(no subject)
Last night was of those nights that i look back on and realize just how wonderfully surprising life is, and how truly merciful. yesterday, i could not stop feeling incredibly depressed, it seemed that in everything i did in my classes, i ended up being continually mediocre, from bombing a piano test i had spend 10 hours practicing for to getting a barely passing grade on a theory assignment to feeling confused in italian to going to a required recital only to find out that it ended when i thought it started and that i had missed the entire thing. Slumping home after this, i was prepared to spend the night pouting alone in bed watching movies on my computer, but then Dan came into my room and asked me to go to his concert. I was pretty much thinking i wouldn't go, until Mike came in and asked me to go with him, so i decided to pull myself out of the depths of despair long enough to attend the stupid concert. I was sitting in the front row of the balcony with Stefanie and Mike and in the middle of the first piece "Rainbow Body", I realized that this was really really good. There was this moment of oppressive silence and then the cellos began this slow creeping slide down he finger board, and then faster and then louder, now adding an aditional shift at then end. And then this got exchanged back and forth between the basses and cellos and as you watched, you could see the exchange happening. The cellos would slide their hands down and just and the released and seemed to be drawn to the top, the basses' hands would all drop in perfect unison. It was so incredibly exciting, i found myself on the edge of my seat, my entire body moving backwards and forwards as if drawn and shoved by their arms. But this was nothing, absolutely nothing to the second piece, Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto in C minor. The first movement had this haunting yet adventurous and epic theme and then the second movement. well, i can't even describe the second movement. all i know is that i completely fell apart in the middle of it. I mean, i was actually crying, there in the front row of the balcony of finney chapel. I was continually reminded of all the things that had been hurting all day. That music, it was like it was mercilessly pouring salt into those wounds. Unscrewing the cap of the salt shaker with reckless abandon, it simply tipped the thing over and dumped the entire lot onto every last heart ache, and yet, in that intense pain and hurt, I was remade. I was so overwhelmed by the concerto, that I considered leaving before the final piece Saint-saens' "organ" symphony. ' What could possibly match what i've just been through?' anything else would be a let down, but then stefanie said "no, you have to stay, you're gonna love this." and so i stayed, and thank god i did. During the first part, i realised that it was absolutely beautiful and expressive, but it was not until the final theme arrived that everything came to a culmination. That theme, so famous and easily recognizable was like coming home, despite the fact that it was the first time it was being introduced in the symphony. I am realizing as i write this that there is no possible way i can describe how wonderful and aweinspiring that music was. I have rarely been touched like that in my life. I want to feel like that forever. Only music can tear you to pieces in a moment, yet in the next put you back together again, only stronger and better than you ever were before. Music for me has been such a relentless teacher, pulling me within, forcing me to find in myself deaper depths, greater compassion, stronger endurance, passion, despair and love. I realized during that concert that through all my relentless work the past month and a half, i have forgotten one of the main reasons i'm here. My love for music is not based on trills, breath control, and proper vowel modification. I want to express something with music. I want one day to make someone else feel the way I felt in that chapel, listening to that orchestra. As much as I loving being taught by other people's music, I hope one day to be the instructor myself. I have worried for such a long time that my carreer choice while fulfilling to me, would not make a real difference in the world, like i was being selfish in my choice. I have finally realised how vital, important, and unselfish being a musician is. In playing music, we teach others how to feel. Music pulls people out of the mundain. All colors are brighter in music, all emotions more acute. I will never feel such deap despair or such uplifting joy as that that music inspires. To play music is to teach others how to truly feel. I can think of no carreer more worthwhile than that.