a man with a flute

Dear Ones,

Some of the students I’ve had in the past have healed or reclaimed somewhat from significant abuse from their childhood through their own determination and courage willing them forward onto a pilgrimage involving music in some way. Especially the male adults.

One of the senior citizen students I’ve had the opportunity to be employed to be a private music teacher, was a retired Christian pastor who was finally pursuing a life long wish to play the flute.

As a boy, he was forbidden to play the flute as it was deemed shameful and inappropriate for a boy to play that instrument. (Meanwhile women at that time weren’t holding orchestral or professional positions of being a flautist either….but that’s for another blog.)

He was in his late 60’s and suffered from a very weak short term memory. For weeks he would come to his lesson, and not even recognize that some of what I was teaching him was review. I feared he was beyond hope and I began to question the morality of taking this man’s money. His wife was an oboe student and she assured me that he practiced at home usually about 5 to 10 minutes most waking hours. He was very devoted.

I decided to be patient and wait a couple more months to see if he’d make enough progress to justify the money he was spending, or to have a real heart to heart with him.

Anyway - fast forward - his consistent hard work started to “pay off” in terms of he was making progress and bit by bit playing the flute. He was getting a sound, getting endurance for phrasing, remembering fingerings and developing - some - dynamics.

BUT

He grew more and more frustrated because technique aside, he wasn’t being expressive. He just wasn’t connecting his heart with his sound. It was noise, not music. He had a mini melt down, because he’d always wanted to play the flute he saw NO moral reason for him being denied the ability to study flute - so his studies were guilt free - yet he felt trapped. Now that he was doing all he could, he hit a wall of ability and feared he’d never play - really play - the flute before he would die. He was feeling impatient also, and that isn’t helpful either.

This gentleman was a retired pastor so he was familiar with hymns and biblical characters. I said, secretly pick one of the following three biblical characters, and play this hymn the way you’d imagine one of the characters would sing it, but play exactly what is written. ( I gave him the most contrasting of three characters I could think of because I was afraid I’d have NO idea, which one he’d pick!) Well, clearly he picked the holy mother and he did extremely well expressing HER character as he’d imagine.

So, my point is, we all have hearts and we are all musical, the trick is finding what we love to access our own ability to “sing” or emote or express our hearts. Sometimes it helps to express ourselves, our hearts through our adoration which isn’t blocked to enter the vast sea of our own emotional sea of expression.

In time, he was able to express more and more of his own heart without requiring to move sideways through adoration of another.

Much of my work with adult students was therapeutic in assisting/witnessing them overcome toxic pedagogy or limiting beliefs of their youth. Fortunately because of their own dedication and love of music, I was able to help them through the wall they willed to fall down.

Very rewarding honor to witness these successes in the heart. There is healing in music.
I am grateful that moving forward, humanity is liberating itself from such narrow ideas of what it means to be a boy or a man.

My oboe teacher, Peter Hertling told me about how in some native American cultures, a boy ready to become a man would go out on a vision quest, fast, have a vision, then make a flute while out on the vision quest. When (if) he returned to the tribe, he’d play on the flute and expression of his vision, on his flute which he forged, for the tribal elders. After hearing the music, he would be given his adult man name.

It was a rite of passage. To go alone in the wilderness, fast, pray, have vision, forge a flute, return, express and choose to be a part of the tribe.

There is a beauty and wisdom there.

Thank you.
K.J.P.
February 17, 2020

Alchemy

Dear Ones,

ALCHEMY is the consistent underlying art form in this pilgrimage as a creative being - whatever - the medium or task; teaching, composing, blowing wind through a pipe, painting, even meditating….

The process of ALCHEMY demands courage and love in order to harvest the plethora of emotional ingredients to use in the food of music, painting…etc. PATIENCE is demanded of us to develop the technical elegance of skills to transform these ingredients of sound, feeling, sight, relating…

Although it takes time to cultivate technique - if the “IT” is there - that special something …. that ability to courageously TASTE the ingredients of AUTHENTICITY, the IT will come through.

At 54, I feel like I’m in an interesting perspective point along this journey as a student/teacher/life long creative….

As I go forward I am exploring more and more this ALCHEMY .

E VERY year, there is a new harvest of GRAPES (emotions - the pas de deux of relating to the macrocosm as a microcosm).

How do you grow your grapes? How do you harvest? How do you stomp the grapes, barrel them up, store, ferment, bottle and serve?

In the work “DREAMS OF THE BLACK SWAN” a trio for flute, oboe and bassoon - I consciously did a lot of alchemy. It helped. I sat down and tasted a lot of bitter and painful emotions. The thorns and daggers in my heart. With as much patience, courage and compassion as I could muster, I listened to the echos of these torments. I listened to my younger self, as if I were listening to a younger student whom I loved and cared about. That strategy helped. It was like ruff tangy tasting of bitter grapes from the barrel that were left to ferment.

Next, with compassion, I listened to inspiration to transform the pain into sound, lovingly. To do this lovingly, I had to FEEL and RESPECT the difficulty of these feelings, give them wings so they could fly away with beauty.

Another way to put it, is to acknowledge the pain, grind it like a mortal and pestle with loving attention and make a paste.

Add inspiration - and you have wine. Add technique and you have a bottle of containment - i.e. the written page.

Not all feelings are sweet. Not all music as food is a light desert, nor should it all be. We have cuisine - we have emotions, we have sonic food for a FULL COURSE MEAL complete with wine.

As I travel this pilgrimage as a creative, it helps me a lot to have some skills so I can transmute via alchemy the slings and arrows and agonies of the human experience into sound.

Now, that it’s been years since composing “DREAMS OF THE BLACK SWAN” I find myself needing to do more alchemy (every year is a new season of grapes - as well as many other ingredients in the garden of life - . Now I am using my “grapes” as I compose 100 Longings for oboe d’amore - these are solo works.

So - if you are an artist of some medium, how do you embrace this blog for your own benefits?
Sit quietly and listen to the most painful feelings of your life experience like you are listening to a younger person you truly love. Do so courageously - do not be afraid to feel - emotions are like wind storms - THEY PASS - emotions are not solid, they flow like water - courage is your life raft. If you are afraid then either wait until you are stronger or older or get help you can trust. If not - then shelve it - until you are ready. THERE IS NO HURRY. You can barrel up your bitter grapes into a casket for a later time (like I did) and if and when you are ready, listen compassionately to yourself, and then follow it up by practicing your craft be it composing, or painting, or dancing in silence or writing poetry or shaping clay or cooking a stew or planting bulbs in the garden - sewing, knitting - writing a letter to your younger self or older self or best friend or become your best friend or become a loving best friend to someone else, or take a dog for a walk…go fly a kite and celebrate the listening and liberation of the shadows of your heart set free.

From despair to beauty is a wonderful thing. From bitterness to deliciousness is a glorious gift for yourself and if you wish - you can share your art with others.

BEST WISHES for peace, and the growth of love consciousness.
The more we can embrace our own bitter feelings and shadows, the more we can be loving and compassionate. It takes COURAGE. Empathy and awareness and courage - real emotional face the music - courage are the building blocks of loving higher consciousness leading to peace and well being for us all.

K.J.P.

January 24, 2020

46 years - feeling grateful

Dear Ones,

This past week, I recognized the 46th anniversary of my first oboe lesson. Here is what I wrote on Facebook. Thought I’d copy and past to make this blog. ENJOY

Today (January 7, 2020) marks the 46th anniversary of my very first oboe lesson, which I had to wait 5 - intensely - LONG years for, until I was (almost) old enough to start playing!

I asked my teacher (a jazz saxophonist named James Cassera) How do you play the oboe!!!?!?!?

He said, (in a steady incredible crescendo) “Well, you take a
R E A L L Y deep breath, pucker up, and blow kisses to God baby!”

He was quite the sight. An American born Italian Stallion with broad shoulders and an open shirt revealing a chest adorned with the Catholic saints on gold chains interwoven with his plethora of chest hair. Full side burns, bell bottoms, and gorgeous shoes. Thick luscious dark curly hair. Square smokey sun glasses.

He was very warm and kind man. Loved music, loved children, very community oriented. When the other adults were trying to convince me to play flute or clarinet, I insisted upon the oboe. He was best friends with my ballet teacher, Miss Judy who was a goddess among women and a Shero in my life, which is how he heard about this little girl determined to play the oboe! He took pity on me and said - I’ll get you started until you can find a proper oboist to teach you.

So, I took a really deep breath, and played the longest note to the end of the universe that I could with ALL MY ❤️. I remember it was an E because I couldn’t quite get my right ring finger to cover the D key - so that was the best I could do. It tickled my lips and I broke out into a peel of giggles afterward.

It was a thrill. And here I am, playing, teaching, and composing for this honker with gusto to this day!

It’s a marriage. It’s a significant relationship. It’s my hiking stick in the pilgrimage of life. It’s a prayer stick and constant companion as I wander through life.

It’s opened doors to studying, music, composing and meeting beautiful beautiful people whom I love dearly.

Thank you 17th century French musicians Jean Hotteterre and Michel Danican “Philidor” who modified the louder shawm (the prevailing double-reed instrument) to invent the original oboe. 🥳💗

I feel grateful - really grateful - to the set up in childhood enabling me to play in public schools and competitions and extra ensembles in addition to steady weekly lessons my parents gave me. The state of NY had great programs in the 70’s and 80’s through NYSSMA (New York State Schools Music Association) which James Cassera was later the president.

The NYSSMA competitions helped tip over the beginning dominoes to help me get the scholarships I needed to study oboe and my ultimate goal - composing in college and conservatory.

If you’re an oboist, and still reading, please tell me what you want to see created in Études and feel is important for me to keep in mind as I work on my 2020-2025 progressive oboe Étude project.

Now is the time to speak up!

Paying it forward, I wish to create more for the oboists of tomorrow.

I feel grateful for all the music composed and existing for us oboists to play today and realize that we owe everything to what we inherit from our teachers, composers and those who come before us.

Thank you, hugs and kisses to all the oboe makers, reed makers, composers, teachers, music dealers,
event organizers, and those who FUND the fun which is serious fun and makes a critically important aspect of human life possible.

My first composition teacher’s (Karel Husa) very first question to me was, “If all your friends were fighting in a war that they believed in, would you fight or compose?” I said instantly “compose” he was taken aback. “How can you be so sure?” I said, if composers stopped composing every time people went to war, we wouldn’t have much music. Besides, I’m a creator not a fighter.

If you’re still reading, you might want to visit my website (www.oboebrilliance.com same as www.composerKJP.com) as I just started a new decade of blogging. You don’t HAVE to be a person who plays oboe or composes only to get something out of it. But you’ll get even more out of it if you do ... I HOPE! 🙏