“Spirit Garden” is the title of an
orchestral composition by Toru Takemitsu. It is also the name of one of his cds
which contains an incredible collection of some of his greatest works. The
following thoughts were inspired by listening to this cd.
“Little
children remember, but only a few, and down they forgot as up they grew” – e.e. cummings
I think I
nearly forgot—forgot that what attracted me to music in the first place was its
power to alter my state (of consciousness/of awareness). The kind of music did
not matter, it could have been jazz, or classical, or pop, or later, the music
of the East; what did matter, was something quite intangible and subjective, it
was whether the music touched something in me—opened some place—where everything
was beautiful and made sense. Life has never made sense to me…
I have always
known that it is the silence behind the music that gives music the power to
transform my state. Music is beautiful; doing music can be a beautiful thing;
but it is silence that I have always loved. What is silence? I am not speaking
about merely the absence of sound; it is not the rests in music notation; nor
is silence the canvas on which sounds are painted; silence is the very soul of
sound—silence is sounds’ inner most dweller. Sound can be the messenger of
silence when sound is aware of and experiences the silence within itself.
There is a
story about a Perfect Master who favored a certain disciple—much to the
consternation of His other disciples. One day they approached the Master and
asked him why. He indicated that he would answer their question and promptly
removed a magnificent gold ring incrusted with precious jewels from his finger.
“What is the value of this ring?” he asked them. They replied that they did not
know, saying that they knew nothing of such things, but, if the Master would allow
them to, they would bring an expert to appraise the ring. The Master agreed,
and an expert was brought, and the ring was appraised for some astronomic
amount.
The Master
then called the ‘favored’ disciple into the room. He had not been privy to the
previous conversations. The Master gave him the ring and asked him its value.
Without any hesitation he answered, “Like this, off your finger, it is worthless,
on your finger, priceless!”
Silence is
the Master and music is the ring on the Master’s finger.
The music of
Toru Takemitsu not only reminds me, but inspires me to experience that silence
and that state of transformation that I have always found priceless. Was Toru
Takemitsu aware that music can be the messenger of silence? He speaks of
silence often in his writings and conversations. One of his books is titled,
“Confronting Silence.”
When the
casual listener listens to music it is melody and rhythm that creates a path
for them to follow through the music. Toru Takemitsu’s music also has melody
and rhythm, as well as harmony and dynamics. But the melodies of Takemitsu are
not the tune-like melodies most
listeners of classical, jazz, and pop music are familiar with, neither are his use
of rhythms, harmonies, like those found in more familiar musical forms.
Without the
familiar paths, many people feel at a loss to be able to follow, let alone
appreciate the music of Toru Takemitsu…
Consider an
artist who squirts ink into some container, then presses a piece of paper into
the ink, and then pulls it away. What do think? It this art?
The best
answer I ever heard to this question came from one of my students. Without
hesitating he said, “I would have to see it.” Indeed…
Andre
Segovia once said, “What the world does not need is another guitar player—what the
world does need are musicians and artists who happen to play the guitar.” The
guitar players works from the outside in. He is like a conductor that follows,
rather than, leads the orchestra.
A musician
works from the inside out. He is like a conductor who hears the music inside
himself and finds the way to express it through the orchestra. An artist, not
only creates music, he creates art—his music is art. Art has the power to
transform the listener’s state, to wake the listener from his dream of life
into the dream of that which is beyond life—the divine dream that ends in the
experience of real silence.
