We bond before the shows — as a group we work together to set up the stage, to find our place in its narrowness, with the adequate positioning, so as to allow each of us to benefit from plenty of room for expression. We find our proper spot to notice and to hear ourselves as well as one another sufficiently well. We also bond one-to-one: the violists attuning, the guitarists and the drummer preparing to set the rhythm, the pianist and her daughters playing cello and flute integrate their professional selves with their familial relationships, the sopranos warm up voices together and review the more challenging parts and so forth. There’s mutual support, understanding and emotional regulation in all of this process. And fun. Our bonding moments before this particular show revealed that we were all a little nervous — enthusiasm, expectation, curiosity about what this concert was going to turn out like and some other mysterious feelings we couldn’t quite name. When the sound engineer announced the gathering of the band on stage on the soundtrack of Haggard’s Rachmaninov Choir, we went up there and remained silent, simply listening to this beautiful piece like the prologue of an ancient story. The audience stood up and gathered in front of the stage, watching us quietly as if facing a religious ceremony. That was our first dialogue with this audience, as between two wholesome parts uniting into a new kind of Oneness. What followed was one of our best musical encounters so far.
“Make everything count towards a certain degree of progress”, Seneca1 wrote to his friend Lucilius, many centuries ago. With and without getting a hold of his lines, we all have known it intuitively that making progress in music, in philosophy and in friendship would be worthy endeavours. For a few years now, we find ourselves in it with ever the same passion, dedication and pleasure.
Taking every good opportunity to practice and to perform, we arrived at the M2 in Timisoara on the 26th of July — coincidently the date when Carl Jung2 and Aldous Huxley3 were born (in 1875 and in 1894, respectively). Their philosophies align well with Coincidentia Oppositorum, considering that Jung has adopted the notion as a fundamental organising principle and ultimate aim of all human psychological activity4, whereas Huxley proposed the idea that all religions of the world relied on universal beliefs and experiential wisdom and that we’d be most benefitting from their synthesis. We were not aware of this beautiful synchronicity of dates during the show, but looking back it could as well have been a concert dedicated to these two inspiring philosophers.
There was something special in our interaction with each other and with the audience on this occasion — a surprisingly good connection, discovered progressively and appreciated fully, beat by beat. The responsiveness of the crowd, the appreciation, the keen participation and all the subsequent expressions of fondness and surprise enabled us to experience this performance as if for the first time. We had chemistry. As Jung used to say about human encounters: “if there is any reaction, both are transformed”. Thank you, wonderful crowd! We hope to see you again, really soon!
The communication between performers and audience seems to be one of the key features of a memorable concert experience. We’ve been thinking that it’s mostly about being immersed into the meditative state of contemplating the stories unfolded by the songs. But there’s something particularly touching and awakening in the willingness of the listeners to find out what we’re going through as we’re each doing our part in this beautiful and complex composition. Music is, apart from silence, the best way of expressing the inexpressible, as Huxley said.
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Ending on another philosophical note from Huxley: “The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm” — if any of it was dimmed for any of you for whatever reasons in the meantime, we are confident you’ll have it fully restored by training in music and by engaging philosophically with others, be they as they may. Love and be loved! Peace!
Read further: Seneca’s Letters to Lucilius, CXXIV[1]
Read briefly about Jung: Society of Analytical Psychology
Read more on Aldous Huxley’s Perennial Philosophy