You’re in it for the music

Where did I hear or read that, that you need at least two out of three in order to make the job. And these three would be: quality, fun, and money. Anyway, even if I know my colleagues must be tired of this already, I keep quoting this a lot, and a second thought immediately comes along: “Most of the times, it’s just one”. Or, lately, something like “two halfs, or one and a half”. Something like that. Now, what is the work of a standard early music performer in Germany? You have your own projects if you got the ideas, the ambition and the energy, and a bit of luck. That’s great, it gives you two out of three, even all three, and it can make you happy or at least high. You got to get high, in order to cope with all the extra load which comes inevitably together with your activity as a performing musician: travelling a lot, sleeping way too little, rehearsing from eight to twelve hours a day, sometimes having to cope with inconvenient lodgings and lack of privacy. You can also cope with real discomfort, provided by inconsiderate concert hosts, conductors, colleagues or fans and poor concert locations. Such things are not often the case, but often enough to be mentioned. If you don’t get high, you can’t cope with any of this in the long run. Then, however, apart from performing as a soloist or with some great projects that are the fruits of your own mind and soul, or of some other colleagues you love to work with, there are the other jobs an early music performer in Germany does, and they are the majority. These are the gigs: one Christmas Oratorio here, one St Matthew Passion there, performed by freelancers just like yourself, some you know, some you don’t, under the direction of a first grade church musician, together with his choir and some hired vocal soloists. These gigs are our daily (or rather weekly, or monthly) bread. This is what feeds us and pays our bills. Providing that these gigs sometimes prove to be fun, challenging and sophisticated, in most cases you find yourself sitting on that chair of yours and trying to get high, on the music you actually love, but which is not happening the way you need it. You ask yourself if you can cope with it. How different is this music allowed to be, in order to still get you high? The porn scene you are forced to watch now, how different is it from the good sex adventures and romance in real life you have experienced and which you want to recall, in order to get high? How well are you able to accomodate with what’s going on? Can you still get high while watching that porn? Is anything going to happen in order to at least “push the button”? Well, you’re trying hard. Maybe it’s up to you to make that porn go away and turn it into real passion. And it’s exhausting, as seconds pass by in slow-motion. Your mind is at the music you play, while trying to get high, but one other thought is there as well: “It will be over soon”. In the concert, all musicians play better. We try to get high, and sometimes we can, but it required some energy. Then we think about getting to the station in time so that we can get the last train home, because no matter what waits for us there, it is better than the porn we left behind in that concert hall.
I wondered for so long if I were the only one who feels it this way – quite pretentious of me, I admit. Now I know better, there are many of us.
Last year one dear colleague announced his early retirement from the concert scene, I know of many who seriously consider quitting as well. Others got seriously ill. I may be a bit too forward to connect all these things, after all, I do not take the liberty to talk for others and some of them might, in good faith, not agree with me. It is for sure, in the world of the musical scene – very undemocratic as I see it – an unwise move to talk freely about such things. And yet I wish we did, to take into consideration that we may disagree, and eventually to find advice and solutions. I know I am not the only one who feels porn when it’s supposed to be passion, I cannot be.

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