Cohesion, Life Force and Music

Funny, over the last few years making music got more easy, more fun, and my fans like what I am putting out there more than ever. What the heck happened?

I couldn’t put my finger on whatever I had realized and still can’t fully do so, but I saw a youtube vid the other day that may help explain it.

The video was called “where mind meets matter” by Dr. Bruce Lipton. It is a 17 part vid that everyone should watch (yep, a long playlist) but the crux of what he talks about is that Newtons “mechanistic” model of the universe is not 100% on the money.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iB81L9zGLjE&hl=en&fs=1]

What is the mechanistic view, and what does it have to do with music?

Well, there came this old notion that the universe and our bodies are like watches or machines, that can be taken apart, the gears & springs can be looked at, replaced, repaired and put back together.

Well, life is not that simple we are finding. Spirit defies that in certain ways. The magic of the parts blending and springing forth from source is something far more utterly complex than an “assemblage of separate parts” working like a machine. Modern day medicine and new ideas of healing are on a more quantum level than a mechanistic level.

I always wondered as a music student about melodies written by master composers. One note, two notes, three notes – and bang! It could be Mozart without a doubt. Something invisible, some binding force behind the notes is evident in the spirit behind the music. Take the notes apart and you can’t find the spirit – much like a human body.

Here are some ways I have discovered this recently in music:

– Recording my new CD. One or two (or three) songs were heavily edited, several takes pasted together (I am sorry to say). While they are correct and beautiful, they do not possess the “life” of a take played straight through with some rough edges made smooth. Different feeling altogether, at least for me.

– I’d always feel out of whack musically if I practiced just technique or just scales or just one aspect of music in a disconnected way. Any technique or idea MUST be practiced in conjunction with the “life force” and joy (groove) in the music otherwise it doesn’t apply in real music

– Techniques fall into place if you make the life force the primary objective! (Beauty, groove, melody)

Music reflects life and life reflects music. Now I see why my greatest teachers (and Bach by the way) insisted on musical, loving, spiritual solutions to problems. Mike Longo my teacher would tell me “your answer is technically correct, but not spiritually correct”. He’d show me musical things that would make me laugh from deep in my belly and tickle my intuition! 🙂

Of course intelligence and technique must be learned, but in the right way – in a way that connects to spirit!

More to come on this fascinating topic!