Good human beings vs. Good musicians

[kevink]

To be a 'good musician', does one need to be a 'good human being'?  Discuss.

[schnabels_grandson]

I would say no.  anyone disagree?

[chopiabin]

No. Wagner was a very terrible person, but he was a great musician, as was Debussy and countless others.

[L.K.]

Beethoven and Scriabin were old perverts, too. (or so I've heard). Their music is great, so I don' t care.

[bitus]

We all know that it's impossible to be a musician without some kind of passion for music... something that also motivates you. Where does this come from?
If you are a composer, it's even more imperative to have a source of inspiration... and in this case, the inspiration can be anything from a simple addiction to God. That inspiration will put the amprent on the composer, therefore influence or even take control of his life.
The Bitus.

[bernhard]

In the East  there is a tradition (quickly dying down) that in order to be a good artist you need to be a good human being.

What this means is that there is an assumption that your art is a reflex of your inner self. A good human being is defined as someone who has put a lot of work in oneself. It means not only that one tries to better oneself, but that one observes oneself, one’s behaviour and the effect such behaviour may have in others and in the environment.

According to this tradition, if you do not do that kind of work on yourself your art will come from superficial layers of your personality rather than from a deeper essential part of oneself.

This of course is too brief an explanation to do justice to this idea, but it is not uncommon in Japan, for instance to find the most accomplished craftsman and artists happen to be Zen Buddhist masters, or zen Buddhist monks (potter, garden designers, cooks, martial artists, painters, calligraphers). The art they produce bears witness that this is a sound tradition.

However I must emphasize that in this tradition “good” human being has no moral connotations whatsoever. The connotation is simply one of work on oneself. So it follows that many of these “good “men are frequently at odds with the social morals of their times (the poet Bassho was ordered to commit ritual suicide because he displeased the shogun. The same happened to the master of the Tea ceremony Sen no Rikkyu. Both men were artists of the greatest calliber, and had spent a lifetime working on themselves and perfecting themselves in order to perfect their art and yet were regarded as bad men by the authorities of the time and society they lived in).

So you could say that in this sense – and if you agree with this tradition – then , yes, one needs to be a “good man” if one is to produce good art.

In the West on the other hand we seem to have adifferent sort of tradition. In the West rather than a complete, selfless and forever perfecting individual, artists are expected to be eccentric, debauched, live dissipated lives, have enormous egos and more or less behave badly.

So most composers and musicians lived dissolute lifes. Beethoven was often drunk, resorted to prostitutes, had terrible social manners and made a mess of his relationship with his nephew Karl and his mother. And yet at the same time he was clearly forever searching for something. He often talked of becoming a better person, and seemed to think that this would result in better music. Schumann was also a heavy drinker, had syphilis and was a vagabond according to his father in law. And yet in his copious writings and diaries, one finds the same yearning for wanting to be better. Even J. S. Bach was considered a troublemaker by the authorities and spend some time in jail. And yet is there a composer more introverted and more seeking of self-perfection? The list goes on and on, and the surprising result seems to be that in spite of appearances, these Western artists were pretty much inserted in that Eastern tradition.

Of course, if one’s definition of a good human being becomes moral or religious, then even if it was possible to agree on such a definition, no one would probably live up to it. The problem here is that no one close up is a good human being in this sense. So it becomes a matter of degree.

Yet there is probably no musician or composer who willingly and intentionally caused harm to another human being for purely personal profit (I may be wrong here). Someone like, say George Bush. Or an arms dealer.

So, like everyone else they had their very human weaknesses, but all of them were seekers after something. So maybe that makes them good human beings after all. Most importantly they left a legacy of joy for all of us. Unlike er, George Bush. (and my bank manager  )

So I would say that to be a good musician one does need to be a good human being in the sense of constantly seeking for self perfection, and that one also needs to experience much intense emotional upheaval, and be able to relate such experiences to music and music making.

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[chopiabin]

What about believeing you have attained or are perfection? Scriabin (one of the most talented and non-superficial artists of the Romantic/Post-Romantic crossover, imho) eventually came to the conclusion that his music and art were able to "rebirth" mankind. He also frequently wrote about his belief that the universe was the creation of his mind.

[bitus]

This might not be relevant for the topic we're discusing, but I read somewhere that Scriabin said he had in mind the perfect piece for orchestra... does anybody know any details?
The Bitus

[bernhard]

What about believeing you have attained or are perfection? Scriabin (one of the most talented and non-superficial artists of the Romantic/Post-Romantic crossover, imho) eventually came to the conclusion that his music and art were able to "rebirth" mankind. He also frequently wrote about his belief that the universe was the creation of his mind.

Perfection is unattainable. That is why it is such a good goal. You can dedicate your whole life approaching it and never getting close.

Yes. We should always aim at perfection.

Completeness is a different story. It is perfectly possible to achieve completeness (although it is rare).

So what was Scriabin talking about? If it was perfection I would say that he was delluding himself. If it was completeness, who knows, maybe he did it (I better listen more carefully to those preludes... )

Can you supply any more details?

And yes. The Universe - as one knows it -  is a creation of one's mind. but isn't this common knowledge after the Matrix trilogy?

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[bitus]

It was either Sostakovic, Stravinski, Scriabin or Korsacov...
It was a piece for orchestra... i don't remember what form, that he thought about, and put some thoughts on paper, but nobody saw it, because he died before he could show it, or even write it. I am sory, it's been a while since i saw the video... hope i didn't create any confusion.
The Bitus

[Beet9]

Gosh you guys are making all musicians sound evil!  What about J.S Bach, he was a very moral and religious guy.  

[chopiabin]

Scriabin was writing the Mysterium when he died, and it was supposed to be a synthesis of all forms of art. It was supposed to be held in a specially-constructed temple in India around a lake. It would combine all forms of art, and there was supposed to be orchestration for things like glances, gestures, scents, and colors, as well as music, and all forms of visual art-from dancing to sculpture. It was supposed to last for days, and Scriabin believed that it would cleanse and rebirth the human race. Part of the libretto can be found in Faubion Bowers book, Scriabin, and it is very beautiful poetry.

[bernhard]

Gosh you guys are making all musicians sound evil!  What about J.S Bach, he was a very moral and religious guy.  

On one occasion when the Church was empty, J. S. Bach was caught frolicking in the choir place with a young maiden (some say it was his ocusin Maria Barbara whom he eventually married - but there is no evidence on the identity of the lady). You may laugh at it now, but in those days this was a serious moral offense. So serius in fact that he was reprimanded and the reprimand entered into the city registers (which is why we know of it).

He also got involved into a duel with a bassonist.

He got into a fist brawl with a group of University students when he was teaching there.

He so irritated the Duke of Weimar that he was thrown in jail for one month.

He asked for a week's leave from his job to visit Buxtehude and stayed for three months.

So there you have it: an irresponsible rufian, trouble maker, with a criminal record and a lewd character to top it all.

This is just to show how easy it it to find fault with the most saintly man if you put your mind to it.

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[bernhard]

Scriabin was writing the Mysterium when he died, and it was supposed to be a synthesis of all forms of art. It was supposed to be held in a specially-constructed temple in India around a lake. It would combine all forms of art, and there was supposed to be orchestration for things like glances, gestures, scents, and colors, as well as music, and all forms of visual art-from dancing to sculpture. It was supposed to last for days, and Scriabin believed that it would cleanse and rebirth the human race. Part of the libretto can be found in Faubion Bowers book, Scriabin, and it is very beautiful poetry.

This is very interesting.

Was it ever performed? And if performed, would one need to attend to it in order to be reborn and cleansed , or it would automatically do it to the whol of mankind just by being performed?

Does Bowers book have more details (I might get it).

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[ted]

Bernhard:

I readily identify with much of the Eastern artistic aesthetic. For me it is intimately connected with the constant, lifelong unifying process of conscious and unconscious - what Jung called individuation. My music is very much a manifestation of who and what I am. Therefore I tend to prefer creation through enlightenment and serenity than through angst, conflict and crisis. In other words I am a Milhaud man rather than a Wagner man. I am not sure that this is anything more than elective preference though.

Morality ? I don't know. It's a hard one isn't it.  At the end of his life Aldous Huxley could only suggest we try to be kinder to one another. The older I get the more I agree with him, but I'm not sure how much this affects my music.

In general, although my music may reflect negative states, (by its nature it must reflect everything) it is not propelled by them. The music itself is something like Wordsworth's emotion recollected in tranquility. For me the popular image of an angst ridden musician rushing to the keyboard and  producing works in a state of tormented passion is just a Hollywood idea. Doesn't happen - not for me anyway - might for other people, I don't know because I don't mix with any musicians.

[dinosaurtales]

Based on my experience and what I have seen, there's no connection between excellent musicianship and being a *good* person.  Musicianship is the result of some basic talent combined with a lot of hard work, just like any other profession.  Can you tell listening to an orchestra which instruments' players are *good*?  Some of the finest musicians I have heard and known are simply awful people - in general and to be around.  They are selfish, rude, mean to others, talk about others behind their backs in a two-faced way, and are very insecure.  But they play just great!  

So my answer is NO.

[Clare]

I know that there was a performance in the seventies or around then of a Scriabin piece for orchestra that included a huge light and colour display based on a number of charts he drew himself along with detailed descriptions. I don't know if this was the Mysterium, or something else he wrote, or whether the performance was a scaled-down version of what he originally had in mind for the Mysterium, but there you go. I saw some of it on a TV show once.

[bernhard]

This is beginning to look and sound more and more like a Maksim performance he he

[trunks]

I would first and foremost be a good human, then a good artist, then a good musician, then a good instrumantalist (pianist in my case)