Another blog post, so soon after the last?! Zoinks.
I am a researcher. In the arts, that usually means looking at some trends or a kind of conceptual Venn diagram, making an educated assertion, and then supporting your argument with both old and new observations. It’s relatively empirical, even when there’s some subjectivity. We artists can disagree about interpretations and conclusions, but ideally, at least the facts are grounded in some form of reality.
But there have been a few times in my career so far where my relationship with music seems to have brought me face-to-face with something not empirical. I’m honestly not sure what it is. Or if it is even really there. It is sort of like being in a room that is completely dark, but knowing there is some creature in there with you. As in, maybe it is a cute fluffy critter, or maybe it is a grizzly bear. It is so improbable, and flies in the face of everything I believe as a humanist, lover of biology— every truth my brain is telling me about the world.
This… whatever it is… has been a multi-step process, taken on entirely accidentally. Well, maybe not entirely accidentally. I have always been on the lookout for some kind of spiritual connection to the world, probably like most of us. And of course we are all striving as musicians to connect more to what we do beyond just making a few bucks. But the last year or so, as my frontal lobes have gotten older and slower, I have learned to connect with a little more inner calm. I have made some peace with myself, I have accepted some percentage of who I am (however small). And I have just begun to learn to channel that peace into something that I think is pretty ferocious when it is time to break that peace. All kind of in the service of being able to generate drama and connect with the music in front of me, and connect it with the audience.
Via this process, I have learned an openness, a vulnerability. I have tried to unlock new paths to receive information, and I believe 100% that there are paths into the brain that are not reflected by the six senses we all learned about in school. They can be combined. Colors have tastes, and sounds have colors. We can close our eyes and our ears in a warm shower and feel our own shape and the shape of our thoughts and feelings. For a lot of us, at some point, we were taught (with the very best intentions) that this is irrational. I think by the mere process of learning math, learning to read, learning linear processes and engineering, we shut off some of those spigots of our imagination. But I think it is undeniable that there are weird ways into the brain that only imagination can unlock. And when we can dig even just a little deeper, just occasionally, I think there might be more.
Alma Mahler, in her diaries, wrote about how Gustav foresaw his own death. Take her words with a grain of salt, mind you, because she heavily doctored them after Gustav died to reflect positively on herself and their relationship. But Alma wrote about his 6th symphony (in my opinion, his best). In the work, the hypothetical protagonist is hit with three hammer blows, each dealing significant damage, and the final one ultimately killing them. Alma posits that Gustav, perhaps without realizing it, was writing about himself, perhaps seeing his own future. The hammer blows were (not in chronological order), his misdiagnosis of a serious heart condition, his falling out of favor in Vienna and move to New York City, and the death of his daughter. Gustav died decades before he otherwise could have.
I wonder if there is some truth in Alma’s words. Gustav, maybe more than any composer so far, was so spiritually connected to his music, that if anyone could find and peer past an invisible curtain, it would have been him. I’m not saying that I am even a shadow of the musician Mahler was, but I imagine that the process is similar for any artist. It does not take a particularly skilled practitioner to begin to unlock something special (believe me, I am not). So I wonder if we both have opened our souls to the possibilities that don’t make sense in the realm of physics.
Do I see the future? Ha. No. But I wonder if music has shown me some glimpses. Nothing of consequence. Just brief moments. I have also met a couple of people before I met them for real. Just acquaintances, though. Again, so far, nothing that would change the course of events. But the handful or so times it has happened, it has been *extremely* unnerving. There is no mistaking it for something else. So if a memory happens before it really happens, but it’s nothing particularly important, does it matter? I mean, not really. Shoot, it could just be my imagination.
There is a really interesting movie called “The Arrival,” with Amy Adams and some other big name actors. (Spoiler alert) It is about some aliens who, well, arrive, to the world that is on the brink of world war. The main character, a linguist, is charged with learning their language, which is a series of symbols. Throughout this process, she begins to have visions of events that turn out to be glimpses of the future. By learning this alien non-linear language, she is able observe some turning point that hasn’t happened, and to avert conflict.
I know what you’re thinking, though. And you’re right. Ain’t that some shit, Andy. It sounds cool to think that music could connect us to the past and the future in some esoteric way. A mystical “echo through time.” Even I’m not convinced. I am, after all, rational to a fault.
I *am* convinced, however, that music might just be the closest thing to actual magic that we meager humans can summon on this Earth. It can heal. It can connect us with ourselves and others so deeply across generations, as easily as across state lines. It can create and destroy nations. It clearly has access to corners of our brains that we do not normally have access to. Don’t believe me? Read Musicophelia by Oliver Sacks. I wonder if music, when done properly, might be a little like The Arrival. Probably not as on-the-nose, but maybe not as far off as one might think. Maybe we can’t see the future, but the pathways music unlocks can change the world.
In any case, it has benefitted me to acknowledge this magic not just in the context of a performance but also in the context of practice. Opening up my mind and body to be ready for what I am tasking it with. And I think that becomes part of who we are when we do it every day. Part of living our craft. And it is extremely tricky to harness. It feels like some kind of Harry Potter-esque magic, both terrifying and mysterious.
Musicians, if you are at all tempted to think that what we do doesn’t matter, or is somehow arbitrary, you can think again.
Administrators, parents, school committees, who are thinking about rolling back arts. Yes, you. Do so at your own risk. Make no mistake, there is more at stake than you think. Far more.