Does music play an important role in your life? While you sit and listen to it, you may not be really thinking about what it is, exactly, that you're listening to. You are listening to someone's heart. The person who wrote the song freely gave their time, thoughts, and feelings. The person who performed the song gave their interpretation, which is close to a definition of who they are. I am just as guilty of brushing over these things as the next person; we often don't see the musician behind the music, but being a musician has its struggles.
Musicians have to know some words from foreign languages. I don't mean being fluent in the language, and certainly not being able to carry on a conversation in that language, but knowing the pronunciation rules of languages along with key words. Most of the words that say how to play the music are Italian or French. These can be anywhere from the volume to the speed of the music. I've been in choir for only two years, but I have learned to sing in Swedish, French, Italian, German, and Hebrew, and that's just choir. I can't imagine the languages that professional singers know!
Playing music is one big habit. Along with playing or singing music comes a slew of little habits that I bet the musician himself/herself did not realize they had. This means that musicians will spend most of their time trying to overcome those habits. When we [musicians] have overcome some of these habits (there are never no habits), we try to form good habits. It takes more time to conquer the old, bad habits than to form good ones. The result of this is frustration like no other.
Musicians have a lot of things going on in their heads when it comes to music. First, we have to write it. There are more "rules" to writing music than I care to mention. Many music teachers will ask their students to have an interpretation or a picture that goes with the music. We have to dig deep into ourselves to find this. This can be beautiful, or it can be angering, especially when another person misunderstands your take on the music. It's like having your whole self criticized. Lastly, we need to have the skills to perform the music well. This usually requires training that started at a young age, but you're never too old to learn!
Musicians are busy, and nothing truly makes up for it. You've probably heard that being a musician isn't a good job and doesn't pay well. The time commitment to payment ratio is terrible. We're always busy trying to master our art, resulting in many hours of practicing. We go through times when we want to drop everything and try something else; we wonder if we're going anywhere. However, we know that we could not live doing anything else. Music has enslaved us with its peaceful melodies.
I only hope that those who listen to music realize all that they are hearing. They're not just listening to music; they are listening to hard work, to feelings, to many hours of someone's life.
