On this day, October 17th, in 1849, Frédéric François Chopin passed away in Paris.
“He had no predecessor and no successor…. Chopin came and departed like a comet from remote space,” said Australian pianist, Ernest Hutcheson.
He is remembered as a morose and anxious man, one who composed a song to cope with his sorrows of believing his friends had all been lost to a storm. Yet, his contemporaries write of him being quite the jokester as well.
Many of Chopin’s waltzes are nicknamed these decorous names like “The Grand Waltz” or “The Minute Waltz,” but “The Farewell Waltz” is as intriguing as the man himself.
He wrote this waltz for Maria Wodzińska, to whom he was once engaged. When his health began to fail, however, her parents forced the two to break off the engagement. Chopin said his farewell to her through this waltz.
Most of Chopin’s works are held together by a single recurring melody. Sometimes the recurrences are masked within decorated accompaniment, sometimes the melody develops with each sounding, and sometimes it simply returns as it originally was.
In this waltz, it is the last of these. The piece can be broken into three major sections: A, B, and C. The A section contains the melodic binding:
The waltz begins with two iterations of this theme, with a slight alteration of the polyrhythmic run in the eleventh full measure of the melody.
The B section follows. Marked “con anima,” we might guess that this section refers to joyful memories.
It bounces along with a lovely registral accent in the right hand every other measure. Most interesting about this section in particular, however, is how the left hand accompaniment pops out of the texture during the second half of each measure. The accent on the weaker beat in the measure hearken to the Mazurka for which Chopin is most prominently known. The focus on the left hand here also characterizes much of Chopin’s style.
Charles Rosen, noted pianist and writer on music, attributes this to Chopin’s exposure to 16th-century counterpoint (through studies of J.S. Bach). Romantic composers and 16th-century counterpoint don’t always seem to fit together, so Rosen explains that Chopin’s version of counterpoint mimics the aural experience of listening to J.S. Bach. Certainly, many voices independently sound to create a cohesive whole, and one can listen to each individual voice through repeated listenings, but the experience of hearing Bach live is that of a prominent voice with the other voices fading into more of an accompaniment role. The voices take turns being the most important.
Such is it with Chopin. Rosen writes that Chopin does not achieve “the constant independence of the voices in classical counterpoint, but a latent independence of each voice, consistent and continuous, which could break into full independence at any moment.”1
This B section in particular exemplifies that idea in this Waltz. After the first iteration of the B section, the A them returns, and then a repeat of the two lead into the C section:
Again, we have an accent on a weak beat, this time on beat two, which references the Mazurka rhythm. Perhaps Chopin is remembering happy days with his formerly betrothed as he says his farewell. This section repeats without the A theme interfering and ends with a grand crescendo on a figure that emphasizes beat two even more.
And then this crying out of love or sadness falls back into the whimsical, yet somehow also melancholy A theme.
There is so much to unpack in all of his pieces, and I hope to do many more on this blog. The common thread running through them all is the use of a melodic thread to hold together each of his works. Listening to that thread interacting with the rest of the notes creates layers and expectation and is perhaps why Chopin is still so popular today.
1. Rosen, Charles. The Romantic Generation. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995.
Although I use a great piano course that’s full of improv games and theory, I still find it useful and fun to use games not in the book.
Much of my inspiration comes from Teach Piano Today; they’ve got lots of freebies on their site, so go check them out! I am a huge fan of their improv games. Most of these games come with printable cards with themed words that are set to rhythms. It’s a very natural and helpful way to help students with rhythm.
I took their Halloween set a step further by using these cards to help my students compose their own Halloween song!
We first go through the entire deck (there’s only 9 cards, so it doesn’t take too long) and make sure they understand the rhythms. Then I show them my version of the final song and tell them to pay attention to what repeats. They point out the four-measure phrase that repeats twice, and then I have them guess what AABA form means. And so far, 100% of my students have guessed correctly!
Then we go through and pick out their own set of four cards to use. Since the piece is in A minor, I limit their note choices to A-E, so their pinky stays on A, and 5 stays on E. This works for every level, even the ones who don’t yet read music (they’ve only been playing a couple weeks). Then, for the B section, we jump their thumb to C and have them choose notes from there. As they choose notes, we write them into this handy template.
It takes about 10 minutes to do each section, so the last ten minutes of two lessons in a row is a good way to incorporate some Halloween fun! If you can find some fun Halloween paper to print it on, that’s even better!
Hope you got some good ideas from this game, and let me know if you have any other fun ideas for Holidays!
Hello, it’s been a little bit since my last post, so I wanted to pop in with an unofficial post. Regular school work, my two jobs, and preparing for grad school have been dominating my time, but I hope to get back to a regular post schedule with short essays on music.
Until then, I wanted to share that I published sheet music for my arrangement of The First Noel on Sheet Music Plus.
I plan on arranging more pieces for piano, and I’m in the editing process for a few pieces for pop acapella to put up. Although I haven’t been with Sheet Music Plus for long, I will say that I am impressed with their service toward composers and arrangers. It doesn’t cost anything to publish music with them, and their commission rates are among the highest of sites like theirs. So if you’re looking for a place to sell music, they are my first recommendation.
Given that their site provides much more exposure for sheet music, it is a good deal.
You’ll notice a new tab on the top menu: Sheet Music. Here I’ll post links to all sheet music I’m sharing on the internet. This is how I’ll avoid spamming you guys every time I come out with a new piece. I will continue to post some freebies as well, and those will also be in the sheet music tab. As the numbers go up, there will be a little more organization to the page, but for now you can enjoy the two that are up there right now.
And of course, I love criticism on my pieces. If there’s anything in particular you like about my arrangements, I’d love to hear it! Conversely, if you can offer suggestions of anything I can do better, please share!
Raise of hands, how many of you feel like you’re faking your way through life? Like you don’t actually know how to do your job, or people think you’re a lot smarter than you actually are?
Impostor syndrome (also “imposter”), impostor phenomenon, impostor experience, impostorism, and fraud syndrome are all terms that encompass the idea of feeling like a fraud. It’s been a bit of a buzz topic lately, especially with a few celebrities speaking out about it, like Neil Gaiman:
In addition to Gaiman, the following well-known figures also report having felt the phenomonen: Maya Angelou, Emma Watson, Tom Hanks, Michelle Pfeiffer, Chuck Lorre, John Green, Tommy Cooper, Sheryl Sandberg, Sonia Sotomayor, Mike Cannon-Brookes, Diana Crow1, Seth Godin2, and Amanda Palmer3. I especially love that Palmer dubs it “The Fraud Police.” It’s less impending if you name it, right?
Actually, both Palmer and Gaiman have very vivid fantasies of imaginary people coming to them in the middle of the night and telling them, “We know you’re a fraud, and now we’re here to take everything away from you and to tell everyone you’re a fool.”3,4
What Impostorism Is
The first study on impostorism, by Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes, published in 1978, explains that those “who experience the impostor phenomenon maintain a strong belief that they are not intelligent; in fact they are convinced that they have fooled anyone who thinks otherwise.”5 In a later interview, however (in 2015), Clance amended the definition: “if I could do it all over again, I would call it the impostor experience, because it’s not a syndrome of a complex or a mental illness. It’s something almost everyone experiences.”6
It’s a growing body of research, but the more psychologists study the phenomenon, the more they learn how universal the experience is. In fact, that first study by Clance and Imes asserted that it was only the women in academia who felt this way, but men were later included after ‘fessing up to being quiet on the matter.6
Impostorism can be defined with three major characteristics. Those with impostorism:
Believe that others view them more favorably than they deserve.
Have fear of being found out and then viewed as a failure.
Have trouble internalizing their actual, tangible successes.7
How Impostorism Presents Itself
If you’re really down the rabbit hole of not believing your own worth, you may not know you meet any of the above criteria. One of the easiest ways to tell is if you find yourself exhibiting a behavior consistent with this mindset.
There are many behaviors that those with impostorism may exhibit, but there are four pretty standard ones that Clance and Imes outlined, and later works still agree. Someone with impostorism may exhibit one or two of these, but it’s rare for them to show all four.
1. From the belief that hard work will cover up a lack of intelligence or talent. They work hard and make sure to do so behind closed doors. This can look like someone who pretends to be playing games on the computer when a family member walks by, but they’re actually studying. Sense of approval from others reinforces this behavior.
2. From a sense of phoniness. They believe they participate in intellectual flattery by doing types of work that will please others (i.e., choosing a paper topic that they know their professor will like). If they had not flattered their superiors, they would have failed because they’re just not smart or good enough. Actual success feeds this behavior.
3. From a desire to be liked as well as thought of as competent. They use charm and perceptiveness together to win approval, like flirting with intent. And when they do win approval, they don’t believe they earned it. That if they were actually intelligent, they wouldn’t even need outside approval to convince themselves of their value. Again, success itself reinforces behavior like this.
4. Avoidance of success completely, out of fear of failing. As in, they don’t even try to win something they possibly could win because they’re afraid they’ll fail, and everyone will see, so they just avoid the situation altogether. This one can go hand in hand with depression and is fed by opportunities for success.5
As you can see, all of these behaviors feed into themselves. They encourage more of the same behavior, and it may seem like an impossible war to someone who’s been stuck in the cycle for a long time. Unfortunately, it’s not just the internal mindset and behaviors that contribute to the problem. There are also external factors.
What Irritates the Problem
Although impostorism is a fairly universal experience, it tends to be worse in fields like academia or the arts where there is a lot of competition. Instead of waning all on its own, as it does for many people, impostorism is developed by physical events.
In a study about academic faculty and the ways they cope with impostorism, Holly M. Hutchins and Hilary Rainbolt discovered four types of “imposter incidents,” which they describe as “disruptive events that created doubt, shame, and questioning of who they [the participants] were.”8
These four types of events perpetuate rather than diminish feelings of fraud:
1. Moments when expertise is questioned. This can be when someone straight up asks you if you’re qualified or when you have to teach in your field, like giving a lecture or presentation. I just dealt with this myself with some suburban moms asking if I was qualified to teach their children beginner piano, and I almost said, “Even with my degree, I’m not qualified at all!”
2. In moments of self-evaluation of one’s work. The faculty members in this study spoke specifically about submitting their work for publication and applying for grants and tenure. Universally, this might look like when you’re trying to prove your worth (like in a job interview) or dealing with negative criticism or comments.
3. Competition or comparison. This one’s pretty obvious. For piano, a great example is when you’re looking up recordings of your repertoire to listen to, and you find a wonderful rendition by a four-year-old prodigy. It makes you re-evaluate why you play at all. But in general, any kind of comparison can do a lot of damage to one’s perspective of self.
4. Moments when one is asked to accept success. Winning awards, getting asked to be a judge in one’s field, and being invited to speak as an expert all aggravate the cycle because impostors really can’t internalize their own success.8
Strategies to Break the Cycle
So it is a war, not just a one-night battle. There are so many forces encouraging feelings of fraud, and this can make you feel trapped. But, all you have to do is interrupt the cycle to find a way out. Just one little bump, and there’s some hope. Each of the studies and articles I looked at have different strategies to cope, but these five are fairly universal ideas that are easy to do.
1. Be open and honest with yourself.
Remember how Amanda Palmer gave her feelings a name?3 Part of the psychology of naming is that you choose to accept that the idea is a real, tangible thing. This isn’t AA, but it’s the same concept. The first step is to accept you have a problem and choose to do something about it.
I think I’m going to call mine Fred the Fraudmonger. That seems like a great villain name. Let me know if you’ve picked out the perfect name for yours. But the idea is to face it like it’s a tangible enemy. Be proactive, and let yourself feel it.
I’m coming for you, Fraudmonger!
2. Know that everyone else feels the same way.
In the same speech in which Amanda Palmer dubbed impostorism “The Fraud Police,” she had everyone in the room raise their hands if they had ever felt like a fraud. All the faculty sitting on the stage behind her raised their hands as well, and she said “If they didn’t, they’re lying.” She’s right. That’s exactly why Pauline Clance said that if she could redo the original study, she’d call it the “impostor experience.” It’s that universal. Some people just have more trouble with it than others. Palmer even says at the end of the video that the feeling never completely goes away; you just learn how to deal with it.
For some, just knowing that it’s part of being human helps them accept it and move forward.
3. Be honest with others and vice versa.
In her book, Presence, social psychologist Amy Cuddy includes a chapter solely about the impostor experience. She sums up her research and interviews with,
As I review the research and talk to people like Pauline [Clance] and Neil [Gaiman] who’ve experienced the same fears, I see the one quality of impostorism that stands out from all the others: it makes us feel alone in the experience, and even when we learn that other people have similar fears, we don’t take heart.6
Sometimes it’s really not enough to hear that all these famous people suffer from the same feelings. Because they’re actually talented, and I’m obviously not.6
The APA lists talking with people as two separate ways to deal with impostorism.9 Find someone you trust and aren’t afraid to just be open with.
In some cases, mentors are excellent to talk with, but don’t be surprised if your mentor actually makes you feel worse. I’m not trying to be mean to all the mentors out there (I mean I guess as a piano teacher, I am also one), but in different study by Hutchins, results showed that in all but 3% of the participants’ experiences, mentors actually made feelings of impostorism worse. The mentors didn’t do anything wrong, but the fact that they were so successful, and the participants in the study felt they weren’t added to the issue.10
The original study by Clance and Imes discusses the high effect of group therapy sessions. “A group setting is also valuable because one woman can see the dynamics in another woman and recognize the lack of reality involved.”5
There’s always someone to talk to. The worst thing you can do is keep it to yourself and suffer alone. You may actually be helping another person by bringing it up.
4. Look at the hard facts.
If you have a degree, you earned it. If you won awards, you earned them. Take another look at the tangible evidence of your skill. You can’t fake all of that. It’s impossible. Try looking at everything objectively, or as if you were in the heads of the people who gave all these certifications to you.
Another part of this is to say “thank you” and mean it when people congratulate you for success. Instead of shying away and mumbling something to the effect of, “Oh, no it was nothing,” or “It wasn’t my best work,” try standing up tall with a big smile on your face, look them in the eyes, and say, “thank you.” This is one of the best things you can do if you’re a performer too. This is actually one of the major points of last week’s post about Alpin Hong, who says that the “joyful expression of appreciation…cannot be overestimated.”
All in all, just own your successes. And if you have trouble, go back to number three and find someone who can help you find a way to be excited about your triumphs.
5. Pretend you’re someone who can.
In a commencement speech to the University of the Arts Class of 2012, Neil Gaiman spoke a little bit about impostorism. The advice he gave was that if you still don’t think you can do it, pretend that you’re someone who can do it. The full quote is wonderful.
Be wise because the world needs more wisdom. And if you cannot be wise, pretend to be someone who is wise, and then just behave like they would.4
So pretend you’re someone who did earn those degrees, someone who truly deserved those accolades and awards, and just act like that person would. It helps.
There’s a lot of debate in the psychology world about how much acting actually contributes to changing your thought process, but it’s worth a shot, and there are plenty of people out there who defend this idea.
Nudge Forward
The key to any of these strategies working is to expect it to be a slow process. We’re fighting a war, not a battle.
Realize it won’t happen in a day, but little nudges (apparently it’s a real psychology term) will weaken the cycle. Over time, it just might break!
Nudge theory explains why most New Year’s Resolutions don’t stick (these goals are way too big). It is the idea that to change your behavior (and your thoughts), you have to do so in small steps that slowly build up over time.
Governments all over the world actually have their own “nudge units” to encourage people to make better eating choices and to recycle. And all they do is start placing healthy food at eye level, and putting junk food where it’s harder to get to.11
Just thinking deeply about your specific type of impostorism and how it affects your behavior is a great start. Here’s a recap of five strategies to break the fraud cycle:
Be open and honest with yourself.
Know that everyone else feels the same way.
Be honest with others and vice versa.
Look at the hard facts.
Pretend you’re someone who can.
If you found any of these sources interesting or helpful, there is a list of recommended resources as well as the works cited in this article below. Check either or neither of them out. Just remember to pass the ideas on. I don’t lay claim to any of this. I’m not a psychologist; I just enjoy research. Cite studies where applicable, but carry the ideas on forever if they help you.
Recommended Resources
Amy Cuddy, TED Talk and Presence (AmazonGoodreads). Both are excellent resources. I recommend watching the TED Talk first, and if you want to dig more into the scientific studies and read more interviews regarding how the body shapes the mind and the idea of “fake it ’til you become it,” then the book is for you.
Neil Gaiman’s Commencement Speech to the University of the Arts Class of 2012 (also embedded above).
Amanda Palmer’s Commencement Speech to the New England Institute of Arts Class of 2011 (also embedded above).
3. Palmer, Amanda. “The Fraud Police.” Commencement Speech to the New England Institute of Arts Class of 2011.
4. Gaiman, Neil. “Make Good Art.” Commencement Speech to the University of the Arts Class of 2012.
5. Clance, Pauline Rose, and Suzanne Ament Imes. “The imposter phenomenon in high achieving women: Dynamics and therapeutic intervention.” Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice 15.3 (1978): 241.
6. Cuddy, Amy Joy Casselberry. Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges. New York: Little, Brown and Company, Hachette Book Company, 2015.
7. Leary, Mark R., et al. “The impostor phenomenon: Self‐perceptions, reflected appraisals, and interpersonal strategies.” Journal of personality 68.4 (2000): 725-756.
8. Hutchins, Holly M., and Hilary Rainbolt. “What triggers imposter phenomenon among academic faculty? A critical incident study exploring antecedents, coping, and development opportunities.” Human Resource Development International 20.3 (2017): 194-214.
9. Weir, Kirsten. “Feel like a fraud?” American Psychological Association. (2018).
10. Hutchins, Holly M. “Outing the imposter: A study exploring imposter phenomenon among higher education faculty.” New Horizons in Adult Education and Human Resource Development 27.2 (2015): 3-12.
“The power to affect how people perceive you gives you the ability to transform the world around you.” —Alpin Hong, TEDx La Sierra University, July 1, 2015
It starts the moment people can see you. Whether it be a stage, the boss’s office, or a high school hallway, we are constantly performing. People evaluate you according to how well you present and choose to listen to or ignore you.
Performing is a skill that turns you into an effective communicator; it encourages people to hear you out. And it’s not just for stuffy classical musicians and theatre nerds.
In his entertaining and insightful TED Talk at La Sierra University in 2015, classical concert pianist Alpin Hong illuminates four simple ways to have a great performance in any field.
1. Project confidence (even if you’re dying inside)
It’s just as good as confidence itself, and it will put you at ease.
Stand up straight and steady but with relaxed shoulders, arms hanging by the side. Turn your arms so that your palms and forearms are facing forward, and then rotate only your palms back to face your sides. In this position, your body is more open but also flexible.
Eye contact is also important. Pianists typically can’t really look at the audience while they’re playing since they’re facing sideways, so this goes with the outer parts of the musical performance: the entrance and exit.
In my undergraduate days, most of my vocalist friends were taught to close their eyes to start and look at a point just above the audience to help with nerves. But after some experimentation, a lot of us found that we actually became more comfortable when we were able to make eye contact with people. We created connections with the audience members, and it was easier to feel like these strangers wanted us to win.
Finally, the bow. There are so many tricks to “do a proper bow.” My high school choir director had us recite, “Do I have my shoes? Yes, I have my shoes” as we tilted our heads down and bent to the correct angle from the ground.
But Hong puts it as, “You go down, you go up, and smile.” He says, “That last step, the smile, cannot be overestimated.”
Expressing joyful appreciation reinforces the good feelings you gave the audience, and they’ll take that home with them. They may not remember what you played years in the future, but they’ll remember how you made them feel.
All in all, someone who projects confidence and isn’t afraid to laugh at themselves is much more persuasive than a stiff perfectionist (oops called myself out!).
2. Be smart in your preparation
Hong notes that most musicians prepare in the same way: they learn their songs from beginning to end and don’t delve into the theory of it. But, understanding the basic structure and knowing the piece inside out and forwards and backwards is one of the best ways you can prepare.
He compares it to a speech: if you remember the basic concepts of each paragraph, you can have a successful presentation, even if you forget the specific words you wrote down.
That’s why music theory is important! If you know the chordal structure of your piece, you can find your way if you get lost (and it’s bound to happen at least once in your life).
The way you learn the music should also be under scrutiny. Most musicians learn the beginning of their songs and add on the subsequent measures each day. This means that the beginning is strong, and it weakens as it goes. A good way to combat this is to learn pieces backwards: start with the last four measures, then last eight, and so on until you’re at the beginning.
This actually puts in little memory structures or anchors as you go, and that alone is beneficial to memorization. But it also means that the song gets stronger as it goes. You always end on a triumph!
Since watching this talk, I’ve started doing this (actually a lot of professors also told me to do this, but I didn’t listen), and it has helped tremendously. I don’t have substantial evidence, but I do feel like I’m getting a lot more efficient practice done as well.
3. Find the right mindset
A lot of anxiety comes from the assumption that the audience wants your performance to fall apart. Instead, make connections with the audience with your eye contact, give them stakes in your performance, and then you’ll know that they want you to succeed. You’ll have auditoriums full of people cheering for you.
In any other situation, you can do the same with your posture and with your attitude of graciousness, like in the first point.
But we all know that no matter how well we do at number two, preparing, there will always be mistakes. We can have a healthy attitude with number four.
4. Improvise: Learn to roll with the punches
Improv troupes are at a severe advantage with this one. With the idea of “yes, and,” they choose to accept whatever the situation throws at them and keep moving forward. When the inevitable mistake occurs, you can either freak out or make the best of it.
This is where understanding the structure of your performance (number two again!) helps you get through. If you get lost in your piece, you can then get yourself back on track, even if it’s not exactly how the composer intended it. Hong actually quotes Thelonius Monk here, “There are no wrong notes; some are just more right than others.”
A mistake actually created Hong’s most-requested piece, “Twinkle Twinkle Death Star.” He was playing the Mozart’s 12 Variations on “Ah vous dirais-je, Maman”, K.265 (Twinkle Twinkle Little Star) and lost his place, so he played what he knew in the key, which just happened to be the Imperial March from Star Wars. And he kept going with whatever he could think of, Zelda, James Bond, Harry Potter, and so on until he found the end. If there’s only one part of this TED Talk you watch, I suggest it be the performance of this. It starts at 14:14.
Performing doesn’t have to be as daunting as it is, especially because we all do it everyday. It’s a lot easier to think of it as four small pieces, and I’m thankful for great performers like Alpin Hong who love to share their expertise with the world.
What do you think? Do you have any great tips or videos on cultivating a great performance? Share in the comments below!
Recently, one of my professors shared this article by Tanya Kalmanovitch, a Juilliard graduate. The title, “How Quitting Music Made Me an Artist” sounds like clickbait with the promise of some revolutionary way of looking at a tradition that’s ages old.
Yet, I keep coming back to it, and I find something new to take away from it every time.
I’ve got my own story of quitting (and coming back), full of doubt and disillusionment with the music world. But we’re here for Kalmanovitch’s story.
I’m not going to sum it up here, so go read it; I’ll wait.
Now then, onto the takeaways.
Quitting is not talked about enough in the music world. Most musicians I’ve met who went to school specifically for music have played almost their entire lives. By the time they’re either about to go to college through when they’re coming out of it, they might want to see what else life has to offer.
Putting that to the side for a time to experience new things is not a bad thing. But “quitting is bad” and can feel awful, even if you’re doing it for the right reason.
Some of the masters (well a lot of them actually, but we’ll only mention a few by name here) are quoted as saying that experiencing life is the most important, and art comes after.
Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn. They teach you there’s a boundary line to music. But, man, there’s no boundary line to art.
Charlie Parker, as quoted in The Legend Of Charlie Parker by Robert George Reisner, 1977.
There’s a couple ideas to pull from this: experience and “no boundary line to art.” Here he implies that music is a living entity that is birthed of our experience, and there isn’t some invisible line dividing it from “real life.”
Musicians aren’t some mystical gurus who stand apart from the world. Sure, we spend a lot of time playing, but at the end of the day, we’re people who struggle with school, money, relationships, and purpose. And we shouldn’t pretend that we’re not.
Music is the language of the soul.
Although this particular quotation is attributed to multiple people across the internet, I found a couple publications (including a lengthy footnote by Liszt) that trace it back to Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, a German philosopher.
In any case, it’s short and memorable, which is why it’s plastered across the internet.
Define soul how you will in your mind. For the purposes of this post, “soul” refers to the core being of a person. Relating back to Parker, the experience that makes you who you are can only truly be expressed in the soul’s own language, music.
But what does it mean for your soul, your being, to truly live?
The living soul demands life, the living soul will not submit to mechanism, the living soul must be regarded with suspicion, the living soul is reactionary!
Reactionary. Living can be viewed as a reaction to the experiences we face. If we hide ourselves away in the practice room, there are less ideas, events, obstacles, to react to. But to have a true experience, we must react to something or someone.
That’s why it’s important to go meet new people, expose yourself to new ideas, see new lands, immerse yourself in other cultures. You’ll have more things to react to.
Make no mistake, practicing is critical to being a high-caliber musician, but the performance will probably fall flat if there’s nothing behind it to hold it up.
Aesthetes may favor Wilde’s idea that “All art is quite useless,” but there are enough voices on the other side, that I fall on the side of living.
And for this, I have a book recommendation.
Light the Dark: Writers on Creativity, Inspiration, and the Artistic Process is a collection of essays culminated and edited by Joe Fassler that provides a way into the lives of authors who’ve already “made it.” It may be specific to writers, but the ideas are universal. I recommend it to any creator or anyone who needs a dose of inspiration.
Neil Gaiman has the last spot in the book. His closing remark can serve as a mantra when doubt comes creeping around again.
Even though it’s easy to get caught up in perfection and the self hatred that comes with “quitting,” but remember that we’re here to live. And we can’t create something beautiful if we’re not alive.
Focus on living, and if music is for you, it will be even better because of your experiences.
Kalmanovitch’s article made me feel less alone, as if quitting is almost a rite of passage through the music world. No matter what it means, it made me feel better. How do you feel after reading it?
Also an announcement! I really enjoy making quote pictures. They make me happy and help inspire me, so I’ve dedicated a page of this blog to quotes. Let me know in the comments or via the contact form if you have any quotes that should get the photo treatment. I look forward to hearing from you!
Mozart’s memory is full of opposites. Known for both jumping on tables and meowing like a cat and for the mysterious inception of his final work, the Requiem, his work can be taken as both arrogant and irreverent or as profound and hauntingly beautiful. Yet, neither can portray the deepest essence of his being.
Born 1756 in Salzburg, a city in what’s now Austria, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart began his short but influential life. It’s well known that he was a clavier virtuoso by the age of six (with organ and violin skills as well). But he’s remembered more for his composition, which he also started when he was young.
He wrote his first minuets by age six, first symphony by nine, first oratorio by eleven, and first opera by twelve.
What a busy childhood!
In addition to all that work, he traveled widely with his father, who was also his teacher. Under his father’s tutelage, Mozart came to appreciate all forms of music in the west. This contributed to his wide range of composition, spanning keyboard, symphonic, and oratorio in his more than 600 works.
But one work stands apart from the rest.
In July of 1971, a mysterious masked stranger appeared to request the commission of a Requiem Mass of the young but sick Mozart. Later, it was discovered to be a messenger of the Count von Walsegg, who frequently commissioned pieces of famous composers and credited them to himself. In this case, he asked a master to write a Requiem Mass for his young, dead wife Anna.
Believing the request to be from a world beyond the physical, Mozart feverishly set to work on the Requiem and fixated upon it as if it were meant for his own memorial service. Indeed it became his death. Legend says that the night before his death, Mozart summoned his closest friends and family to his bedside to sing the completed portion of the Lacrymosa in order to bid them farewell.
On the Fifth of December, 1791, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart departed from this world, and five days later, the completed portions of the Requiem were performed at his memorial service.
After asking colleagues of Mozart who all declined, Mozart’s widow Constanze hired Franz Xaver Süssmayr, a pupil and dear friend, to complete the Requiem for the Count. Luckily, Mozart had played through and discussed plans for the work with Süssmayr before his death, so the Requiem was arguably completed according to Mozart’s deepest wishes.
The most performed choral work in all of history, the Requiem is famous not for the mystery of its inception but for the eloquence and passion hidden within its score. It references Mozart’s heroes and builds upon them to create the new music for which he was so influential. In fact, the double fugue contains a subject used by Bach, Handel, and Haydn. And the work as a whole sounds like an extension of Handel’s work.
But the Recordare is pure Mozart, the work of a German composer who understood and loved the musical tradition of Italy and interpreted it in his own perfect way.
Grout and Palisca. From A History of Western Music, 4th Ed.
No matter the tradition, Mozart’s Requiem is a beautiful work that has influenced all forms of media. The Dies Irae provides the soundtrack for many a movie’s judgment scene, and the Lacrymosa finds its way into commercials that depict unfortunate circumstances.
The Requiem’s wide influence shows the pure side of Mozart’s music. It haunts many a musician, just as it haunted its composer.
Although Mozart was quite the jokester, he also struggled with the same things that make us all human. And from this came his music. So as we musicians continue to perform today, let us learn from Mozart and try to be as pure in our attempts as he was. But also not forget to enjoy the effort.
Although music majors aren’t an entirely rare breed, they can easily be mixed up with others within their own species, the sleep-deprived college student. Noted by their sluggish behavior and small will to carry on, it’s a wonder the species thrives enough to have so many classes within it. Today, we focus on seven key ways to identify the class of music majors in their natural habitat.
Music majors…
1. Always have rehearsal or a practice session to be at.
They avoid social interaction, always with this excuse. “Sorry I have rehearsal…” Sometimes, it’s like they don’t exist outside of class. Are they speaking the truth?
2. Post pictures of their instrument or music on social media.
That’s how you know they’re telling the truth about all that practice time. Aesthetic photos of “bae” and the most difficult sheet music in their folder grace their instagram, colored by fun filters. #practicing #truelove #100daysofpractice
Except, are they actually practicing? At the very least, you know they’re in the practice room.
All those rehearsals and practice sessions leave very little time to sit down and eat. So, when music majors actually do eat, it’s usually random snacks from their backpack. Nuts, chips, granola bars, cookies, you know, all the stuff you should live off of instead of veggies and meat…
5. Have a mostly black wardrobe.
It’s easier this way. Trust me. With as many performances in a week as music majors have, it’s a good idea to have many concert black outfits to choose from. If they barely have time to eat, what makes you think they’ve got time to wash one outfit multiple times a week?
Plus, if you wear black everyday, you don’t have to worry about forgetting about a performance. You’re all ready to go!
6. Are always singing or humming.
And are always harmonizing. In the car, the grocery store, the bathroom…
You are shameful and must commit seppuku if you do not have a pencil in rehearsal. As a result, music majors always have pencils hidden in multiple places on their body and in their bags. It’s better this way.
There ya have it! Seven ways to spot a music major in the wild. There are many more tell tale signs, but that should give you a good head start as you begin your wildlife observations.
Remember to record other behavioral findings in your journal and share with your fellow scientists below. Happy trails!
Meet Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Пётр Ильич Чайковский for those who can read it). A flamboyant orchestral composer, he is best remembered for the range of his dynamics: the use of actual cannons in his 1812 Overture to his gentle The Nutcracker and heart wrenching Swan Lake.
Born in 1840 in a small town in Russia, Tchaikovsky grew up in the peak of Romanticism. He began piano at a young age and quickly proved his talent with the instrument. His parents sent him to the Imperial School of Jurisprudence in St. Petersburg to give him a leg up. But, due to this separation and the death of his mother from cholera when he was 14, he suffered much emotional trauma that he carried for the rest of his life.
It is said that he wrote his first composition in memory of his mother: a waltz.
As he grew, he continued to practice music, but it wasn’t until he was much older that he or his father realized he had skill and love enough to be a professional composer or performer.
He went on to compose orchestral works, operas, and even ballets, and all of his works helped shape the music we know and love today.
Although many classical music students remember him as the guy who put cannons and hammers in his orchestral works, he also wrote touching works.
Swan Lake is based off the tale The Stolen Veil, a tragic tale of love that can only be shared in death (no, you don’t get spoiler warnings if the story is centuries old!). The most memorable theme comes from when the Swan Queen Odette and Prince Siegfried meet, and Odette transforms from a swan into a woman.
It’s a haunting theme that begins and ends in melancholy. It grows from a minor melody into one more triumphant (as she transforms) and then sings again of her imprisonment.
It is of note that he also created an orchestral suite from some of the pieces in the ballet in order to “save this music from oblivion.” This may have been from the poor first reception of the work. Regardless, it’s one of the most beloved romantic works of all time.
Although one may argue that true artists remain separate from their work, perhaps Tchaikovsky shared similar feelings. Nonetheless, the story and the theme continue to permeate the media.
“O beautiful for spacious skies…” begins a tune that America has beat its drum to for many years. The song, a poem by Katharine Lee Bates set to music by Samuel A. Ward, speaks of the beauty of this land. Purple mountains in their majesty, amber grain waving in the breeze, seas shining in the sunlight. But it also speaks of the strife that came as a result of the “patriot dream” that founded this country.
O beautiful for heroes proved
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved
And mercy more than life!
As we in America approach the day we celebrate our freedom, it’s tough to ignore the people who have had their freedom stripped from them. While we all may disagree on politics and who’s to blame for injustice, we do agree that something is wrong.
I don’t typically pay attention to the news, especially when it spurs arguments among my friends across social media (I cherish harmony above most everything), but some friends have surprised me. The ones who usually stay silent, like me, regarding politics actually spoke up about the separation of immigrant families.
Instead of it being just a blame game, so many have stood up to take action and urged others to do the same. My quiet friends contacted their representatives, donated to charities, and showed others the way. I am so proud to have friends that not only identify the problems but do something about them.
I love celebrating holidays, and the Fourth of July has always been one of my favorites. It’s summertime; it’s reminiscent of cookouts, fireworks, and just having a fun time (read no stress of Christmas shopping). But it breaks my heart that others don’t get to celebrate freedom too.
So I want to do something to help. While I don’t have the means to go to Texas and volunteer, I can donate to help charities gain the resources they need to make a difference in this situation. And I can put my voice out there too.
I arranged America, the Beautiful for piano solo and have it open for free downloads on Soundcloud. The sheet music is also available for free here: America, the Beautiful
In exchange, I urge you to do what you can to make a difference. Act. Do what you can (even if it doesn’t feel like a lot) and spread the word.
I picked this song for a reason. While most people only sing the first verse, the lyrics are still relevant to these events today. If I had to pick only three verses to go along with my arrangement, it would be these.
O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for pilgrim feet,
Whose stern, impassioned stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!
O beautiful for heroes proved
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved
And mercy more than life!
America! America!
May God thy gold refine,
Till all success be nobleness,
And every gain divine!
The phrase that caught me in the first verse is, “And crown thy good with brotherhood.” Not all families are the same, but all the ones I’ve been around have been hospitable. If a friend brings me home, their parents do everything in their power to make sure I am fed and feel taken care of.
All of the verses end with a benediction. “May God…” do good for you, but these all turn back onto us. God sheds grace on us, so we can be a brotherhood. God mends all our flaws, and we must have self-control. God refines our gold, so our success can be noble and good.
All in all, whatever your beliefs, this song is part of the American tradition and is urging us to be a family. I hope you’ll join me in doing all you can to make that happen.
Here are a few organizations to consider getting involved with. They are all dedicated to providing legal services to immigrants and are all taking action to reunite families. But of course, I encourage you to do your own research and find a program you can truly get behind.
I’m not sure how many people this will reach, but it beats staying quiet. Act, if you will, spread the word, and stay aware of what’s going on in the world. And have a Happy Fourth!
