Spirit and Music Part 2

_W. H. Hadow_

It may be interesting for a little s.p.a.ce to consider the conditions under which Inspiration operates, for, like any other faculty, it is subject to the control of law. We have already emphasised the universality of vibration and the call of like to like, but the theme will bear some further elaboration.

We adventure into the study of sound and its laws and we find that all sounds are propagated by means of waves. These proceed in circular fashion, as do the ripples upon the still surface of a lake into which a stone has been thrown. Further, these waves are of differing rates.

Middle C, on the piano, for instance, is made by waves that reach us at the rate of about 256 per second. As sound travels roughly at 1,100 feet to the second, it is clear that the wave of this note is something over four feet from crest to crest. The wave of a note an octave higher would be double the rate and half the length. In addition to this there may be big waves and little waves travelling at the same rate, and also the actual shape of the waves may differ very widely. Thus waves have points of similarity and yet their infinite variety, as do human beings.

This variety in the shape of the waves results in the difference in timbre between various tones. n.o.body could fail to distinguish between the sound of a note played on a penny whistle and the same note given out on a violin or a cornet: yet the actual rate of wave would be the same in each case. The reason is that no tone is a pure fundamental tone, there are always super-added a number of other tones, termed the overtones. These are, to the original tone, exactly what the flavouring is to the pudding. You have your fundamental tone and you can add your overtones to taste: you can flavour with the penny whistle, the violin, or the cornet timbre to suit yourself. But according to the flavouring, so is the shape of the wave. Isolated fundamental tones are apt to be colourless and monotonous, like the diapason work on an organ. The organist is able to flavour his fundamental tone at will, by the stops he draws to add to it: he has a special supply of "mixtures" which sound truly dreadful and impossible by themselves, but these in combination with the fundamental go to the making of a successful timbre. Carrots, by themselves, are not a Christmas diet, but we understand that they go to improve the flavour of the festive pudding.

In some such way as this thoughts are tuned, and from the thoughts we think, the desires we entertain, and the aspirations which fill our souls, the timbre of our life is determined. No one is fundamentally and wholly good or bad, we have all of us our overtones, and some of us have very curious mixtures which go to make us what we are. But just as the gramophone will take in all the wonderful complexity of sound waves which are sent out by a whole orchestra of instruments, and will combine these into one wavy line on the record--a kind of compound wave containing "all the elements so mixed"--so also it is with ourselves.

All the thought elements are so mixed in us that as we go through life we vibrate to a note that is unique, compounded as it is of all those inner thoughts and emotions that are so exclusively our own. To those who sound the same note, or one that is in harmony, we are akin. We meet them for the first time, and in a moment we have known them for years, perhaps always: we play unison or harmony in our sympathetic attunement.

On the other hand, sounding our persistent middle C on our little journey, perhaps we come up against an equally insistent C sharp: excellent notes, each of them--yet there promises but doubtful harmony.

Keep to your own key, and be happy.

Whatever note we sing is an invisible, and yet most potent, influence in our lives. We may deem that our thoughts do not matter overmuch, and that it is only deeds that count. Heresy and mistake. Thoughts make us or mar us. Sympathy ensures that we are surrounded and encompa.s.sed by that which we ourselves attract. There is a law of consonance, and we are responsible for things in a way that but few realise. This note we sing, this mirror of our personality, this invisible force attracts our friends: change the note--the personality--and we inevitably alter the friendships which were determined thereby. This same note selects the clothes we wear, the things we eat, it chooses the books we read and the avocations we pursue. It is reflected in the pictures on our walls, and in the furniture which decorates our rooms. It determines the prospects which are before us, just as it has attracted the appropriate difficulties and trials that we have left behind. It marries us, and eventually it buries us. Sometimes our overtones of desires or greed inter us long before our lease of life is due to expire. But perhaps most important of all, it determines and selects the Inspiration we are able to receive.

Thoughts of every kind beat upon our minds, as the waves lap the seash.o.r.e, but we are only able to respond to those that call and awaken some sympathetic answer within us. The heart that is pure can live in an ocean of impurity, and yet remain unsullied: but the character with anger implanted within will find that anger blazing out in echo and answer to a hundred provocations a day. Hatred means nothing, in temptation or response, to a heart overflowing with love. Thus this attunement is at once an avenue for our a.s.sault, or our sure shield of defence, according as its note determines. A low tone is an ever-present danger, and a high one a permanent safeguard.

Inspiration is therefore only possible to us at our own level, and unless we are mentally attuned to a high note the inspiration itself will reach no lofty measure. It is true that a mood of exaltation, of earnest prayer or aspiration, may enable us to catch a glimpse of the higher vision, but under these circ.u.mstances it is apt to be elusive and fragmentary. The condition of any permanent influx is that the attunement should be habitually and continuously lofty. When this condition is at length reached we are not so very far from that "prayer without ceasing," which most truly means "the practice of the presence of G.o.d."

The avenue of inspiration is the subconscious part of the mind, that part of us which in fact const.i.tutes the greater self. In ordinary life this department of mind is more or less shielded by the consciousness.

It would retain the permanent impress of every idea it came across, were it not that the consciousness off-hand and summarily rejects a number of impressions which might otherwise prove detrimental. One man calls another a fool, but this one knows very well that he is nothing of the kind, and so the idea carries very little weight in its record on the subconscious. On the other hand, if there were no protective mechanism of this nature, the subconscious might very well accept the statement and believe that its owner certainly was the fool he had been dubbed.

The effect, therefore, of consciousness is thus to limit and reduce this sensitiveness and susceptibility of the subconscious part of mind.

As the consciousness pa.s.ses out of action, as in dream states, brown studies, and in the induced sleep of hypnosis, this sensitiveness and activity of the subconscious gradually emerges. The normal sleep, or as Iamblichus calls it--"The night-time of the body"--is, to continue his remark, "the day-time of the soul." Thus it is so often in the Bible stories that we find the phrase--"The Lord--or the Angel of the Lord--appeared, in a dream." These waves of thought and Inspiration are continually lapping the margin of our subconscious selves, both by day and by night, leaving the dream-traces of their impress as the ripple leaves its marks upon the sand. It is the connection between this under-mind and the consciousness that is so frequently at fault, so that we remain unaware of the tidings. Usually the consciousness is kept so busily engaged that it never has a minute to itself, and so peace, quiet, and receptivity are unknown. The subconscious tries hard to get in its modest word occasionally and edgeways, but the consciousness rarely stops talking: the whole business is one-sided. Plenty of material goes from the consciousness to the subconscious, but comparatively little is able to come in the reverse direction.

This, of course, is a distorted method of existing: there should ever be in the mind a process corresponding to the in-breathing and out-breathing of the lungs. The active and acquisitive consciousness procures the mental food: the subconscious stores this up, a.s.similates it, and turns it into a kind of inner mentor or conscience which in due course issues its orders and offers its advice. But just as we are said to stifle the "still, small voice," so also do we strangle our possible inventions and discoveries, and so do we cause our inspirations to remain still-born. This is the price we pay for our mad rush after the things that do not matter. We have said that no aspirant ever lacks a teacher, but we would further say that when a person is content to make use of the subconscious powers he possesses, he will find that the knowledge and the inspiration he earnestly seeks will be granted him.

"With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, we see into the heart of things."[10] The acorn is already in the garden of the mind, we need only to provide the requisite conditions for growth, and the oak tree will then follow as a matter of course.

[Note 10: Wordsworth.]

Things grow and fashion themselves in this under-mind, as the novelist and dramatist will testify. The artist finds his picture forming itself before his inner vision, and so the musician hears his composition. "It comes," they say: so does the oak. But like the oak it can only come when conditions allow, and one of the main conditions is that the consciousness should not rule the roost, and hold sway and dominance to the exclusion and smothering of the still, small voice. "Be still, and know."

Many things and conditions clog communication from the under-mind to the consciousness. The well-being of the body is of the utmost importance: a clogged and constipated body is no medium for inspiration. High living kills the genius of inspiration, and masterpieces are more often produced in the garret than where luxury rules. Success is an even greater test of true genius than is poverty. A bilious attack will put a stop to the most perfervid outpourings of genius, and a common cold in the nose will play havoc with a work of Art. An unstable temperament will have its moments of exaltation and its hours of despair: this is sensitiveness uncontrolled. Sensitiveness is indeed the stock-in-trade of all who work in the temple of Art, but unless it be controlled by reins of more than ordinary strength it is a very doubtful blessing. We must ever be able to keep our souls in tune so that they afford no echo to the undesirable. Indulgence of the body in any form hampers its work as an instrument of the spirit, while self-discipline (tho' by no means to the verge of asceticism) increases its sensitiveness, and occasional quiet periods afford the opportunity for the subconscious treasures to reveal themselves.

On the mental side, selfishness is one of the most complete and effectual deadeners of inspiration. The delicate intimations of finer things can make no impression on a hide-bound mind. As Trine somewhere puts it--"The man who is always thinking of himself generally looks as if he were thinking of something disagreeable." The self-centred mind is a mind closed to other things, and to this extent it is nearly always unbalanced and distorted. Under these conditions such inspiration as it may receive is liable to be of an uncouth and bizarre nature. Hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness tune the mind to very undesirable levels, and at this level it will come in touch with the whole body of similar undesirable thought that is circulating around it. It both gives out and receives. Such a mind is indeed doing active work in the world, but in the wrong direction. Nevertheless, the individual who sets himself to work positively and constructively to utilise inspiration, as it a.s.suredly may be used, is in some degree helping his generation and becoming a prophet, and maybe a saviour.

CHAPTER VI

THE INTERPRETER

"I like joy, for it is life. I preach joy, for it alone gives the power of creating useful and lasting work"

_Jaques Dalcroze_

There are, roughly speaking, three cla.s.ses of interpreters in Music: performers or executants, composers, and teachers. The function of each of these is, by a special sensitiveness, to apprehend the message of spirit, and then, by their own technique and in their own particular way, to pa.s.s it on for the benefit of others. In the body the nervous system, which is the link between spirit and matter, serves somewhat the same purpose. Spirit is too tenuous to be able to act directly upon the comparatively inert matter of the body, but through the medium of the brain and nervous system it makes contact with spirit at the one end, and at the other the nerves control the muscular system, which effects the necessary and desired movements. Thus the spirit in music is sensed by the artist in solitude and communion, and is given out by him to the mult.i.tude in public.

The artist thus necessarily has two sides to his work, the inner and the outer, the artistic and the technical. No amount of technique alone will ever make an artist, nor will artistic or spiritual perception by itself enable the message to secure adequate treatment. Both sides are indispensable. But there has been far too much worship of mere technique in Music, until at times even the fact that there has been any message at all has been overlooked. In times, happily now gone by, a simple melody which perhaps by itself might have conveyed a homely message, has been smothered under showers of variations, decked out in wearisome arpeggios, and entangled in meaningless scales, until it has reminded one of nothing so much as a vulgar and greatly over-dressed woman: and yet this has been looked upon as music. Technique is indeed necessary, but only as a means to an end. Directly it begins to obscure the meaning, or is developed for its own sake without reference to its task, it is missing the mark. It puts itself on a par with the stupidity that leads a man to undertake to play the piano for twenty-four hours without stopping.

So many hours' scales per diem would be warranted to drive the spirit of music to distraction: the utmost perfection in scales does not of necessity lead to any illuminating message. It cannot be too strongly urged that the feeling and the emotion are the real things, and that the object of technique is simply that these may be expressed in the best and most intelligible manner. Indeed the artist himself is secondary in importance to the message, it is the spirit that works in and through him that must ever come first. The true artist never seeks to obtrude, or to make his own personality the first thing. He will, of course, endeavour to make his technique fully equal to all demands that can be made of him, but he will realise that he is doing his work in trust. "No MAN ever did any great work yet: he became a free channel through which the eternal powers moved."[11] In thus working the artist shines, as does the electric bulb, by reason of the unlimited power which according to his own measure may flow through him: and this limitless power may be relied upon to secure its own effect, if only the steward be faithful.

[Note 11: Newlandsmith. "The Temple of Art."]

Contrast the work done in this spirit with that accomplished under the stimulus of financial gain, or for the end of mere selfish display. The latter is a species of artistic prost.i.tution. Superficially the performances may seem something alike, the difference may be intangible, but it exists and is real. Time is ever the winnower. Things always prove their survival value, that is to say the real things last, while the shams are sooner or later extinguished. It is necessary, no doubt, to make a living, no one will be so foolish as to overlook this elementary fact: but the mere aim of making a living only too often obscures the actual meaning of life. Balanced and informed views of life work, through a law of consonance, to ensure a corresponding equilibrium in the outer circ.u.mstances: in other words, if we seek first the inner Kingdom, all these things, financial means and so forth, will be added.

But there are thousands who drive for the financial and other incidental ends, and as a matter of fact miss the Kingdom entirely. To find the personal centre of gravity in the world is to master life, to fail to find it is to be mastered by life.

A performance that has self as its central motive can never ring true or achieve any lasting success. Inferior music may be decked out by a capable performer to sound impressive or pretentious, or be invested with a glamour which is largely fict.i.tious, but this surely amounts to false pretences. It is simply a method of misleading the public. Such a performer has misconceived his function, which should be to act as interpreter, guide, philosopher, and friend to those who follow his efforts. What is to be said to the singer of royalty ballads? Here is a vocalist who receives, maybe, two or three guineas for each dozen times he sings particular songs, the publisher of the song in question being his paymaster. Of this type of song a contemporary Musical Journal states:--"Every serious musician knows it, and, scenting the boredom, tries to avoid it. It is highly sentimental, it moves within a limited scope, emotionally and technically, and it deals with a few well-worn subjects. Gardens, spring, sunshine, flowers--these are favourite themes. If only, the singer tells us, he could have a cottage on the hillside, with honeysuckle round the door (this appears to be of great importance), heaven would indeed be there." These MAY be compositions of artistic worth, in which case financial gain and true musical interest consort together: but on the other hand they may NOT. Which, then, is to receive the first consideration? Is the artist to refuse the guineas because the ballad possesses no intrinsic worth, or is he to pocket the cash and deck out with all the devices of his Art the twopenny-ha'penny shop-tune, and make it sound something like the real thing? No doubt under these circ.u.mstances the song may achieve a certain measure of appreciation. Some of the audience will buy it, and only when they come to try it at home will they realise what feeble stuff it truly is. The artist has been paid to betray those who trusted in him and followed his taste. In this he may have been eminently successful, but what is the value of such success? And what of Art--and Music?

Wherein is the particular glory of a top note, or the specific value of a compa.s.s that extends a note-and-a-half beyond that of anyone else? Why should it be considered meritorious to be able to bang louder or to scramble more quickly over the keys than one's compet.i.tors? Yet we have certainly met singers and players who gloried in such accomplishments. A performer may also know every device and trick of the trade, he may be well aware of what will go down with his audience, he may play up to all their little foibles and weaknesses and give them exactly what they want: we can indeed scarcely quarrel with this. But so many are apparently content to allow the matter to remain on this lowly level. A singer who is thus able to play upon his audience and hold them in his grip can surely also lead them up to the appreciation of better things.

An audience is normally receptive and impressionable, they come expecting to receive satisfaction and enjoyment for the money they have expended in the purchase of a ticket, or because they have some other interest in the proceedings. Presumably if they were not interested they would not be there. This element of expectation stimulates their receptivity, and aids the performer in his work of giving out. Whatever the audience receives, by the mere fact of its making some impression on the delicate nerve-stuff of the brain, is retained and becomes actually a part of them. Thus the artist is definitely building the minds of his audience: he is forming their taste, and giving them that material in mind which will enable them to enjoy and understand music the better for the future. He is pa.s.sing on the message according to his ability.

Therefore that individual who is merely seeking for compa.s.s, technique, press notices, or his fee, shows that he has not appreciated the elements of his task. Being thus in search of all the things that really do not matter, he is putting himself into a position that will ensure him a more or less comfortable mediocrity, provide he is lucky enough to escape actual failure.

We call to mind a press criticism that appeared in a first-cla.s.s London daily newspaper, with reference to a singer quite unknown to fame. It stated that "every note was pure joy." Could one say anything finer than this, and would not anything added to it but serve to spoil it? It epitomises what we have here been endeavouring to express. There could be no "pure joy" apart from spirit, and in giving this forth in song the singer achieved the aim of Art. This joy would become part of the life of those who heard her, because it can never be too clearly understood that we are built of our memories, and though we seem to forget, yet these memories are absolute. So the joy that the singer gave out went to gladden the world, and that which she gave, paradoxically enough, remained with her. That which we express, by the record of that expression we tend to become.

Herein the personality of the interpreter counts for much. The music, it is true, carries its own meaning and message, but this is reinforced by the mediumship and the imagination of the performer. "Imagination is the life of art. Why so many performers give such little pleasure and leave the audience coldly critical is simply because their imagination is of the feeblest."[12] Necessarily there is always a certain coloration from the mind which transmits the message, just as the tones of two violins though played by the same hand might be different. Moreover, as a resonant instrument would amplify the sound and an inferior one would hamper it, so a greater artist would interpret a message to more effect than one less capable. The gramophone will give us the actual notes of the singer, but it depends upon ourselves as to whether we catch the real thing or not. What is actually there is the sh.e.l.l: there is no personality unless we ourselves build up that personality of the singer in our imagination. We must supply that which the machine lacks, or else perforce go without. When the artist is present in person we need no effort of the imagination, and though the machine can give us a personal rendering it can never offer us the personality. In much the same way the mechanical piano-player may give So-and-so's exact rendering if only we follow the requisite directions, but it is impossible for it to be the same. Two things seem alike, but one is stuffed, and the other hollow.

[Note 12: Lancelot, in the "Referee."]

Personality, then, must always be a vital factor since it colours and vitalises, as well as reinforces the meaning of the music. Spirit is a fact, but a beautiful personality will invest it with all the glamour of romance. The emotion may be "pure joy" but it needs a warm heart to give it out to full effect to a coldish world. Consequently, for the beauty to shine through, the artist's personality must be finely wrought. A selfish soul might sing a love-song, but a woman would not be taken in by it--unless she thought twice: it would not ring true enough. Beauty lies in the heart of all worthy music, so the artist who studies it and lives in its atmosphere gradually builds that beauty into the life and the character: the mere expression henceforth makes it part of him through memory. So, beautiful thoughts are needful food to the mind of the artist, and no amount of cleverness in the simulation of this or that emotion will ever enable the same effect to be produced, as when beauty is reinforced by beauty. Personality counts beyond all calculation.

The music that is written shows whether its composer was an artist or a mechanic in music. "The spirit of anything which a man makes, or does, is his nature expressed in those things, and the fineness or poorness of his work and actions depends upon the way in which he feels or thinks."[13] The academic writer, steeped in his contrapuntal devices and harmonic progressions, so intent upon the orthodox resolution of his discords, is apt to produce excellent dry bones without the informing spirit. We have even heard it stated that no music publisher would deign to consider for publication a song ma.n.u.script with Mus. Doc. on the t.i.tle page. Yet Parry's books of "English Lyrics" stand as permanent testimony that scholarly music may also contain the emotional and spiritual elements to infuse it with abundant life: the pity is that the combination is none too frequent. "A vast proportion of what is printed and sold as music... is meaningless, and therefore worthless."[14] Such music as is composed, or selected, for popular consumption is frankly written for this purpose of pot-boiling, and as such it settles its own fate. We need waste no tears upon it. Nor need we devote much consideration to the sentimental ballads issued by the hundred, for "if music has no further function than to appeal to the emotions, then it is nothing better than melodious nonsense."[15] Of the dance and other miscellaneous music issued broadcast some, no doubt, is genuine music, but the greater part of it is avowedly commercial in tone and intention: in any spiritual scale its weight is of the lightest.

[Note 13: Leigh Henry. "Music."]

[Note 14: Sir Henry Hadow.]

[Note 15: Sir Henry Hadow.]

The interpreter who works in collaboration with others, the choral singer or the orchestral performer, should be bound by the same canons of Art as the soloist. A chorus does not merely consist of a certain number of voices, any more than eleven football players const.i.tute a team. Even the footballers must have their technique and must play with their heads as well as their feet: but to ensure success they must individually have subordinated their personal interests to that of the team, they must play in the spirit of the game. Equally so a choral singer must first have the vocal ability, then the intelligence, and furthermore the spiritual vision. His individual aims must also be subordinated in "team play," so that collectively, as individually in the case of the soloist, the purport of the music may find its due expression.

The one point to be emphasised is that, in whatever capacity the exponent and interpreter of Art be concerned, the paramount consideration must be the transmission of the artistic impulse. People do not send telegrams flying about the country except for the purpose of conveying a message: in the absence of a message there is, naturally, no telegram. It would be a step in the right direction if it were generally recognised that Art-work should be based upon somewhat the same substantial and bed-rock foundation.

CHAPTER VII

THE TEACHER

"The teachers of this country have its future in their hands"

_William James_