greek epistemology. At times, in our lives, we have little spirits that speak to us and inspire us to do our best. The Roman version of the Daemon was "genius." Gilbert gradually links these to the tradition of shouting "Ole" during Spanish bullfighting or flamenco dancing. I will include the text, which I think is the best part of her lecture:
-- centuries ago in the deserts of North Africa, people used to gather for these moonlight dances of sacred dance and music that would go on for hours and hours, until dawn. And they were always magnificent, because the dancers were professionals and they were terrific, right? But every once in a while, very rarely, something would happen, and one of these performers would actually become transcendent. And I know you know what I'm talking about, because I know you've all seen, at some point in your life, a performance like this. It was like time would stop, and the dancer would sort of step through some kind of portal and he wasn't doing anything different than he had ever done, 1,000 nights before, but everything would align. And all of a sudden, he would no longer appear to be merely human. He would be lit from within, and lit from below and all lit up on fire with divinity.
**N.B. What she is describing here is the same thing that we see when Ravi Shankar sits down and plays. For a minute, he looks young and brilliant, definitely not the ninety-plus years his age.
And when this happened, back then, people knew it for what it was, you know, they called it by its name. They would put their hands together and they would start to chant, "Allah, Allah, Allah, God, God, God." That's God, you know. Curious historical footnote -- when the Moors invaded southern Spain, they took this custom with them and the pronunciation changed over the centuries from "Allah, Allah, Allah," to "Ole, ole, ole," which you still hear in bullfights and in flamenco dances. In Spain, when a performer has done something impossible and magic, "Allah, ole, ole, Allah, magnificent, bravo," incomprehensible, there it is -- a glimpse of God. Which is great, because we need that.
I like that thought. When we experience brilliance, it might not be ours and there is a good possibility that it is on loan from elsewhere. Gilbert, in her talk, is very concerned with the fact that our most brilliant moment might be our only moment of creativity. However, I wonder if there is a greater issue at hand. What if the situation of our livelihoods require us to give that creativity up? Giving something up out of reality is much more daunting, especially while there is still youth to fulfill it, than it is to retire from something because we lived a fulfilling life doing it.
So, yes, the arts are highly relevant. Music, in some cultures, aligns with the science. An example of this can be found with the Greeks and their derivation of the overtone series. Relating to the Pythagorean saying, "What is the Oracle at Delphi?" The answer is "The Tetraktys, the thing which is the Harmony of the Sirens." The arts, in our lifetime, might have a renaissance brought forth through the sciences. In the academy, I already see this happening. The joy of singing is being used to promote eye, nose, and throat awareness. The brilliance of the composer is leading to new and exciting breakthroughs in computer programming and mathematics.
Roger Scruton described music's intrinsic value akin to that of the value of a friendship. He describes this relationship in his book on the aesthetics on music, but I will not quote that here. I found a quote from Scruton in his reader that makes my point much more clearly, one that is not too far away from Gilbert's notion of genius.
The friend commands my special attention: I make an effort on his behalf, and his friendship becomes part of my life, something intrinsically valuable to me. The intrinsic value of 'neighbor' belongs to him as a rational individual. He is valuable for his own sake but not necessarily for me. The value of the friend is a value for me; one of my possessions, and one that has no price. Friendship elevates those who are bound by it; it lifts them above the plateau of agape into an illuminated region which is theirs and which they have no duty to share.
The value of the arts come from within. Our genius, maybe God, even though I am not quite sure about that, speaks to all of us while we are making them. If we listen close enough, we might just hear or maybe even learn something.
Not going to try for a kickstarter account?
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