Quote:
Originally Posted by A-Mac
I agree and disagree with Pitar, particularly if one performs in public.
I have often said here that all performing is acting. Having done some acting, I am not a fan of method acting as as means of expressing emotion. To me it is a short cut to controlling the exterior, it utilizes more energy than necessary and produces uneven results. To express emotion while playing the guitar, I do not think of things that make me happy or sad, I analyze what techniques make the piece happy or sad and I concentrate on producing them at will.
Often attributed to Spencer Tracy is the quote, "Acting is all about sincerity - if you can fake that, you've got it made."
In short, I do believe it is important to convey emotion to the audience in one's playing, but I do also believe it is best conveyed by technique, not inner release.
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Agreed.
It's not about "emotion" as such, as in something we are feeling in ourselves, outside of (or before) the music. It's about committing totally to the music itself. The music is its own expression. We can't be half-hearted or detached, we have to
play it like we mean it - which I'd say is what worked for the OP. It wasn't that he was depressed or mad, but that that condition enabled him to enter into the music with more power, to not hold back.
Hal Galper's Dizzy Gillespie story sums it up for me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_7DgCrziI8&t=225
while this one explains the counter-intuitive need to
minimise emotion:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJRjEpjd9S4
- TL;DR: because emotion gets in the way of the technical control needed to convey accurately what's in the music.
Feeling emotional means you push the music, which distorts it. Instead you have to get inside the music, be calm, and let it carry you.
Dizzy Gillespie screaming the notes to himself in his head is not his own emotion - it's being taken over by the power of the music itself.