Creating Sound

For those reading this who may not know, most music schools have something called concert credit; a weekly concert or lecture which all students have to attend. There's something special, unforgettable even, about an entire group of music students gathered together to watch a musical performance. The energy in any concert hall is sacred, but the energy in one full of developing musicians is...indescribable. Today's performer was a violinist, and his collaborative pianist (Acadia didn't put his name on the website, and we don't get to keep our programs) playing together, and they had this incredible connection, both between one another, and to their audience (namely, us). They played an incredible set, and you could feel the energy rising and rising. There was complete silence, and all 150 of us (plus faculty) simply sat transfixed by what we were hearing (and we're a loud group. We don't sit in silence easily). 


Once they had us in the palm of their hands, they played Debussy's Sonata in g minor for violin and piano (the link isn't of today's performance, but the two interpretations are quite similar). They finished, and my friend Angela voiced what I think everyone in the room was feeling: "I just remembered why I love music so much."


I once suggested that music is, at least for me, one of the only places where I can express truth as something I feel instead of something I know. In music, we get a chance to say what words can't touch, all those intangible things, like how gloriously wonderful and painfully tragic it can be to be alive; to be human and vulnerable. 


In her book How to Write Your Dissertation In Fifteen Minutes a Day: A Guide to Starting, Revising, and Finishing Your Doctoral Thesis (yes, I've read it as an undergrad. No one can say I'm not thinking ahead!), Joan Bolker suggests that you can't write unless you're willing to stand in front of other people naked. I concur - you can't write without being willing to expose yourself to the whole wide world. 


Today, as I watched these performers, all I could think was that you can't create music unless you're willing to stand in front of other people naked, while making love to the notes. You expose yourself while showing the deepest, most vulnerable parts of your soul to everyone listening/watching. 


And that, my friends, is bloody terrifying. I don't know about you, but in addition to being the relatively-happy-if-somewhat-stressed-out-and-overly-loving person that I try to present myself as being, there's some deep, dark, twisty parts of my soul that I'm not wildly enthusiastic about people possibly seeing. That, er, may be why I tend to play Haydn instead of Beethoven when I know people can hear me... 


But when those brave, brave souls who are willing to be honest about things like fear, pain, anger, and even joy and hope...when performers (and composers!) can really share a piece of music, and what it means to them, with an audience that also gets it...


Well, in a nutshell, it's probably why we all love music so much.