The following essay is actually a paper I wrote for a class called Freshman Colloquium. (Don't know what freshman colloquium is? Pick up a phone and let's have a conversation (561-531-4349). Too close to make a phone call but still want a conversation, let's go out for coffee. That's right, Nikki LaBonte is asking you on a pseudo-date. Write that one on your resume.) In writing this, I've sort of remembered how therapeutic writing is for me and how much I like to do it. So, maybe, possibly, I'll write something within the next year. Kidding. Here's the prompt and paper. Enjoy.
Prompt: Dr. Burgett shared with us his mantra of “passion and ability drive ambition.” What is your ambition in life? What are your passions and abilities, and how do they drive your ambition? How do you hope to utilize your time at Eastman to fulfill your ambition?
I know full well what is expected of me in response to this discussion. I attend the Eastman School of Music. Therefore, my response must be in turn that my passion derives itself from the namesake of the school. My passion is, of course, required to be music because I am a musician. My abilities? An additional obvious answer is to be expected. My talent, as an artist, must, logically, be used to service my passion. And thus, the question is "answered" by my scholastic ties before I have the chance to speak.
You can see the dilemma if I were to argue otherwise. A musician whose passion is not music? Blasphemy! They must surely be sentenced to some kind of eternal purgatory or subject to the most horrific torture allowed by the Geneva Convention. As controversial as it may be I, myself, am not passionate about music. Before the shackles are placed upon my wrists and I am expelled from Eastman, I must be frank in saying that I have never met a musician whose passion is music. For, if one’s passion were truly music, they would be content with a daily routine confined to the space of a practice room. They would be truly fulfilled to be given the opportunity to perform an endless drivel of scales and arpeggios for hours upon end, only pausing momentarily for the daily bottle of water and loaf of bread. To those of you who protest to my statements, I urge you to think logically. Are scales not music? Then, if music were their passion, wouldn’t one be content with surrounding oneself exclusively with the company of scales until death pries them away from the piano? If music is truly the passion of someone you know, I urge you to go out in your front yard and dig them out from the rock under which they reside. Kindly tell them that it is the year 2013 and escort them immediately to the nearest symphony orchestra concert.
For you must be able to now recognize the error in describing my passion as music. My ambition of being a musician cannot correspond to a passion of music. An artist cannot have a passion of art. They must have so much more than that. My passion is not for the music on the page, it is for the people who have ears to hear it. For a musician to have a love for anything else would defile the tradition music has set since the beginning of time. Composers do not take joy from a soulless, yet perfect performance of a piece (if such a thing were to exist). Music critics do not take a tally of the number of notes cracked by the brass section in order to judge a performance; for that horn players everywhere breathe a sigh of relief. The pre-concert discussions preceding the greatest performances are never occupied by questions of “I wonder if the New York Philharmonic will hit all the right notes tonight.” No, people search for much more than that in music. Many a great teacher has stated that notes are merely ink on a page, and it is our job to make them come to life. However, something rarely mentioned and a much harder truth to accept is this: no matter how emotionally charged the performance, these notes are still just sound--noise even. The only object that has the ability to change this noise into an emotional force is the listener. Again, I reiterate, my passion cannot be for music. My passion is for people.
My abilities, therefore, cannot lie in musical talent, if indeed I have any talent at all. They cannot lie in hard work. My abilities cannot be calculated by how much time I spend in a practice room, how strong my ear training is, or how solid of a fundamental base I have on my instrument. My abilities must be my own emotions. I will be the first to recognize that this is not the ideal ability to further my ambition. Emotions are subject to change, highly unreliable, and can be misinterpreted. But they are all that I have. Truthfully, emotions are all that any of us have. So, as musicians, as people, we hope. We hope that we can connect. We hope that we, somehow, can be relatable to the audience that we play for. We hope that our highly volatile and subjective emotions will somehow strike a chord with those who hear our music. When this connection is made, it is always a miracle.
Of course, all that being said, how should a musician, or any artist, go about developing their art? If there’s so much volatility in the task of a performer, how can we even begin to change the fate that we are subject to? There are many answers to that question, many of which I have discussed earlier. It can involve technical preparation, a limited degree of talent (if one is fortunate enough to have it), or a good work ethic. I must confess that hours of isolated scalar practice, although incredibly mundane, is certainly a viable answer to this question. However, it cannot be the only answer. For this part of the equation addresses only the instrument, but not the people that lie behind it and before it. In order to grow in your ability to impact others, you must first explore the great variety of humanity that surrounds you. And you must discover yourself. This discovery and exploration is what I intend to pursue not just during my time at the Eastman School of Music, but for the rest of my life. And when this life is over, death will not be prying me from a piano after a lifetime of playing scales. Instead, it will pry me from the hands of humanity after a lifetime of playing people.
