Music and Relationship

I can't play that song for you. The raga of the song is upset with me!

- An anonymous musician on stage one day

Even today, I'm still puzzled by his words. How can a raga, a musical scale, be "upset"? This personification felt so unusual. He was to play a Lydian song, differing from his last song in the major scale by only a single note. This incident happened in 2020, yet his statement remains vividly etched in my memory.

Years of dedicated practice have yielded little more than frustration as I strive to reach even an intermediate level in music. This struggle has led to a profound realization: the vast difference between how listeners and musicians interpret music.

Let's begin with a naive analogy. Listeners often experience music in a more limited way, focusing primarily on surface-level elements like the beat, bass line, or lyrics. For musicians, however, music possesses a richer spectrum of colors, a depth of meaning that transcends simple auditory sensations.

This analogy may oversimplify the concept. Let's delve deeper.

For listeners, music is like a friend, a constant companion offering solace, joy, and escape. It remains accessible and forgiving, readily available whenever they choose to engage with it. This effortless connection can easily be taken for granted. 

For musicians, music is like a deep and almost stormy relationship with someone. You need to commit to working on it every single day, even when you're tired or discouraged. Just as you would if you were offering prayers to the divine. But even with all that effort, there's no guarantee that you'll succeed. It's a leap of faith, a surrender to the unknown.

But even when you find profound fulfillment in this challenging relationship, music demands unwavering respect. Taking it for granted, making assumptions about its accessibility, or failing to acknowledge its power can quickly lead to disillusionment and even a complete breakdown of the connection.

Here is a better analogy. Imagine music as a beautiful and mysterious woman. 

If you just want to admire her from afar, that's okay. Like a listener, you can be her friend, and she will serve that friendship well. But if you truly want to have her as a significant part of your life; if you truly want to see her naked, you need to earn her trust first. You need to give her the highest level of respect. You need to prove that you are worthy of her. You need to commit to a deep and passionate relationship with her. This relationship, like all others, would be a divine gift. It won't be easy. It would be a constant challenge that requires faith and dedication, and yet, there's no guarantee that you'll succeed. You'll need to work hard and make sacrifices. Eventually, you will have a profound connection with her and experience a level of intimacy that goes beyond simple amusement.

When you embark on this journey, with each passing day, you realize that you need to practice harder and harder. Decades can pass while perfecting a single note; making sure it sounds perfect; giving it the color it deserves. But alas, the harder you try, the worse it sometimes gets. It can feel like you're constantly slipping backward. You fail at every stage performance. No one wants to listen to you. You become worse than a naive bathroom singer. At this point, you should surely be tempted to give up. But it's too late. You realize that music is the only thing you've ever truly wanted in your life.

This relationship with music will have its ups and downs as with any other relationship. From the perspective of Rumi, music is Laila and you are her Majnu. You fall in love with it more and more deeply. But to get to her, you need to surrender yourself to her. A surrender to Laila is surrender to the divine. A surrender to the divine is surrender to yourself.

Music will act like a mirror, showing you your strengths and weaknesses, your determination, and your ability to overcome obstacles. It pushes you to your limits, forcing you to face your fears and insecurities. That's when you will realize that music isn't something outside of you – it is you. It is your own reflection. Each note that you play is a reflection of how you feel, how the blood rushes through your veins, the emotions that course through your blood, the level of control you have over yourself,  the happiness or sadness that occupies your soul.

In order to truly achieve music, you would have to surrender to yourself. You need to let go of everything that you have and that you think is yours, including your body and preach it till your last breath. And then one day, when you are lying, too weak to move your body, when your heart has stopped pumping blood through your veins – you will hit the right note. Your body would die, your soul will be liberated, and with it will be the purest note that you have ever been able to play!

Love, death, the divine, and music: distinct paths leading to the same profound, ineffable state.

And that is why my friend, the musician said that "the raga is upset".