 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: LeOpus1190s
Date: 2004-01-26 18:17
Do you think that taking anti-depressents can also effect a persons playing as well as their mood? I am curious to as if it could possibly hurt ones creativity as a musician. I don't think this has ever been talked of before so it should prove interesting.
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Author: javier garcia m
Date: 2004-01-26 20:15
I took anti depressant between may and november, a weak dosis. I never felt nothing special about playing...but only my personal experience.
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Author: Ralph Katz
Date: 2004-01-26 20:47
I have played with people take anti-depressants. The ones who take them regularly, under doctors' care, for definite medical conditions, seem to do OK performing. Their approach to playing is similar to their approach to their disease, which is to say, there is a methodical long-term commitment on both fronts. They have had ample opportunity to accustom themselves to the medication, to listen and think about any effects the meds have on their playing, and to make adjustments.
On the other hand, I have a couple of friends who spot-medicate themselves to combat performance anxiety. Their playing is different under the medication, my guess because the medication is not part of their normal regimen. Their playing is not bad, per se, but they are not particularly fun to play with when medicated, either.
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Author: Amy
Date: 2004-01-26 21:28
I found that when I started taking anti-depressants my playing improved (perhaps not in the way you are thinking about) because I practised more often. When I was at my lowest point I didn't even bother to get out of bed most days and took a lot of time off school. Most people have the opinion that when you are feeling blue, playing your instrument will make you feel better. But I was so low that I just didn't see the point in picking it up. So in that respect it did affect my playing, yes. But I've never felt that the medication slows me down or anything....is that what you're asking?
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-26 23:24
As someone with some personal experience in this area, I would counsel against anyone with chronic depression attempting to reach a truly "serious" level in any area of music.
A lot of teachers and ensembles would have been happy to cut Amy's playing career off at the knees during her low period. There is a body of decided opinion out there that just doesn't give a damn about the person playing the music.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2004-01-27 00:22
There is a rumor that the newest run of Vandoren reeds will include 10 anti-depressant pills in each box.
One for each reed ... GBK
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Author: Henry
Date: 2004-01-27 01:18
GBK....What gives me the idea that you don't like Vandoren? LOL!!!
Henry
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-27 01:21
(SWK) >> Oh please. The history of the arts could serve as a catalogue of men and women who have suffered with various forms of mental illness. <<
No argument there. I just wonder how much of it had to be that way. The road is littered with destroyed and battered lives. I wonder if anything is gained by their sacrifice if no art, or substandard art (whatever that is), comes from it.
I come from a jazz perspective, where we're apt to lavish a little too much holy absolution on our burnouts, our druggies, our nutjobs. We take them as sad testimony to the power of The Man to mess up geniuses and oddballs (sometimes irrespective of what they actually produced).
Maybe on the classical and/or commercial, working-session-man side, such is regarded merely as the cost of doing business. Oh please.
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Author: wyatt
Date: 2004-01-27 01:38
some have a side effect of dry mouth which can effect your level of play.
bob gardner}ÜJ
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Author: LeWhite
Date: 2004-01-27 04:25
I was very depressed about two years ago, and it effected my playing a lot - I didn't feel like playing at all. I decided to get through it without medication, and it took me a while but I did it.
I believe that depression in artists is true - because we wouldn't be artists if we weren't sensitive. Sensitive people get depressed. I could explain further but I won't, I know others have differing opinions and those who have the same as mine know what I'm talking about.
LeOpus, try the medication - it could be the boost you need to make you happy and to help you get out of the situation that is making you depressed. I know it's hard to make the first move to pull yourself out of it, it's probably the hardest decision for someone who's depressed to make, to want to get better, but you can and you should.
One last piece of advice that someone told me - Your happiness is worth more than your music. Don't put music before your own well-being. Get better, then play again, even if it means taking a break like I did.
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-27 08:55
(SWK) >> Is it being suggested that mental illness is caused by being a musician? <<
It depends on your definition of "being a musician."
I think the unrelenting nature of the craft is more than some people can take. Combine that with a musical gift and a deep need to express it, and one can find oneself in quite a pretty pickle.
Depression and allied disorders require trying lots of different things in the work to Get Better. It isn't easy, a lot of the time, but if something doesn't work, you chalk it up to experience and try something else. It takes a certain faith in your potential and in what may lie around the corner.
Musical achievement requires trying the same thing over and over and over even when you don't get results. (This is sometimes given as a definition of insanity...hmmm...) In a way, that's even harder, because it requires not only faith in your future, but faith in a here-and-now that often doesn't seem too promising.
Post Edited (2004-01-27 08:57)
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Author: Katrina
Date: 2004-01-27 14:26
FWIW, just working on your depression with medication is not the best way to health. The meds ALWAYS work better and more fully if you are also receiving talk therapy. (I'm not a doctor, but my sister's been through the wringer and I've experienced a little bit too)
Katrina
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Author: Lobo
Date: 2004-01-27 15:11
In my personal experience, taking anti-depressants definitely helped my playing. I was less anxious about my playing (Most anti-depressants are also anti-anxiety drugs.) and my reaction time seemed to improve. It can easily be seen how both effects would improve one's ability to play.
For those of you who have never needed to take anti-depressants, they do not affect your personality or your perception of the world. They don't make you a different person or turn you into an emotional zombie. They don't make you light-headed or giddy or high. They do help you to handle the world in a more realistic manner.
Although I believe that taking anti-depressants can, in at least some instances, improve one's playing, I do not advocate seeking them out for this or any other purpose other than those they are intended for. On the other hand, if your physician prescribes them to treat depression, you should not be overly concerned about their affect on your musicianship.
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Author: Ralph Katz
Date: 2004-01-27 16:06
If you have a medical condition that requires treatment, it doesn't matter whether you are a musician, bricklayer, soldier, stay-at-home parent, or anything else. The bottom line is you can't work without treatment, and can work with treatment.
Amy's point is well taken in that regard.
And it shouldn't make any difference to your teachers or fellow musicians. If they have no empathy for your situation, it says bad things about them, not you.
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Author: BobD
Date: 2004-01-27 17:19
I found the reference to "the Blues" interesting. In the Twenties hearing about having the Blues was quite common parlance but we don't hear that term much these days with reference to depression or feeling down.
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Author: JMcAulay
Date: 2004-01-27 22:32
SWK has made some sound comments. Many other comments, although experiential, are too individual to use as generalizations. Clinical depression is an individual disease, affecting different people in different ways, with no "one size fits all" therapy for relief.
If you have clinical depression, you likely will not be able to play well, just as you will not be able to do anything else well, even though you may think you can. If you are properly medicated, your normal functioning may be essentially restored, although severe depression may not respond as well.
With proper diagnosis of clinical depression and proper medication (and perhaps other therapy), you will be more like your real self, and there is every reason why you should play that way.
Regards,
John
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Author: john gibson
Date: 2004-01-28 00:52
I grew up in the 60's....Berkeley California.....the stuff available at the time that I took...well.... was a pro drummer..double bass....four toms on top...
two floors on each side....not to mention....six cymbals and a hidden hi-hat... and can tell you.....drugs make a difference....One day....me and the band took some "illicit" stuff.....and man....I felt like my bass drums were nothing more than big wheels of cheese....and the cymbals were just "dead"..SO......yeah....no matter if the drugs are legal or from the street......they'll affect the way you play and what you hear.....
Sorry to those not familiar with the ways of the "times back then"......
but then again.....can I tell you stories about the days with Country Joe....
Janis....The Airplane....Eddie Money....and any number of bands that I was hanging with in the Bay Area......
Bottom line....drugs do weird things to your perception.....
JG
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-28 01:50
So does depression. It may be natural, but it's not healthy.
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Author: msloss
Date: 2004-01-28 12:50
Look's like JG's been using his clarinet as a bong again.
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Author: Amy
Date: 2004-01-28 16:15
But maybe the drugs John Gibson took have stronger effects than the legal anti-depressants prescribed by doctors.
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Author: Brenda
Date: 2004-01-28 17:12
If your system isn't out of balance any drug will throw you off. Don't try to compare the illicit use of drugs with properly prescribed medication for a specific condition. Any proper medication is a must if a person wishes to live a normal life because the medical condition is throwing his life off. And why some would say that a properly medicated person shouldn't try to be professional is beyond comprehension.
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Author: Henry
Date: 2004-01-28 17:26
Brenda says "And why some would say that a properly medicated person shouldn't try to be professional is beyond comprehension." I'm not sure who would say (or has said) that but I fully agree. I would even expand on that. Even an improperly medicated person should try to be professional.
Henry
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-28 20:57
I guess I caused the confusion when I wrote that a chronically depressed person shouldn't get their hopes up about becoming a "serious" musician.
I certainly didn't mean someone whose depression is responding positively to treatment and who understands what kind of life commitment treatment AND music will require. This can sometimes be a very unforgiving field, and before you get involved in it, you obviously have to get to the point in your own emotional life where you are resilient and stable enough not to make a lot of excuses for yourself.
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Author: Brenda
Date: 2004-01-29 03:34
This is true, and thanks for the clarification. As you say, the music field isn't always very nice and you need to be able to bouce back from disappointments. We have some family and friends with variations of depression and we see how important the meds PLUS the talk therapy (and diet, etc.) is for these people for leading a happier life. They can be amazingly talented, imaginative and pleasant people once they're brought back into balance.
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Author: Mark Pinner
Date: 2004-01-29 10:24
"Don't try to compare the illicit use of drugs with properly prescribed medication for a specific condition. Any proper medication is a must if a person wishes to live a normal life because the medical condition is throwing his life off. "
A "must", I doubt it. If most people took the trouble to read the full information sheets that are available for most medications they wouldn't bother. Have a look at the beneficial effects of control groups taking placebos. The results from the control groups are often not far behind those taking the actual drugs, this is known as the "placebo effect". I am sure there are some sure fire cures out there, penicillin maybe, but psychiatric/psychotropic drugs are a fairly dangerous area of medicine. They are generally make users extremely reliant, lithium for example, they do little to fix the underlying cause and their effectiveness is debatable.
Another approach for depression, or even performance anxiety, may be some form of cognitive behaviour therapy in which case treatment by a psychologist is more in order than treatment by a psychiatrist which is generally pharmaceutically driven.
Most people use illicit drugs to get off their faces or have fun, the rights or wrongs are open to debate. The use of drugs, either pharmaceutical or illicit, to treat psychological problems raises some issues. The main problem is that drugs only mask the problem and often create a whole new raft of problems on their own. Always remember LSD began its life as a pharmaceutical drug; it has been widely used in the artistic gambit for both recreational and creative uses.
I have been in the music industry all of my working life and have seen the effects of both scenarios and neither is particularly desirable.
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Author: Lobo
Date: 2004-01-29 14:52
Mark, I don't think anyone is advocating the use of illicit drugs or, for that matter, unprescribed drugs. Nor have we been discussing psychotropic drugs such as lithium. The discussion is about modern antidepressants such as Prozac, Wellbutrin, Paxil, Zoloft, etc. and then, only when prescribed by a physician or psychiatrist.
Usually, when these are first prescribed, the patient also undertakes some course of therapy as well.
These drugs, contrary to what you state, do not make the users "extremely reliant," nor are they addictive. As I stated earlier, they do not make you high or change your personality. They act by blocking the reuptake of seratonin, a chemical normally produced in the brain, a chemical that those with clinical depression produce less of than the normal person does. In effect, it helps bring the seratonin up to normal levels. The net result is that they improve a person's mood. They simply allow some people to function more normally in the world.
As you continue to traverse the music world or any other part of the world, I doubt that you will be able to distinguish those using prescribed antidepressants from "normal" people. In fact, you probably encounter many that you are unaware of during the course of you day. The only time you might be able to perceive that someone is using antidepressants is if you notice that someone you knew previously to be commonly depressed, obsessive-compulsive or anxious has become less depressed, obsessive-compulsive or anxious.
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Author: JMcAulay
Date: 2004-01-29 16:59
Re depression vs serious musicianship:
Anybody else around here remember Oscar Levant? He suffered almost constantly from what then were described as severe neuroses -- today, a diagnosis of clinical depression or bipolar disorder might seem more appropriate. Whatever the cause, he lived almost constantly with a tortured mind. This was long before the medications available today had been imagined. He took those that were available to him and was hospitalized several times for addiction.
On the other hand, as a pianist and close friend of George Gershwin, he was considered the top interpreter of Gershwin for over twenty years. He played in concert under many of the greatest conductors of his day and in several motion pictures. At one time in his career, he was the highest-paid concert artist in the US. Playing from memory, more than once he became lost while performing and had to begin again or was "crutched" by the director, yet he almost always drew great applause. He was a film actor, Broadway conductor, radio talk-show host, television performer, and author of three books. His compositions include a number of film scores as well as piano, string, and orchestral works.
I used to appreciate Oscar Levant greatly. After all, if he could make it in the world, I had a chance.
Do what you can, right now, with what you have.
Regards,
John
"There is a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line."
-- Oscar Levant
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-29 17:16
I don't think Oscar could have made it today. Professionalism has reached too high a level. We're all jaded by perfection.
"The perfect is the enemy of the good," they say. Well, it's also the enemy of the great, the near-great, the unique, and the interestingly flawed.
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Author: Carmen
Date: 2004-01-29 20:52
Hey James,
Are you talking about side effects from drugs? Or Basic subtle things. Zoloft has made my hands shake from time to time, and occasionally caused a little more tension in the facial muscles and breath. Similar drugs may do the same. Just make sure you check out the side effects of your drug and then see how they can relate to your playing
***...so do all who seen such times, but that is not for them to decide. All you can do is decide what to do with the time that is given to you.***
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Author: Carmen
Date: 2004-01-29 20:53
...As far as mood, as long as you know what you are doing with your music, and pedagogical fundamentals and always aware, nothing can too harmful. So...all I have to say is be aware of whats happening to you.
***...so do all who seen such times, but that is not for them to decide. All you can do is decide what to do with the time that is given to you.***
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Author: Carol Dutcher
Date: 2004-01-30 04:46
I take Prozac and have for a couple of years. I don't know if it has affected my clarinet playing but at least I got rid of the murderous impulses whenever I was around the accordion player.
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Author: JMcAulay
Date: 2004-01-30 16:01
paulwi, I cannot agree with your last post. If you are speaking for yourself, that's fine. But "we" haven't all become "jaded by perfection" by any means. To me, anyone jaded by perfection is going to languish around nit-picking, failing to enjoy almost anything. I've enjoyed maybe two performances in my lifetime that were "perfect,", but I've also enjoyed thousands of others that weren't.
As for the general public's ability to tolerate (and even adore) weirdness, I offer Michael Jackson and Ozzy Osbourne just for starters. The list does go on and on.
My view is that Oscar Levant would go over well today. Of course, I'm prejudiced: I liked the guy. Sure, I could be wrong, and we'll never know.
Regards,
John
Opinions are like noses. Everybody has one, and some smell better than others
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Author: paulwl
Date: 2004-01-30 20:59
DGMW, John - I like Oscar too. He brightened up (all right, maybe that's not the word :-) ) any movie he appeared in. I just can't see such a flake getting past the first round of an audition or competition today, however talented. At best he'd be a kind of David Helfgott figure, pitied more than respected.
Post Edited (2004-01-30 21:04)
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