Art & Aesthetics

Two Questions That Help Answer “Are You Intrinsically Motivated?”

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(The Attributes of Deliberate Practice: Commitment, Motivation, and Willpower) “It’s damn cold. My fingers are numb, and useless. With each breath, the intake is shocking, as if my lungs had already forgotten the frigid air inhaled only seconds before. I’m hunched with my arms curled around my knees in a desperate play to lose as little body heat as possible. And I’m so tired. Not just from the lack of sleep, but from the journey…this seemingly endless path. Tortuous and punishing. In moments like these, it’s hard not to ask ‘Why the …

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Why did MUSIC win the “cagematch”?

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Okay, so as discussed last time, my “science vs. music” situation wasn’t really a “cagematch”…or even Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out. I did not experience my education as a zero-sum competition for my identity, with one field’s gains necessitating the other’s losses, ultimately leading to “victor” and “vanquished.” Instead, I’ve always found science and music to be overlapping and mutually reinforcing. They augment each other. They are cross-pollinating. I wrote that, for me, music and physics “are really just different directions on the same axis. We seek outward on that axis of curiosity to …

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Science vs. Music: the CAGEMATCH

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(or, “Being a Liberal Arts Human-Venn-Diagram”) “So…do you miss science?” I get asked this question a lot. Which I totally understand. I’m a “human venn diagram” after all, with seemingly disparate skill sets that overlap in unusual ways. Specifically, I’m one of a small handful of players in major orchestras who’ve had full and totally different careers prior to winning a big audition. I currently know of four others: Mark Almond, the recently-appointed co-principal horn of the San Francisco Opera who previously practiced medicine in England; Steven Hendrickson, the former principal trumpet …

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