Performance as Rare Privilege

I’m much less a performing artist than I was in an earlier part of my life; I took some years off from performing and, when I returned, I had decided for sure that I would play only when I wanted, how I wanted, what I wanted. No more gigging for money. So nowadays preparing a concert has all of the excitement, mystery, and just plain BIGNESS that it once had and then lost. I’m keenly looking forward to playing a public recital; it seems like a very big deal because it isn’t something I do all the time.

Which is the greatest gift of all. How could I have forgotten what a privilege it is to make music for an audience? What a responsibility? What a joy? (What a terror?) The whole thing had become humdrum; oh, yes, it went fine well you know it was just a concert you know, do them all the time, no big deal you.

But it is a big deal. It is a very big deal. It’s an act of sharing, of communication that extends across cultures and races and countries and time. I communicate with the past (no-longer-living composers and their eras), with the present (current composers with whom I’ve worked, and the audience for whom I’m playing, not to mention me myself), and the future (if I put recordings out there that we can hear years from now.) The opportunity to do this is denied to most folks; the talent is insufficient or perhaps just the exigencies of living have made it impractical, or impossible, to spend this kind of creative time.

I can do it, however — in fact, it’s one of the things I’m expected to do, although I don’t make a living at it any more. My living comes from teaching primarily and some extra cash from writing. So my own creative work, both of the original variety and of the re-creative variety, can be something I offer without charge and with expectation of personal gain. (To be sure, my concert on December 9 charges admission, but that’s for the school, and not for me.)

Therefore: a bit nervous, on edge, anticipatory, looking-forward-to, dreading, hoping to do well, feeling confident that I will do well because I’m a good player and I’m extremely well prepared for this concert. But there isn’t the slightest thing humdrum about it, at least not to my mind.

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