<<  -- 3 --  Gordon Rumson    I'VE GOT THE MUSIC IN ME ...

Sadly though, I have also seen and heard the successful lament their situation. One world famous pianist sadly told me that he had slept in his own bed but half of of the previous year. The constant touring was a burden to him. Yet there are many pianists who think they ought to be touring and this pianist shouldn't be.

For the many musicians who do not attain their dreams of glory, reliving the triumphs of Liszt, Rubinstein and Paderewski, their retreat into obscurity is clouded by a developed pomposity of manner. They know and are happy to tell anyone all that they know. They critique, self promote and puff themselves up until they well nigh burst.

Around them, the non-musicians must view this with some degree of confusion. Why are they acting like this? What is going on here?

I rather believe that the regular folk have a subconscious awareness of this weakness in the mentation of musicians. I rather think that this causes a certain distrust of the musician's basic capacity to evaluate reality sanely. I rather believe that most people think musicians a little off-balanced. 'Artistic temperament' is the polite term.

As long as musicians suffer from this, insofar as they do, they are also likely to split off into mutually exclusive groups, and rather than together work for music, work against each other to the detriment of a musical culture. In a small town in British Columbia, there are two violin teachers. They neither speak to each other, nor allow their students to speak to each other. What madness is this? Can you find examples of this in other parts of the world?

With the declining fortunes of orchestras and slumping classical recordings sales the situation is perilous. But I believe that if we work together we can save the day. We need to work in harmony. Is that not what music is claimed to be? Is that not what music claims to do? When will musicians heed the evidence of their own ears and say instead 'We've got the music in us. Let us sing for the tuning of the world.'