Violin, Technique and the Spirit:
Here's the odd thing about being a violinist, from my perspective. The way you play, the notes you produce, the sound you make, have almost nothing to do with your spiritual condition. Yes, your spiritual condition can affect how you prepare, how you approach music, how you dedicate yourself to the music you play, how you seek to channel spirit into the music. However, there's a reason for all that old mythology about how the devil played the violin, about how Paganini channeled the devil to achieve virtuosity: the reason is that you can, if you so choose, divorce your spirit from your fingers and your technical equipment. Not that this is desireable, nor efficacious, nor good. It's merely possible.
To play music on the violin, or on any instrument, you must first acquire enough technique so that the technical aspects of playing fade into the background as you approach the music and make music. For those of you non-musicians out there: imagine that when you start to type on a computer, you have to hunt for each letter, then push the key producing the letter, then think of the whole word, then push the next key for the next letter, and imagine that you have no idea which finger to use for each letter, so you're making it up as you go. That's analogous to the situation of a musician who has no technique. Now imagine that you can type; you arch your fingers over the qwerty keyboard (assuming you're not a dvorak user!) and you type words effortlessly, as a whole, not letter-by-letter; you can think in sentences if you have the technique to type this way. Perhaps you can type fast enough so that you can send your thoughts directly onto page or screen. That's something like how it feels to be a technically=proficient musician.
Now, back to the idea of spiritual condition: of course I think that my spiritual condition actually has a significant effect on everything I do, including technical operations like typing and playing the violin. And I can see subtle effects of my spiritual focus and approach in almost everything technical, now that I've been spiritually-focused for awhile. How does this manifest itself? by an urge to do things right. What does doing things right have to do with the glory of God? I'm not sure, but I may soon find out.
Quote for the day: Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might. (Proverbs, or Ecclesiastes--not sure!)
Here's the odd thing about being a violinist, from my perspective. The way you play, the notes you produce, the sound you make, have almost nothing to do with your spiritual condition. Yes, your spiritual condition can affect how you prepare, how you approach music, how you dedicate yourself to the music you play, how you seek to channel spirit into the music. However, there's a reason for all that old mythology about how the devil played the violin, about how Paganini channeled the devil to achieve virtuosity: the reason is that you can, if you so choose, divorce your spirit from your fingers and your technical equipment. Not that this is desireable, nor efficacious, nor good. It's merely possible.
To play music on the violin, or on any instrument, you must first acquire enough technique so that the technical aspects of playing fade into the background as you approach the music and make music. For those of you non-musicians out there: imagine that when you start to type on a computer, you have to hunt for each letter, then push the key producing the letter, then think of the whole word, then push the next key for the next letter, and imagine that you have no idea which finger to use for each letter, so you're making it up as you go. That's analogous to the situation of a musician who has no technique. Now imagine that you can type; you arch your fingers over the qwerty keyboard (assuming you're not a dvorak user!) and you type words effortlessly, as a whole, not letter-by-letter; you can think in sentences if you have the technique to type this way. Perhaps you can type fast enough so that you can send your thoughts directly onto page or screen. That's something like how it feels to be a technically=proficient musician.
Now, back to the idea of spiritual condition: of course I think that my spiritual condition actually has a significant effect on everything I do, including technical operations like typing and playing the violin. And I can see subtle effects of my spiritual focus and approach in almost everything technical, now that I've been spiritually-focused for awhile. How does this manifest itself? by an urge to do things right. What does doing things right have to do with the glory of God? I'm not sure, but I may soon find out.
Quote for the day: Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might. (Proverbs, or Ecclesiastes--not sure!)
posted by Vicky at 1:04 PM
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