Everyone is a composer!
The ability to breath is coupled with life itself, indeed days pass by, Experience! Each and every day that goes by is a line added to our story. Each and every line fills the pages of our book of life; Those are the stories narrated as our history. It’s up to us to narrate the stories ourselves, or for others when we expire. Because we lack courage, we fail to express. Fear of persecution prevents us from telling these stories, whilst most singers we follow out there put a beat to their life stories.
Music breathes life to dying souls, strengthens broken bones and heals. But where do all these powers come from? It’s simple, Life! Life brings life. Music is life. There is nothing more special than telling others that, what they are experiencing is not new, either we have lived it already or it has been lived by other people we know, or, otherwise, it is being lived by others we don’t know. As long as nobody talks about it, it remains a mystery.
Music is sharing a story. What inspires those stories? We now have the answer! Life! Things we see every day and how our senses decode them, how we feel about them, how we respond to them, how they make us love, or break our hearts; Things we hear, how they either inspire or break us, how they either make us happy or hurt our feelings; Things we touch, how smooth they are, how rough they are, how they give us warmth, how they give us goosebumps, how they make us freeze. Those are the experiences, they visit everyone in different circumstances, not on the same day, but eventually. Put it into perspective, that’s ART in itself. Our lives are a composition, we are the orchestrators, everyone is a Composer!
People around us, how rude they are, how they love us to succeed, how jealous they are, how supportive, how selfish they are!
Why am I including all this negativity? See, no matter how much we like it or not, life can be sweet, as much as it can be sour. We laugh, cry, love and hate because we are people, yes, in as much as we love to be happy sorrow gets jealous and impose itself on us even when we don’t want it. Laugh in a second, cry in a second, sweet and sour is life. But wait, those are the experiences that give our lives meaning. What gives us courage to still want to see tomorrow is the power and hope that we have, that no matter how much we cry now an instance of laughter will come. If we can fight away hurt, depression, misery, hopelessness, we become the Masters. But remember, we are not the same. Somebody out there struggles with the challenges you have mastered. That’s why your story can impart life on others. That’s why you need to tell it. Put that composition together, you are a composer! Everyone is a composer!
Music is what we live. As long as you live and still can draw air from the atmosphere, you compose. Most people who speak about what motivated their songs, will tell you about the things they saw happening in their society. Examples can be given on a number of songs a few of which we can give reference to.
As reported by Allan Duke of CNN in his interview with Jane Goodall, an English Primatologist and Anthropologist who is known for the study of Chimpanzees, Conservation and Animal Welfare told how the Michael Jackson’s song, ‘Heal the World’ came to life. In that interview, Goodall outlined how Michael Jackson’ love for Chimpanzees (Who’s said to made him smile) motivated him to write the song. He wrote the song angry and crying as he was watching tapes of animals in distress. However, the song was later directed to inhumanity around the world. He later created Heal the World Foundation to relieve poor children around the world. In that we can see how his empathy and love for Chimpanzees made him recognize that those distresses are the same happening in our lives every day. He told the story in a song. It changed the world. Even years after his death, it’s still Healing the World, so could everyone if they also tell their stories.
The story of Neria is another one inspirational story. The story of a widow who goes through a hard time as her husband’s brother Phineas takes all cash, property, together with the children claiming to be the heir to his brother. Neria’s brother Jethro (Oliver Mtukudzi) composes a song to comfort his sister. The song composed by Oliver Mtukudzi remains one of the best songs coming from Zimbabwe. The sorrow in the song tells a greater story of what Neria went through. As the song was composed in the hopes to heal Neria, it’s still being used as therapy even today to those finding themselves in the same situation. It portrays similar challenges in real life as people get consoled and healed by the song.
Ludwig Van Beethoven’s Fur Elise was written for his ‘mediocre’ student, Therese. He wanted to compose a very simple piece to teach her. Therese refused to marry him when he was in the midst of writing the composition. He ended up making the verses so difficult that she could never play the song. The song became one of the most profound and popular pieces of all time. The feeling it possesses tells the story of how emotional he (Beethoven) was. He never talked about the song, but it was published years later after his death.
But I am not encouraging people to do bad to others because they made choices not in their favor (as seen in Beethoven’s story). Am writing to show you how our life experiences should motivate us to write and share for the purposes of awareness, healing and encouragement. Many people may say, I can’t write music. That’s not an excuse! One of the best-selling singles of all time, “Con te partiro” (With you I shall live), has its music written by Francesco Sartori. But the lyrics came from Lucio Quarrantoto.
The idea is to tell your stories. However, I urge everyone to try and produce a melody. But, if you feel it’s not in you, music is not the only way you can tell your story. I am telling you this because I believe EVERYONE IS A COMPOSER.