I had an epiphany today. And a little bit of a nervous breakdown. I was at a little Chinese wok shop out on the Eastside this afternoon. They had a huge HD television that was facing my direction. It was impossible to ignore. CNN was on, and it was a roundtable discussion leading up to the closing of the polls for what they were calling “Super Tuesday Two”. I don’t have broadcast or cable tv at home, so I haven’t seen this sort of media in well over a year. The hype level was extraordinary.
I felt my pulse quickening. My mind became jumbled and full of worries. I really felt that my blood pressure was rising. I shook it off, tried to concentrate on my meal and my companion, and soon left to go home. Once home, I did a brief look around online. The view from there wasn’t much better. Everything was as wrong as wrong could be. The sky was not just falling, it was on fire and full of giant pieces of jagged rock. I felt like I was being shouted at from every direction. Every voice was diametrically opposed. Even my usual sources that used rational and even judgement, and those with ample perspective were taking the hardest possible lines on both sides of whatever issue was being ‘debated’. My entire realm of experience outside of actual face-to-face conversation is like being screamed at for most of the hours in each day.
But do you know when that goes away? Well, when I’m asleep for one, or in the arms of my beloved, for another. But also when I am making music. When am practicing, nothing else exists for me but the notes on the page and my desire to realize them with perfect fidelity. When I am rehearsing with my friends in a chamber group, or in the orchestra, I’m thinking about a dozen things at once – none of it concerning anything happening outside the confines of the rehearsal room, or the concert hall stage. When I’m performing for an audience of a half dozen, or thousands, all that matters is what I and my colleagues have to say, and how the audience receives that communication – sending it back to us in that mysterious alchemical transubstantiation of live performance.
This, I realized, is the cure. You can make beauty. You can make ugliness. But only through the arts can you create that chimera of beautiful ugliness that transcends each and causes us to lose our self, and become part of something more. Through art we are transfixed, transformed, and transported. I’m so proud of what I do, and what my friends and colleagues do. We don’t often get much appreciation on the level of national discourse, but ultimately, all politics is local, and we are making our localities much more hospitable and humane places to call home. That is something to be proud of.