Klarinet Archive - Posting 000488.txt from 1999/09

From: Audrey Travis <vsofan@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Lecture schedue//re spirituality in music
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 1999 23:07:28 -0400

David Smith wrote:

> Dear Jennifer,
> there is nothing at all wrong with with feeling full of awe at the
> mathematical perfection of our universe. And I certainly do not think it is
> inaccurate to call this a religious feeling. Many of the most spiritual of
> musicians and composers were those who percieved a certain order in the
> world around them and set to create and develop their own worlds in the
> works they wrote and performed.
> Additionally, I feel that religion has certainly gotten a bad name in our
> modern world. We all to often think of machete-armed, scripture- wielding
> fanatics, bent on twisting great teachings to suit their own frenzied
> desires, and forget the spiritual voice that permeates the works of
> composers from Corelli, Bach and Buxtehude to Debussy, Bruch, Ives and
> others; spirituality is not a no-man's land of magic mixed with brimstone,
> but a reality based in the order we have before us.
> I feel some of my most spiritual moments have been in the practice room,
> when I have finally succeeded in imposing an order which transforms notes
> on a page to a phrase which communicates an idea, more or less abstact, but
> is definitely an existent entity, over and above that which represents it on
> paper.
> I get into this stuff too.
> Patty Smith

Dear Patty
Your comments to Jennifer about the depth of spirituality to be discovered in
music are deeply relevant for me. I have been coming to the realization that
my love for the sublime sound of orchestral clarinet is actually fuelled by my
perception that this is the voice which speaks directly to my soul, through
this sound my soul relates to the Supreme Being and this is the sound my soul
wants to sing. For me, it is the essence of prayer and human-divine dialogue.

I had no interest in playing clarinet whatsoever until I realized that every
time I went to hear our orchestra, the Vancouver Symphony, and Wes Foster, our
principal clarinetist played a solo or exposed passage, my heart would skip a
beat at the sheer beauty of sound ushered into the air. Later, as I began to
study with him - what an extraordinary stroke of good fortune that has been!! -
he had me listen to the recordings of Robert Marcellus, his own teacher. It
took me more than a year and a half of contemplation before I understood that
what draws me so profoundly to the unique sound of clarinet in general and the
sound of Robert Marcellus in particular was his amazing ability to make
beautiful music become the sweetest, truest form of prayer, supplication and
loving homage to the Being so much greater than ourselves. Of course, I will
never know what was in Marcellus' mind as he played the music of the Masters,
but soul was certainly there, and soul and spirit are our connection upstairs.

Audrey Travis

> " It is okay to ask why. Just don't stop asking before you get an answer."
>
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