Time is subjective. The beauty of the so-called “art of time” largely lies in the subjectivity of time. However, the rise of metronome as practice aides in the nineteenth century objectified the feeling of musical pulse for the musicians in their practice rooms. It reflects our current dependence on data and analysis, an aftereffect of Industrial Revolution.
Our past is our memory, our future is our imagination, and the present is our sensory experience. Impactful moments take up more of our memory space. Boring hours are forgettable. In music, a two-minute piece can feel like a long journey into a dreamland, as one cherishes the lingering last chord. The exact opposite can happen when listening to a gripping performance of a thirty-minute symphony; it can feel instantaneous, almost too short.
The acoustic can change the subjective experience of time as well. A passage that can sound exciting at 60 BPM in a dry practice room becomes muddy in a reverberant cathedral, each note bleeding into the next. The mishmash becomes forgettable, because it is not communicative. In order to deliver the same passage effectively in a cathedral-like-acoustic, a pianist would have to slow the tempo down, to send each note out through all the echoes, to the audience clearly. A rhythm that the players and the audience can both groove to depends greatly on the context, and the acoustic is just an example. Everything effects the groove: the weather, the occasion, the time of the day, the lighting of the room, the general mood of the audience, etc. etc… BPM (Beats Per Minute) cannot take these variables into consideration, and therefore is not musical. The subjective experience of time in music becomes meaningful by the flow of the melody, physical experience of the rhythm, the memorable climax that moves us, and the ending whether it is with a bang, or a hush.
To me, music is life. So, in that sense, my next statement is not too far off from what this blog has been about so far when I say…
LONGEVITY IS NEVER A GOAL
Just as beats-per-minute can never measure a performer’s musicality, the number of years lived will not reflect anything about the life itself. More important are the fleeting moments where you are so absorbed in adoration of something, smiles and laughter you share with those you love, your creativity, honest communications, shared memories… These unquantifiable things are what makes our lives meaningful. Music, beauty, empathy, love… What I devote my life to as a musician is to propose a shift in our values. To cherish things that we cannot count.