Music is time, said the violin master.
You can’t miss the stop or you’ll miss the train.
One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four,
one, two, three, four.
She clapped her hands together
as the boy moved the bow across the strings.
One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, the violin master shouted,
one, two, three, four,
louder and more shrill so that her voice
traveled through the house like a metronome,
guiding him, commanding him to translate the beat,
to trust his own internal rhythm.
Good boy, she said.
See how hard you have to be on yourself?
How will your violin know who you are
unless you make it speak?
Music is my life. I don't how else I can express that to everyone that knows who I am. Perhaps if played a piece like Badinerie on the flute you might really understand my passion for the art of sound. I've loved music all my life but it wasn't until I first picked up a flute in 5th grade that I understand the meaning of playing music from the heart. The structure and sound of a flute is just so beautiful that I can't really put it into words. Time is everything in music... that's something I was told since the beginning and it really is. You can play the piece wrong from beginning to end and it wouldn't be a problem if the timing was right throughout. You could play a piece perfectly but it would be awful if the timing was wrong. I really don't understand why that is but I guess it's a matter of time before I get a firm understanding of that idea/rule in music. I remember how hard my teachers were on me if I didn't have the timing right. One day... one day I'll write a blog post in response to the question I once made on why timing is more important than getting the notes right.
I noticed that this poem doesn't talk about a topic in general, it grasps a fragment of the boy's life; his violin lesson. I think grasping that moment made the poem more powerful than talking about how music is time in general because it made the complexity of the phrase, music is time, a bit similar... if that makes sense. As I'm sitting down and thinking about the title of the poem, I'm starting to create my thought on what that means. Music is time... it's true. It's true because the beat is just one, solid tone that needs rhythm to be added in order to create that art which I so dearly love: music.
A line I really found powerful was, How will your violin know who you are unless you make it speak? I found this line powerful because you would think that for someone/something to know you, you have to speak to it and introduce yourself but in music, the instrument knows who you are through the music you play and your level of knowledge on the instrument. I think that Jill is trying to say that music isn't just a sound, but a voice and that art, in all forms, isn't just art; art tells a story and portrays expressions through creativity, imagination, and feeling.
The last line on the thirds stanza (to trust his own internal rhythm) means to play music that comes from you. As a musician, that means to trust that you're a good musician and that if you play something wrong, keep going but keep the tempo so the piece isn't thrown off balance. As a person, I think that line means that you should trust your instincts because they sometimes know more than you do. Your instincts help you make decisions and decisions are the structures of life because one choice leads to another and so on... your life is practically full of endless possibility.
Since this poem is about music, it would make sense if I first draw an inference based on music. Now that I've thought about the title for some time now, I think that the poet is trying to say that to be able to learn something, in this case music, you must have a solid understanding on the basics; you can't play music well if you don't how to maintain a stable tempo (the timing of the piece). I think that she's implying what every good musician says/knows: timing is everything in music. To say that music is time is to say that time is the base of all music. When the poet writes commanding him to translate the beat I think of time being music itself... in disguise. The beat goes on but what makes it a beat and not music is that it's one simple tone that keeps the music from continuing fluently.
But thinking of this on a deeper level the violin is a wise person guiding someone younger (the boy) into life, which in this case is the music piece that the boy is playing on the violin which can be thought of as the young person's heart and brain. Like I mentioned before, decisions are what move someone on with their life but their instincts are what lead them there. So when the violin master continuously repeating music is time, the wise person is teaching the younger one that decisions create life. I think that the last stanza was placed in the right spot. See how hard you have to be on yourself? how will your violin know who you are unless you make it speak? ; See how much you have left to learn about life? How are your heart and mind going to know the person you're going to be in life if you don't let them guide you?
Music is my life... music is life... life is a music piece; it has to start as well as it ends. The beginning marks a first impression on a music piece as well as a person. The end has to leave an impact on the musician and the audience as well as the world in general. I follow my instincts... most of the time so I guess in life a task for me would be to keep the tempo and not go to fast or too slow because it would ruin the entire music piece (this was meant to be thought of metaphorically). The piece I play everyday has some low notes and some high notes, too. Each breath I take is one more note in the myriad of notes that I played and that I'm going to play as the piece advances. I want to make an impact on the world and on as many people as I can, whether the impact was small or big or great or not-so-great (which I hope isn't the case for anyone). My goal in life is to play music for a long time and that when the piece I was selected to play comes to an end, it would end on a good note... remembering those words of wisdom that the violin master spoke.
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