I have coffee with a violinist. She tells me about the struggle with the violin she plays on. She got the instrument from a sponsor after graduation. The violin does not suit her character. The violinist is not someone who likes to be in the foreground. She likes playing for an audience but does not need to be in the limelight. What matters to her is the music she wants to convey, to share. Her violin, on the other hand, likes to attract all the attention. She has to constantly do her best to tame the instrument. When she wants to whisper, it starts screaming. When she is looking for harmony, he cries and curses. Nuances are wasted on him.
Recently, she was with the violin maker who services her over the top pressure maker. He had just built a new violin and asked her to try it out. The violinist did not know what hit her. This violin immediately felt familiar. It was as if she was being introduced to herself. It fitted her exactly, felt like an extension of her soul. When she played the violin, it was like looking in the mirror.
This was her violin. But violins are pricey instruments. She could not financially afford to purchase the new violin, her found self, without getting rid of her busybody. Besides, despite all his talk, she had bonded with him over the years. She only noticed that now. And what about the sponsor? It felt like ingratitude or even betrayal to discard his generous gift. In accepting a gift comes the promise to handle it appropriately.
I understood the dilemma. If the violinist renounced her old violin she was acting contrary to her pure nature. It felt like infidelity. To find herself, she had to deny herself. A Gordian knot.
Alexander the Great failed to untangle the Gordian knot. Finally, he grabbed his sword and cut the knot. I advised the violinist more or less the same thing. Grab a hammer from your shed, silence the troublemaker forever and buy yourself from the insurance money.
Sometimes in art you have to be ruthless.
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