I am a musician...

I received an email last week, part of which I’ll quote:

“Why do you keep doing it, if it causes you so much stress & it's such hard work? Just wondering if the payoff is worth it, since you never seem to mention the joyous portion of that part of your life…”

That’s a wide open statement, isn’t it? What could she be referring to? Well, to avoid drawing it out, it was a reference to the Symphony, and the ongoing hassle that it seemed to be this season. It immediately started me to thinking—I don’t tell you about the good or beautiful things about my musical life. I think I take those sorts of things for granted. This was my response to her:

”Good question about the symphony. I suppose that you really do only get to hear the bitching and moaning. The reason I stay is because I do love playing the music. In spite of the whiners and the moaners and the rabble-rousers. When this group is focused on the music, and it's the right music, the only way to describe it is orgasmic. Yeah, that sounds cheesy, but it's an apt description. Music is all about tension and release, and when the tension builds and builds, and everyone is on the same page (so to speak), there then comes a point where there is a huge release, and literally all the musicians will feel it. Even to the point of breathing heavy. Sorry if this sounds like cheap erotica, but that's the way it really is! When it's working right. At other times, it's simply a bunch of people with noisemakers making sounds.

“In spite of my bitching, I'm also one of those who relishes the pressure. I like being on the "inside" of things--knowing what's going on, knowing things that most others don't (which sounds an awful lot like the MG or anonymous HNT concepts....). This year was particularly difficult due to working with ignorant people. I don't deal with ignorance very well. Not the "I-don't-know-how-to-do-brain-surgery" type of ignorance. But the "lack-of-common-sense" type of ignorance. And that's been running rampant this year. I honestly believe that I would have chucked the whole thing at Christmas had I not taken the week off and run away to Nashville.

“So, in spite of that aspect, I really do enjoy the rehearsal process, and the making of the music. People who know me in real life know that I'm passionate about the music, and have little patience for many people. They do get to see me smile and laugh and enjoy myself. Those of you "out there" don't get to see that. You realize that this is going to have to be the subject of a post in the near future!”

Mozart had a great quote:

“I cannot write poetically, for I am no poet.
I cannot artfully arrange my phrases so as to give light and shade.
Neither am I a painter;
Nor can I even express my thoughts by gesture and pantomime, for I am no dancer.
But I can do so in sounds.
I am a musician.”

And for better or worse, that’s what I am…