No one knew it, but the fiddler standing against a bare wall outside the Metro in an indoor arcade at the top of the escalators was one of the finest classical musicians in the world, playing some of the most elegant music ever written on one of the most valuable violins ever made. His performance was arranged by The Washington Post as an experiment in context, perception and priorities -- as well as an unblinking assessment of public taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?
So go and notice something pretty where you don't expect to find it. I'll still be here angsting over what I would have done.
6 comments:
Our friend, Dr. Slojak-Pittman, recommended this blog to us. He is currently on a research trip to the Andes Mountains where he is conducting pathbreaking research into the reproductive cycles of high-altitude llamas, so he will be unavailable for comment for the next few months.
As to the gist of your last post: we think that it is perfectly acceptable to not notice the music. First of all, context is important, and can't be ignored. The article seemed to suggest that if something is beautiful, it is beautiful regardless of context. We disagree. Example: we think that the Rocky Mountains are beautiful. We also think that Notre Dame Cathedral is beautiful. But we might be a bit disappointed if, on a backpacking trip, we came across a cathedral blocking a nice vista.
The second problem is that the editors of the Wash. Post have assumed that such a thing as universal standards actually exists. "playing some of the most elegant music ever written". This seems to be stated as an empircal fact. Who says it is the most elegant music ever written? Some people don't like classical music. Other people disdain the violin in all contexts. Are the subhuman monsters simply because they prefer the lyricism of the Dead Kennedys over the sonatas of Beethoven?
Third, this article suggests that listening to nice music should be a top priority. Why should it be?
Finally, had we been faced with the scene, we feel that we can report, with confidence, that we would have stopped and enjoyed the performance. We would have also put a few bills (or new dollar coins) in the opened violin case in front of the performer. And we suspect that you would have done the same.
Warmly,
Mick and Bashi
p.s. we apologize for the split infinitive in paragraph #2
Any friends of the esteemed Dr. S-P are friends of mine.
What would make the biggest difference in making people notice the music? Different city? Different country? (You guys who have lived in different countries, pipe up and enlighten me: how much of a difference would that make?) Different time of day? Different genre?
Many times I've hurried by people playing interesting music at the Metro in order to make a six-car train or to get to happy hour on time. If I heard Joshua Bell, however, I hope I would’ve stopped to listen (hell, if I saw him… hubba hubba), but I can’t say with certainty that I would have. (I don’t mean to be elitist and disparage the homeless guy with the xylophone playing “Winter Wonderland” in June, but he just didn't offer enough incentive to linger.)
I found the Collins reference interesting (“The poet Billy Collins once laughingly observed that all babies are born with a knowledge of poetry, because the lub-dub of the mother's heart is in iambic meter. Then, Collins said, life slowly starts to choke the poetry out of us.”) We learn to not notice pretty things in certain settings because we are not supposed to find them there. How many of us as kids picked dandelions until someone told us they weren’t flowers, but ugly weeds? Perhaps it’s typical that we wouldn’t notice the music, but that's what makes it so sad.
p.s. Mick and Bashi, forgive my many, many cases of passive voice. I must be stopped.
That's not Billy Collins, that's Phil Collins, and it's off his album "No Jacket Required".
--M and B
p.s. people would notice if he were in a park. Also, there seems to be an assumption that because someone didn't stop, he (or she) must not have noticed the music. The study's methodology was flawed, and how do we know that some people heard the music and said to themselves "that attractive man is playing some very nice music, and if I had some time, I would stop and listen, but I'm just thankful to have heard the five seconds that I did. And if my cube-mate Steve asks me to comment on his new pedicure, I am going to punch him in the face. I love the violin."
"Collins went on to say, 'Su-su-sudio. Oh oh.'"
M&B, check out the transcript of the discussion of this article on the Post site. People raise a lot of your points.
And Steve, your feet are fab.
I do think a major problem with the experiment was that it was set in rush hour D.C. We both know first hand how horrible commuting there can be, and we know the constant rush that people are in to make sure they get to their desks in the quickest time possible. In my days there, I probably would have run over Joshua Bell on the George Washington Parkway if it would have gotten me to work 5 minutes sooner.
Even so, I would bet that I would have noticed and appreciated the wonderful music, and, even if I did not have much time, I would probably have tried to slow my walk to listen for a bit. I most likely wouldn't have recognized the artist, but I would still have paid attention simply because I am a big fan of the violin. I tend to always listen to the buskers, anyway, because I enjoy hearing live music (generally...talent is appreciated). But to stand there and listen is quite unnatural; who lingers in the metro except deviants and other suspicious folk anyway?
So to answer your question, I do think that location was a huge factor. People linger in parks and public squares and cafes and other pleasant locales, but not in busy, grey stations. A non-rush-hour time in a non-creepy-busstation-like atmosphere would make a big difference. As to culture; I do think that Americans tend to be very scheduled and rushed in general and need to take more time to stop and 'smell the roses' or possibly 'hear the concerto'. I know that no matter how busy I am, I try to appreciate the birds and the sunshine and the lizards and whatever beauty is around me on a daily basis, or, as this article shows, you can really miss out on a treat.
Sadly, I know myself well enough to know that I'm a grumpy fucker that would've just scurried by and probably even quietly cursed him for having the time to hang around a Metro station fiddlin' while some of us had thankless jobs we had to be at in 10 minutes and a stack of TPS reports we hadn't even touched.
God I'm glad we left DC.
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