Discomfort Revelry

Music is traditionally made up of melodies and harmonies; thirds and diminished triads and ostinatos. Lately, though, my friends have been ignoring tradition. They have been pushing the boundaries of music in a way that is both confusing and exciting.

In recent weeks I have been asked to become a more active audience member, sitting behind or above the performers to change my perspective: to become more intimate with the music.  I have attended a sound installation in which the building in which it was performed was also an instrument. I have seen a pianist and a dancer perform silence and discovered silence does not exist. I have watched a life-size chess game in which the location of the pieces dictated the notes being played.  I have listened to the sounds of vegetables.

These performances are theatrical. Sometimes I don’t understand them, or get the point, but they always make me think. These pieces toe the line between music and performance art, which is where the confusion and excitement comes in.

All these performances were written by musicians, so I want to call them music. But if my friends in the theatre department had written any of these I would call them theatre. So what am I to do? I, who like so many in our society, want things to be compartmentalized and categorized in neat little boxes with color-coded tabs.

The answer? I should allow myself to revel in my discomfort.

We should push boundaries and wonder why we differentiate between genres and types of art. We should ask ourselves why a musical chess game hasn’t been played before. We should start to recognize the music in a construction site.

Art—all art—touches the soul in a way arbitrary explanations cannot. There is a reason we are moved by painting, sculpture, music, theatre, movement, images. There is a reason we say, “Words can’t describe it. You just have to experience it for yourself.” The spiritual level and questioning reached through performance, either as participant or observer, is the closest to heaven we will find on earth.

I am grateful to be surrounded by people willing to question and to push. It is a privilege to attend their masterpieces. They force me to reevaluate my own artistic choices, challenging me to think more creatively, to look at things in a new way. It is slowly seeping into all my choices, “creative” or otherwise. And I couldn’t be more pleased.