What Does it Mean to be a Musician by Isaac Stern
I recently came across an old interview of the great American violinist, Isaac Stern. Within a few moments, I realised I had stumbled upon great wisdom being imparted so I took to transcribing it all down, in case the video ever gets taken down or lost. I don’t know which program this came from or where the full interview is but you can find the original video and full transcription here below.
One does not think, or plan. You simply know it and you do your best. Once in a while, there are moments, where you feel…”thank God I’m a musician”. Because one can be a part of something in a way that nobody but a musician can touch. You know, we players, we reach across centuries and touch the mind and heart and soul of somebody long dead. But he’s not dead, he’s right there with us, the music is there. So we have a chance to touch it. You have to understand it. You have to feel this.
If you are thinking about how wonderful you are, and how well you can get into the music better than anyone else, you’ll never do it. You simply do it because you believe in it. And you give yourself to the music. Ideally of course, you have by this time complete discipline in right hand and left hand, so you don’t think about, HOW do I do this, this finger or that bow. You simply do it. Then only can you be free, to let your mind and your heart take wing, fly.
Doesn’t always happen but you try. And you try and you try again. One of the hardest things to teach young players, is that a concert is not the final event. A concert is like a laboratory, you experiment. You try. You try this, hmm not so good. You try that, hmm maybe a little better. Try this, I don’t know, I’ll try it this way or that way and each time, you learn. And in here (gestures to head), this is the most original computer, right here. And it remembers things. So you try and you remember and you try again and you change and slowly, there is an evolutionary process that goes on. And something evolves out of all of this. And that becomes your relationship with that music at that time. It may change. But at that time, that’s what it is.
So what you’re discussing and what we’ve been talking about are very, very hard things to explain to people who think, “let’s play the violin, let me give concerts, let me have a career, let me earn money, let me be famous, let everybody know me.” That essentially does not make an artist. It makes a performer, but so does a dog in a circus. An artist is something entirely different. It’s a different approach, it’s a different kind of thoughtfulness. Most of all, it is a very peculiar combination of humility and arrogance. You have to be arrogant enough to have ideas of your own. You have to have humility enough to know that you will never know the final answer, and that there are other people with 10 different answers who are just as right. But you have to believe in your own answer when you’re doing it. You may believe in it differently tomorrow, or the day after. But at the moment you’re doing it, that’s what you have to believe in, completely.
In a way, this has been a very serious conversation and I thank you for coming and doing this. You’ve asked some very good questions and you’ve made some very, very flattering remarks, I thank you for that. But we have touched on some points that are not often discussed on television. We’ve talked about things that you can’t explain, we’ve talked about magic. How do you explain that (gestures to the air)? Or that? You can’t always find words for that, and all that I’ve been saying, is simply the beginning of saying, “I wonder how”. And then you search, and you search, and you search, and you enjoy the search. I hope, very much, that the producers of this program, will carefully and honestly translate in the most careful terms the things that I’ve said, because I’ve used some concepts that are beyond normal conversation. I thank you for asking this and I thank you for giving me the opportunity to say these things. I wish you well in your own work, go find your own voice. And enjoy, always enjoy.