Don't just play notes - Tell a story!

All art, if it is to be called true art, must reflect some part of the human experience. Art is like a mirror into our souls; it shows us aspects of our lives that perhaps we have not looked at. It shows us our follies and our strengths, our victories and our defeats. Music must follow this ideal. It must take sounds and use those sounds to arouse emotions in the audience. It must stir their mind and their soul, and take them to new planes of thought. While many pieces of music may stir emotions easily, there are some techniques that can help make this process a little easier. There is one, in particular, that is very effective.

Of course, changing the dynamics (the volume), the tempo (the speed), and the tonal quality (the way the notes sound) are very useful ways of stirring emotional responses. But there is one simple plan which can lead to new understanding of a piece of music, and lead to greater expression. Look at the piece of music, play through the piece of music, and decide what the story is behind the piece of music. All you have to do is make each piece you play a programmatic masterpiece. If you can decide on a story and replay the story in your head as you perform, the emotion coming from your instrument will be honest emotion.

When working on Paul Creston's Sonata for E-flat Alto Saxophone and Piano, I realized how what I was playing fit into the way my life was going. It was my life; the music told my story. And so each time I played the piece, I connected with it in an almost unearthly way. Here was music written before I was even born (before I was even a thought!) that portrayed my life through sound. It gave me a concrete reason to play the music, a way to come to a catharsis over the tragedies and successes of my life. I thought of certain scenes and people as I played. And as I think back upon my few performances, I can't remember the music without remembering the scenes I was trying to portray.

The story you tell with the music you play doesn't have to be your life story. It can be about a princess saving her prince from a dragon, or a clown balancing his true love on his chin. As long as the story you tell is a complete story. Use the music to paint the setting, to develop and breathe life to the characters, to portray their interactions with each other. Even if the audience doesn't figure out the entire story you are visualizing, they will respond to the emotions. And they will relate those emotions to their own lives and their own stories. The music will come alive to them, and take them somewhere unique to learn about themselves. Music is a powerful tool, and visualizing a story can help you use that tool to share emotions with people who thought they were just coming to listen to music. You can change

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