Conscience and Sincerity

[mousdrvr]

I'm posting this for Dwoz who had asked for a link. I couldn't find one so I typed in an excerpt from a biography on Ravel that my voice teacher gave me. I'm posting it in it's own thread because It had a huge impact on me and I thought others might find it powerful as well and because I didn't want to completely Jack the thread in which I first mentioned it. The italics as far as I can tell are Ravel's

-mous

I am sometimes credited with opinions which appear very paradoxical concerning the falsity of art and the dangers of sincerity. The fact is I refuse simply and absolutely to confound the conscience of an artist, which is on thing, with his sincerity, which is another. Sincerity is of no value unless one's conscience helps make it apparent. This conscience compels us to turn ourselves into good craftsmen. My objective, therefore, is technical perfection. I can strive unceasingly to this end, since I am certain of never being able to attain it. The important thing is to get nearer to it all the time. Art, no doubt, has other effects, but the artist, in my opinion, should have no other aim.

-Maurice Ravel

[st robert]

the word "sincerity" makes my skin crawl, whereas "conscience" feels like home. the sincerity is of the head, the conscience is of the heart. two different things, as mentioned above, certainly intertwined, but as separate as thought and action.

i like this post, but dwoz' ramblings (http://womb.mixerman.net/showthread.php?t=345) hit me in a more tender spot. more direct, more true.

we strive for perfection with both sides of our brain, the right flowing and feeling and the left keeping track of bitrate and the nearly full 300GB drive whirring quietly nearby. we don't do it for anyone else, true enough. we do it because we have to.

sheaf stout strikes again.

love,

rob

[mousdrvr]

Rob,

I didn't take him to be making a point about cognitive modes/brain hemispheres, not that that's an invalid interpretation. I
thought he was making a distinction between "intention" and "awareness", sort of a rejection of the whole intensity without mastery aesthetic.


-mous

[st robert]

i meant that part as more of a self evident addendum to the passage, not as much a direct interpretation.

...or, it was the beer talking.

either way, i slept well.

rob

[mousdrvr]

Oh, I hear you absolutely.

I think what I'm trying to discuss here is whether or not we right
brain folks have a duty to seek our own kind of rigor and I took from your post that we do.

thanks,


-mous

[Cosmic Pig]

I suspect I disagree with Mr. Pavel. I suspect I suspect because it makes no sense to me particularly. Conscience and sincerity? I mean really. Wtf is that about? I will say with no certainty whatsoever that technical perfection is not what music is about. Technical perfection of sincerity?

Sincerity and conscience in music seems to me a no brainer. Falsity of art? Is falsisititty a word? What do you guys get from all that that I'm missing? Please explain for those of us on the brink of being culled from the herd.

Cos.

[mousdrvr]

CP,

Yeah I figured this might sound like bullshit but still it hit me hard. What I got from it was that whatever you're trying to do doesn't matter fuck all. What matters is being 100% honest about what you actually are doing. There may be more in it but that's essentially what I got modulo all the BS. :lol:

Thank you for forcing me to clarify that!


-mous

[Cosmic Pig]

Ahhh... Sort of a wax on-wax off thing. Jouney more than the arrival stuff... One man's BS is another mans epiphany...

But on the other hand, as Leonard Cohen once said, "Act the way you'd like to be and soon you'll be the way you act."

Cos.

[dwoz]

To sort of mix metaphors here...

my take on Ravel's statement is that the '99% perspiration' part means exactly fuck-all in the absense of the '1% insipiration'.


"sincerity" equates to the raw unprocessed meat ENTERING the grinder, and "conscience" equates to what you allow OUT the other side.


dwoz

[st robert]

mmmm.
sausage.

wait, did that sound gay?

[bunnerabb]

"Let's just say that if you divorced your heart from your head, I don't want to get into bed with either respondant."- Arthur St. James

[Carlo]

You must believe in yourself...in your abilty to come up with an expression of your vein, of your blood.

To this...faith is it's own virtue.