Continuing on with my notion of explaining a bit about each of the "Maxwellism" signs on the walls of the main room in CMAS. To be truthful, most, if not all, are not mine, but rather ideas from others that, over time, I have found to have particular, let's call it...resonance (pun intended) for not just the work done in CMAS, but for my overall sense of music just generally. At any rate, all that said, I think it's good to share these with CMAS. Not to preach to or "convert" anyone - though I am sure it can come across that way to some - but rather to try, at least in some small way, to open up the creative process just a bit more. Maybe it helps some in CMAS, maybe not; but they have all helped me, so I feel a certain obligation to at least share. Anyway...
"Nothing forced endures." This one has meant a lot to me since I first heard it at the University of Arizona more than 15 years ago. The credit goes to a brilliant poet, Richard Beale.
I was lucky enough to be very tacitly involved with the premier of David Maslanka's "Mass" a the time. Truth is that I had no real appreciation for the project. Not the religious elements, but just the real...music, of it all. Gregg Hanson the conductor, Maslanka the composer, Beale the lyricist, all of them and all those involved - I just did not quite see it. Perhaps that is why "Nothing forced endures" has stuck with me. Even now it still breaks through pretty much all else, no matter what my state of mind (musical or otherwise) in might be in.
So. What does it mean? Well, I suppose you'd have to talk to Richard Beale to be certain (unless he's similar to Freddy Mercury, and similar artists, who prefer to refrain from any specific details about their art in order to allow the audience the opportunity to develop their own, hopefully more meaningful connection than one forced on them, even if by the artist themselves. I fully agree with this approach by the way, as much as I do my best to follow it...but I digress....) but to me it has always meant that truly lasting art, in any form, needs to be organic. Natural.
Actually, I find it amusing that I still have a hard time even after all these years finding a way to fully articulate this one. Probably means that I don't have it down myself, but that's part of the journey too, no? I always find it funny how people (audiences perhaps more so for that matter) generally think that just because you are lucky enough to be considered by some an "expert" or to have had some success as an artist, that you don't still learn (I like the work explore better, but...) more about your art. It's like it gets forgotten. "We don't wanna hear the new stuff. Just play the 'classics." It's all symptomatic, but again, big surprise, I digress...
Ok. So let me try to give an example of how I view "nothing forced endures." I spend a good deal of time working with students on how to explore their creative process. How to open themselves up to the honesty of their own art. A lofty goal to be sure, and one I am not at certain I am qualified to attempt, but none the less let's assume for a moment that I require, as just one example, them to write in a particular style.
Now, sure, there is a tremendous value in learning the details of particular style in order to better understand it and how it works and how to better reach an audience through that style and so on. But what if that style does not appeal to the student? What if that student is simply not open to the possibilities the style offers. What if the student just cannot see the opportunity in front of them. S much so that they get so caught up in the style not working form them that it shuts them down pretty much entirely creatively. Seems extreme, but think about it. It happens all the time. Not just in art, but life in general.
So now that student is lost. Maybe we get them back maybe we don't, but in the meantime, time has been lost. Lost for them. Lost for their creative process to move forward. Sure we can make everyone do the same thing, and after a while it'll be the norm, and everyone will be ok with it, but in the long run, overall, it lacks truth. It lacks real artistic integrity. In the end, and it may be years, or decades, or lifetimes, I believe that art of that nature (not really sure it should be called art - another digression, for another time...) does not last.
Let me be clear. This is not able the style. Not at all. The creative process is not simple. And for some it is even scary. Coming round to it by any means other than self determined is just not going to be true. At best its artificial, worse its really just a surrogate for someone else's process. Think about that. What a truly horrible disservice. To make someone else create in a manner that is not their own.
Yes, show then the way. Yes, open them up to all the possibilities. But at some point you have to let them be their true selves. One way or another it has to happen. But if it does, well, wow! Imagine the art. Just imagine.
Nothing forced endures. Not in music. Not in life. And, apparently, not even in blogs.
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