Who is the music for now?

In 1981 the bass player Tony Halligan used to say, "No matter how well you play, it's just someone's night out." It made a lot of sense then.

Now a "night out" to hear a concert is something that most of us (living in the Americas) can't do. We can pretend to have a night out, and listen to a recorded performance. We can do our best to make watching recorded performances seem like special events, or "nights out." We can participate in scheduled premieres and livestreams, and can feel like we are watching with other people, but this pandemic has taught me that Tony Halligan's words don't really apply anymore. And they may never apply again.

This morning, while I was having a great time practicing some Mazas "artist" etudes, I was thinking that Mazas wrote these for people like me. He wrote them for people who want to have harmonic and melodic experiences on the violin, while playing alone. He wrote them for people who would like to explore aspects of technique, and improve their playing. He also wrote them, clearly, to amuse himself, and to give himself and his students music to practice so that they could grow as musicians.

But music has other purposes too. I made a list this morning. The order is random, and I would hope that someone reading this list might want to add something to it in the comments.

Who (or what) is the music for now?

Music is being written and arranged to connect people over time and space.
Music is written to convey the meaning of words.
Music is written to convey other meanings of groups of words.
Music is written in order to allow us to marvel.
Music is written in order to allow us to escape.
Music is written in order to make us want to dance.
Music is written in order to make us want to sing.

Music helps us mark time, in small ways (like a few minutes or an hour, and in big ways, like an era).
Music helps us organize time.
Music helps inspire visual imagination.
Music helps us imagine a better world.
Music helps us to recognize and embrace the whole range of human emotions.
Music provides a safe way to express the darker sides of our natures.
Music provides a safe way for us to express the hopeful sides of our natures.
Music helps us learn languages that we wouldn't normally speak (or sing).
Music helps us learn about cultures we wouldn't normally encounter in our day-to-day lives.
Music helps us to recognize ways of organizing time we wouldn't normally think of.

Music helps us want to learn about the world.
Music teaches children to sing with their own voices.
Music teaches adults to sing with their own voices.
Music teaches us to listen to ourselves honestly.
Music teaches us to listen to other people honestly.
Music helps people gain confidence when communicating with others.
Music helps us each to seek out, hear, and accept our own authentic and unique voice.

Music helps people remember.
Music sometimes helps people forget.
Music keeps us company.
Music helps connect us to the larger world.
Music helps us realize that the world is vast, even though our circle of relationships may be small.
Music helps us form communities.
Music helps us feel that we belong.
Music helps us grow as instrumentalists, singers, composers, and human beings.
Music gives us pleasure.

Music certainly can entertain us, but I think it is far more important to remember that music offers a way we can interact with our fellow humans, whether we are playing with them or playing for them to listen, once it is safe to play together.

I like to live my musical life thinking that every day of isolation brings us closer to the time when we can take part in a better musical world. So that's why I keep practicing and writing music. I keep reminding myself that this is time I can use to grow as a musician, and the people I meet and play with after we don't have to worry about the virus (because we will all be vaccinated) will never again take the importance of their musical lives for granted.