The greater the artist, the humbler the person!
Chatting with pianist Alon Goldstein after the concert by the Chamber Music Festival at Western Hills tonight, I hadn’t wanted to ask these questions publicly because they are so personal in the moment:
Is/are the artistic spirit(s) of your great composers present with you? (Bernstein, Beethoven & Dvorak). Does the trio work in harmony to keep that spirit in check and not your own egos? Or, as you master their work, do you take over at some point. And is the listener a fifth party to the marriage between the trio and the composer, as Tolkien suggested regarding the work of visual art, which he declared carries the artistic spirit of the artist to the viewer. I kind of asked all of these at once. His answers were surprising and very interesting.
"It is the music that takes over. The self disappears! So does the composer!" Oh wow.
This reminded me of Michael Cardew’s response to a question at a Ghost Ranch workshop. He was asked if a great pot by an artist breaks, does it die. He said no, the spirit lives on without the piece. Mr. Goldstein loved that because as we agreed, music is so temporal to begin with.
I enjoyed the music and the people this evening!
So, if: "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
ReplyDeleteEphesians 6:12 KJV", then,
perhaps we ought to mind our spiritual steps and carefully cultivate what we choose to keep inside of our spheres of God's influence - the higher qualities. Yes? Then some wise guy might point out that evil persons might compose brilliantly. So be it. To the pure in heart all things are pure. And WE walk untainted. Yes?