Last week I saw an unusual busker at the railway station.
Taro Hakase is a household name in his native Japan. As a violinist, he is equally at home in the worlds of classical and pop music.
He’s best known internationally for playing on Celine Dion’s song ‘To Love You More’, and he has played with many well-known Japanese pop artists. A composer himself, he has recorded many of his own tracks, as well as writing theme tunes for popular TV dramas, All Nippon Airways and Shinsei bank.
So it was a rare privilege to be standing less than ten feet away from him at St Pancras station last Tuesday, as he played an impromptu free concert in aid of the Japanese disaster relief effort. Every day last week he played at a different venue in London.
A crowd gathered to hear him play, including plenty of Japanese, but also – to judge from the messages in different languages on the Japanese flags spread at his feet – people of many nationalities. While he played, collections were taken for the British Red Cross relief effort in Japan.
Hakase-san’s playing was superb, accompanied by another violinist and a keyboard player. He didn’t speak much, but he didn’t need to – you could feel the emotions through his music.
Standing there among the crowd in the middle of a busy station was an odd experience, as if an invisible cathedral had materialised in the middle of the evening rush-hour. Most people stood and listened silently. A few were in tears.
I was there because I’d heard about Hakase from my wife, who is Japanese. We’re lucky that our family and friends in Japan are all OK, but we are obviously particularly concerned about the situation.
Hakase said in a BBC interview that when he heard the news of the earthquake and tsunami, he spent two days passing on useful messages on Twitter (@tarohakaseHATS) but then realised he wanted “to do something for Japan as a musician“.
It’s easy to be cynical about the value of the arts in the face of a disaster on the scale of a 9.0 earthquake. We even have a ready-made phrase for dismissing art as impractical: ‘Fiddling while Rome burns.’ But reflecting on the railway concert, it struck me that Hakase’s concerts are valuable in several different ways.
On a practical level, he is raising money for the relief effort. Yes, Japan is a rich country and much better prepared than most for earthquakes and tsunamis. But it’s clear that the sheer scale of the disaster has stretched the infrastructure beyond breaking point, and thousands of people have still not received the help they need.
Secondly, the music itself offers a form of consolation to the listeners, or at least a way of tuning into feelings that are hard to express.
It also provides a focal point for people to come together for mutual support. Hakase said in the BBC interview:
I started off thinking “What can I do? But now I feel “What can we do?”
And maybe it’s not too romantic to say that by sharing their art at a time of crisis, musicians – or any artists – can reaffirm the human spirit, by providing us with a touchstone for beauty as a counterweight to horror and destruction.
What do you think?
What value – if any – does art have in the context of a great disaster?
Is there a piece of music, art or writing that has helped you at a time of crisis?
If you’d like to contribute to the Japanese disaster relief effort, you can do so via this page. And if you’d like to help spread the word, maybe you could share that link with your friends, Twitter followers, blog readers etc.
About the author: Mark McGuinness writes about creativity, productivity and creative entrepreneurship at Lateral Action.
This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before. Leonard Bernstein
Great quote, thanks Orna. 🙂
I keep seeing that simply asking the question – what can I do, we do? – then taking some action – then rinse and repeat – is often so overlooked by most people. I’m actively challenging my own stories about that all the time!
That’s actually how I came to write this post. I was asking myself the question and thought “Well, I have a blog, every little helps…”
What remains constant is that we’re all human. We all need a respite from grief, from hardship.
Artists often respond quickly to world crises, and have the power to gather people around them. This is especially true for musicians. If we have the opportunity to call on our community to help another, then I think we should act. And if all we do is provide a little hope or peace in the middle of tragedy, I think that has real value, too.
Very well put. ‘Respite’ was one of the words I was fumbling for but didn’t quite lay my hands on.
Disasters happen to body, mind and spirit…it is the spirit that pulls recovery to body and mind. A no brainer for me, art is hugely important in that process. I have formed my life around it so perhaps that is no surprise. It can lead us to still waters….where recovery is made to the whole. Why is that such a hard concept for the world to accept? A nurturance that leads to tangible healing? Surely we are not so cynical.
I am a Katrina Survivor. Some days it is a simple song that makes all the difference in the world. Or a piece of art. A poem. A glimpse of a dancer’s dance.
I don’t think that can ever be undervalued. Very precious gifts those.
Fantastic post Mark.
Thanks Janice, touched to hear the post had resonance for you after what you’ve experienced.
I was about to write something similar, Janice. Art plays an important role in our emotional and psychological healing, which is just as important as physical rehabilitation.
You have captured this beautifully Mark, thank you.
My pleasure Joanna, as always.
We can if only we decide.
It is not just the ‘ART’ I see, but the ‘ACT’.
We can all make a difference in some way, no matter what talent is at our disposal.
In the end, it all boils down to this; we all have something to give, we just only don’t think it is worth it. All the same, give!
That’s worth pinning up above the desk!
Some might not count this as “art,” but your post made me think about the days after 9/11, when people didn’t know what to do with themselves and pretty closed up… but got themselves out to see live comedy.
Wall Street shut down, but the comedy clubs were packed.
As Stacey said above, we all need a respite from grief, from hardship.
Beauty, art, and humor too, can all provide such a respite. It’s amazing, really, that as a society we place such a low value on art. The ability to heal, to help people survive and thrive, is priceless.
I didn’t know that about 9/11, another kind of respite – makes perfect sense when you put it like that.
Hi Mark,
As always, a very meaningful article and deftly articulated.
Music has been many things for me: a bridge to connect with others; warmth and solace when hardship casts its cold glare; a mountain to scream from.
The sympathy and compassion displayed in the wake of this disaster cannot but inspire hope, in people, in progress. When the earth changes, we suffer. But we don’t suffer alone.
Music can weave threads of empathy instantly, a short-cut to the heart. It can change the world. It can heal the world.
Conor
Thanks Conor, very poetically put, as I’d expect.
Conor,
“Music has been many things for me: a bridge to connect with others”
I agree!
A symphony of instruments that come together to make powerful, beautiful music. Good music can heal, connect, teach and deliver a message that touches the core of one’s being.
Thank you very much for such a timely post.
I’ve been glued to the live NHK broadcast for the last 10 days and breathing quietly deeply in the corner of a room praying and reflective about man’s (precarious) existence on the planet.
The Earth quaked to such a degree this time that it not only shifted the Earth on its axis, shortening the length of the day (by less than 2 microseconds), but it may have opened the box that we may not close so easily …
It just amazes me how ”brave” (?!) we are to use nuclear fission as a viable energy source, despite the fact that nobody can stop the process once it gets started and nobody even knows how to contain it once the cooling systems fail unexpectedly. We may have thought we snatched a great ‘fire’ from Heaven, but can we put it out?
I heard that some children at first thought those tsunami pictures were computer-graphics. They thought they were watching Hollywood disaster-film clips.
But then, me too, while growing up, I watched lots of ”monster” (Godzilla-type) movies or TV series in which towns and cities were almost always mercilessly destroyed; buildings, pylons and cars were scattered around while the Superman-type hero (eg. The Ultra-man, The Ultra-seven) fought against those monsters and rescued people. And by the time the movie ended, the broken towns were all miraculously restored as if nothing happened.
Today I watch the images of towns and cities devastated and turned into piles of rubble, and this time, there’s no Superman arriving in the horizon to rescue people. The towns would remain wrecked for some time. Thousands of lives never come back. It’s sub-zero temperature and snowing there yet little heating available in the camps. Radioactive rays in the air and contaminated sea water. A ban on the locally-produced milk and vegetable crops.
‘Is this really Japan?’ ‘Is this real?’ As was the case with 9/11, sometimes the truth is even more surreal than fiction.
And as Janice Cartier said earlier in the forum, I think it’s the resilience of human spirit that helps to rebuild and to begin again when all’s lost. So we need anything and everything — music, stories, poems — that encourages the spirits to get our lives going under any circumstances.
It’s not the Superman, but Super-spirit within us that powers us up and rescue ourselves.
Thank you for your heart-warming post again. Best wishes for everybody, there and here!
Thanks Chieko, for a beautiful comment that could be a post in itself.
Hard to believe. I was there a few weeks ago, everything seemed so orderly and serene.
I agree with Mark’s comment. Lovely comment, Chieko. Surreal does becomes the new real. It’s like going out beyond all the sign posts you’ve ever encountered in your life, to find you’ve arrived in a very strange place. So spirit, tending that…is a wise investment. I see at least five names here who’ve helped tend mine along the way, for which I am greatly appreciative. Including you Mark.
Thanks for this beautiful post Mark. In these times when so many of us feel discouraged that there’s nothing we can “do”, this story touched and opened at least one human heart (that would be mine), so there is now that much more compassion in the world. Multiply that by all the people who read your post and were moved by it, how can that not make a difference?
Thanks Marilyn, that’s a lovely thought.
One of the most eloquent, emotional, and beautiful cases presented for why the arts matter in times of hardship I have ever read….. the welcome address to parents of students at the Boston Conservatory by Karl Paulnack. SO WORTH taking to time to read it. http://www.bostonconservatory.edu/s/940/Bio.aspx?sid=940&gid=1&pgid=1241
Nancy,
Wow. You were right. Thank you for this. Great eloquence.
http://www.bostonconservatory.edu/s/940/Bio.aspx?sid=940&gid=1&pgid=1241
Oh my god, that was amazing. I’m SO glad I saw this comment in my email and clicked through to read Karl Paulnack’s address. Incredibly moving — it brought me to tears.
And I must confess many of those tears are from the validation that what I do IS IMPORTANT.
Thank you.
http://www.bostonconservatory.edu/s/940/Bio.aspx?sid=940&gid=1&pgid=1241
what Melissa said — wow. . . we need to all OWN this. Thank you Mark, for getting us here with your thoughtful post.
Wow, that’s a really great find, thank you!
Very good article-thank you. Since the earthquake, I have done several paintings related to my feelings about loss, support and the sense of nature’s power. A couple have been shared, however, one is so raw that it may never be shown. Oddly, after completing it, I thought of ways to make it better, technically speaking……but, the feeling was “spent” and the moment has passed. It came from deep within and any changes would be dishonest.
Thanks Debra. There’s a whole other discussion about the role of revision in creativity, but maybe we should save that one for another time…
Beautiful post, Mark, thank you.
You’ve probably seen this, but for something elusively moving and inspiring, this normally works for me:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY
🙂
Ah yes, I have seen it but it definitely bears seeing again. 🙂
A meaningful post, Mark. And insightful comments from your readers as well.
When reading, I was reminded of similarities to the orchestral group that continued to play on the Titanic.
The arts (music, visual, language, or dance) can bring a touch of magic and a little escape into our lives, which can make them so valuable in times of trouble.
Thank you to you and your readers for reminding us!
My pleasure Tracy. And yes, the comments are fantastic, not for the first time! I’m very lucky to have such great readers.
Mark, thank you so much for this important post, and thanks to the participants for posting such beautiful links.