Stream of Consciousness Writing - Part III

The emotion that a stage produces, and the performer on the stage produces, is incredible. The energy that can be transmitted from a performer playing an instrument, to a willing and interested audience, is absolutely incredible. It is my goal to be that performer. To exceed in all aspects of transferring emotion, energy, interest, love, and purity to every audience I might encounter. How should I do this though? I must feel all of this at such an intense level that it practically melts off of me, and finds its way to the audience. This is by far no easy task.

I've seen performers do it, though. I've felt what they felt, I saw what they saw, I realized what they realized. I've experienced performances where everything else in the world disappears. The other audience-members around me. The stage itself. The hall I sit in. It's all gone. It is me and the performer, standing face to face, experiencing every note, every pitch, every interval, every chord, with each other. Feeling the same emotions, having the same kinds of energy, feeling the same tension between notes, which turn into nothing less and nothing more than distances between such feelings and thoughts.

It is difficult to explain it. Especially from the performers view-point. For they have one of the most difficult tasks known to man. To share what they are experiencing with hundreds of audience-members, all at once. To open up every pore of their very heart and soul for the audience to see and - if they choose - destroy. It is dangerous. At the very least mentally dangerous, if not mortally as well. Many musicians go through great trials because of the way they play. The incredible revelation of their soul, over and over again, for the entire world to see, can be unbearable. It can destroy you slowly, if you are not careful about it. For the soul can be pure, or impure, and the audience will see it, have no doubt. And they will judge you based on what they see...or what they don't see.

It is a frightening experience. Incredible, but frightening.

-Phil