Why and how I started music as a kid

(this is the first article on an anticipated five-step journey to where I stand now about music and why…more to come soon if you're interested !)

My name's Arnaud — "Arn…what ? Arnold ?!" — just pronounce "Arno" :-)

I'm French, 27 years old and work in an association. I was born and raised in the great city of Le Mans, I studied in the not-less-great city of Lille, and I'm now currently living in the city so many people think is the greatest French one: Paris.

I'm also a musician, and this means a lot to me ; are you curious to know why ? I'm inviting you to read the following lines : I'll try to tell you a bit about my story and why music — much more, music as a tool for social integration — matters so much to me.

I took much pleasure writing those lines ; I sincerely hope you take as much pleasure reading them.

As a kid, I was given the great chance — it is a tremendous chance, I'll try to explain why a little bit further — to play an instrument.

Around 8 or 9, I chose to start learning to play saxophone. Why this instrument ? Well, my older sister and brother played the piano and the guitar respectively, I must have felt the need to play something else. Furthermore, let's be honest : I don't know about you but I pictured myself the saxophone as an extra attractive instrument, both sexy and complicated enough for me to be proud to be able to play it.

Just to be clear : these weren't "bad" reasons that led me to a "bad" choice and I'm very happy to play saxophone today. I'm just pointing out that, at the time, as a kid, I wasn't fully aware of why I chose this precise instrument as my first and main access to what music is.

This "first and main access to music" is never neutral to anyone : I'll come back to it.

Anyway, I started learning. How ? Where ? At a music school, the most obvious and easiest way to learn music…for some people.

During two to three years, I took music lessons : saxophone, music theory and even some orchestra classes. I was enjoying playing music, not that much learning it : theory lessons especially were boring and complicated, I didn't get why we were having them and I'm sure saying this may have some echo to you if you took some lessons of that kind too.

At that time, saxophone and music didn't really mean anything special to me : I enjoyed playing, I enjoyed being a musician, but it didn't represent something much personal or intense. It was "just" an activity : if this activity had been sports, I may as well have become a sportsman (I truly believe that and still, picturing me as a sportsman looks like a fraud).

Then, aged 11, my family and I had to move back to my hometown (I spent my childhood elsewhere…not sure I'm confident enough to share where exactly) : Le Mans. I had to adapt to a completely different environment : a new house, a new school, new friends…even what could have been quite similar to what I took for granted earlier was different : music lessons there had nothing in common with what I was used to !

The reason ? The saxophone teacher I had the chance to come across was one of the best in France. As a result, the classes (even the exam to get admitted !) were extremely demanding : I remember not understanding what was expected from me, because both the level and nature of musical standards were completely unknown to me, as if what I had learned so far wasn't music…or the other way round.

For some reason, I still managed to get through all this. At some point, I even started to enjoy this universe : as soon as I started working quite hard, I felt more confident with myself and my musical abilities. As a consequence, I was feeling right : I knew that I belonged to this challenging — yet really exiting — world and, like my fellow music learners, I was looking for esthetic excellence and identified myself quite well to this shared objective.

This synthesized my conception and vision of music at the time : some constant search for esthetic and technical perfection, which required much practice and a mix of intelligence and sensibility that I couldn't see anywhere else. This specific reason gave this activity a great value and, to some extent, gave some to myself as well, as one of the possessors of this precious truth.

As a teenager, I dedicated most of my free time to this quest, spending two to four hours every weekday and ten to twelve hours over the weekends in music lessons, rehearsals with various set-ups (sax/piano, sax quartet, sax ensemble, orchestra…) and concerts.

Don't get me wrong : this was neither a constraint nor a burden of any kind. I enjoyed both playing music and the small world it got me into : taking my saxophone teacher as a model, I identified to my fellow music learners (especially saxophone players) and played and rehearsed with great motivation and intensity, because I had the feeling it filled not only my free time, but also my life itself, with a genuinely beautiful purpose.

What I didn't realize at the time, is that I was lacking two major components of both the musician and the man I was going to become : the understanding (I'd rather even use "feeling") of what music truly is, and the conception of musicians as not only the technical experts that composed the tight social circle I was myself part of, but much more as human beings who have, build and express a special connection to any kind of sound material…

(this is the first article on an anticipated five-step journey to where I stand now about music and why…more to come soon if you're interested !)