7 Levels of Music
The Seven Levels of Music
This treatise was written originally over twenty-five years ago and was subsequently lost. I have recreated it here from memory.
Both musicians and listeners have differing abilities in being able to create, or appreciate, music. Some artists can barely carry a tune, while others bring some listeners to something approaching a revelatory or divine experience. Listeners, likewise, vary in their abilities. Two people may listen to a classical masterpiece, with one being aware of all the subtleties while the other may find it utterly boring.
In point of fact, music is something in which both musician and listener alike may achieve proficiency, with practice, learning and experience. Each new level of understanding and artistry brings a higher level of communication with which both may enjoy the creativity and expression which is the purpose of music. This piece attempts to define the levels.
Level one for the musician is the most basic level at which the artist can recreate a recognisable line. Notes on a scale, a familiar passage of a song, the competance is ground zero. And the listener will be able to deduce what line is being played, and gain little more.
Level two is where emotion begins entering the playing. The musician has begun to develop a vocabulary of expression thru the instrument, being able to present his feelings in a way that can be received, that can stimulate similar feelings in the listener. Again, for the emotional aspects, this is ground zero. Most run of the mill musicians fall into this category.
Level three presents a much broader vocabulary of expression for the musician. He can create feelings thru his instrument of great depth and intensity, over a broad range of feelings. The listener becomes truly involved emotionally with the piece being played, his own feelings being drawn into the music and following in lock-step with the changes as they are played. Here, you find the superstars, the kinds of artists that generally are successful, have faithful fans and tend to bring a concert alive with intensity.
Level four is the level of the virtuoso. At this level, the musician has mastered his instrument, to the degree that his vocabulary is complete enough to express anything with no limits from the instrument itself. The listener at this level is similarly complete in his ability to comprehend the subtleties of the music with no limits, nothing beyond his comprehension. There is created a channel in both musician and listener at this stage in which the exchange between them is so complete, one can often forget the medium of music that is the vehicle, the language being used. It is no longer a song or a composition, but rather an experience. Within the material world, this is the ultimate.
But…there is more.
The first four levels involve only the musician and his feelings, and the listener and his emotional response. There is far more, however, that can enter the exchange.
We often hear the word “Inspiration” being used around artistry of all kinds. We see something that is so perfect, so much a thing of beauty, so intense in its raw power, that we know it goes far beyond what could have been created by simply the calculating mind on the human level. One can sometimes feel a presence, an external entity taking part in the exchange, an outside influence that is far beyond the minds of musician OR listener.
Level five opens the door to this category of outside influence. At this level, the musician has so mastered his instrument, he can achieve a trance-like state while playing and submit his performance to the partial control of beings outside himself, beings more advanced, beings which can bring his performance even higher, to a level he would be incapable of reaching on his own talents. When a performance like this is going on, one can sometimes feel a disconnection with time and the material world, a disconnection with one’s own body and a heightened awareness of things on a different level and a different place, wherever the music itself brings you.
The listener in turn also has the ability to follow in the same way, taking part in the disconnection with the physical and entering the higher state of consciousness. At this level, the music can be the vehicle for a channel of spiritual influence, coming from anything from another artist that has passed on and wishes to share his artistry, to a higher spiritual being with a lesson to be taught. The artists capable of this level are rare indeed.
Level six is the level of mastery of this kind of channel. The musician has control over the gates thru which the channel arrives and functions, can seek out specific influences, turn them on and off at will and has the discernment to know his sources. The listener can be a full receiver of all that is being channeled, again with complete control, the ability to turn the channel on or off at will, the discernment to know what–or sometimes even who–is coming thru. Again, with each level of advancement, the artists capable of performing number fewer and fewer. And on this level, they can probably be counted on the fingers of one hand.
This is not to say that others cannot have the experience. Many times, any given musician can have a magic moment, a very special performance that lives on in the memories of all involved for years to come. With the basic prerequisites of a vocabulary with one’s instrument, a vocabulary sufficient to cover all the possible content to be expressed with a given piece, and also given a pure state of mind with nothing interfering with the process, anyone can click into that magic experience and, with the cooperation of the listener who, at this level, is an integral part of the process, the musician can produce such a moment.
With anyone on a spiritual path, there can be defined a point of perfection, of coming to the end of one’s path, a point where one’s awareness and understanding is as complete as it can become in this physical plane.
Level seven is the level of that perfection. The musician has completely mastered communication thru his instrument, to the point where there is absolutely no impediment to expression, and his spiritual awareness is similarly near total. He can turn on the channel at will, from the highest possible sources, and generate a magic moment whenever desired. The listener, given a musician at that level, can similarly experience the fullness of such a moment whenever it occurs in his presence. The artists who can achieve this level are rare indeed. Among classical composers, perhaps Beethoven or Mozart. Ravi Shankar may be there. Perhaps a few choral groups. In the rock medium, we may be limited to only Jimi Hendrix, or the Beatles, at a very few rare moments.
But–those moments are worth waiting for. 🙂
Copyright © 3/18/05
Anthony D’Andrea
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