Elizabeth Coffin
Dr. Knutson
IWC
12 October 2021
Cello Philosophy in Emotion
Lydia Rhea, clad in an orange turtle neck tank top and being the bright age of 21, flipped her hair behind her shoulder with a laugh. Looking off to the side, she remarked, “I’ve only been to Minnesota once, and um, like got caught in a blizzard. Seems pretty on brand for Minnesota.”
Being an idol for many young cellists through her 31,800 followers on Instagram, Lydia has already made something of herself in the music industry. Posting a healthy dose of practice tips, recitals, and political rants, Lydia proves that music is more than just a passion. Lydia believes that music is a career filled with creativity and purpose that impacts the world positively through emotional connection.
Lydia was first introduced to the cello at the age of five by her musical parents, and since then she has bloomed with success. Starting off her stardom at the age of nine, Lydia made her musical debut with the New World Youth Philharmonic Orchestra and the Fishers Chamber Players. Loving the atmosphere of smaller chamber playing, she has performed in numerous venues in her self-started quartet, Kairos. Kairos won both the top awards at the 2018 Fischoff National Chamber Competition– something that had never been done before.
With insight well beyond her years, Lydia made the decision to go into a pre-college program in Chicago, a town three hours away from her home, at age thirteen. The decision came naturally when her previous studio teacher sat her down and explained that her playing level is beyond what he can teach. They said that if she wants to continue to study music, she should apply for the Chicago program. The pre-college program in Chicago was a major jump in her music career due to the program having a conservatory feel. She was able to work alongside professional cellists and have more in depth private lessons that deepened her knowledge about the cello. Going to the pre-college program sparked something in her to pursue music. Lydia noted with ease that, “I never really remember having a lightbulb moment [to pursue music].” She recalled being in awe when entering her pre-college program because she had never been surrounded by such intense musicians her age: “I’m a pretty competitive person, so I thought if they can do that, I want to do it.” Her competitiveness led her to work extremely hard on audition repertoire, leading to acceptance at the Cleveland Institute of Music for a Bachelor of Cello Performance. Being a senior at the institution, Lydia is what young cellists aspire to be.
Lydia Rhea is a personal idol of mine, and sitting down to interview her over Zoom hit me with uncontrollable nerves. Being a cellist myself and in the same degree path as her, speaking to Lydia seemed like speaking to my future self. Through her social media presence, Lydia has informed me about various repertoire must haves, as well as strategies to help with my technique. Seeing her play online and also how confident she is with her career choice influenced me to pursue music, so speaking to her initially was nerve wracking. After the formal introductions, Lydia actually asked the first question about where I was from. I responded that I am attending Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota, and the instantaneous widening of her eyes and reminiscence of her time in Minnesota put all nerves at bay.
Lydia takes on being a musician with much pride despite not knowing what her future holds: “People make a career out of this [music] if they are willing to work really hard at it, and I think nowadays there are so many things you can do with a music degree. It used to be that you can teach, play in an orchestra, or become a soloist if you are one in a million.” Excitement radiated off of Lydia as she proceeded to list all the numerous job opportunities for musicians in today’s world. From podcasters to running admissions at summer festivals (a job she held this past summer), the ideas of careers seemed to flow out of her smiling mouth. Pausing, Lydia nodded as if to remind herself to conclude her thoughts: “There are just so many more things that you can do with a music degree that I find really interesting.” She looked at me directly and the excitement for her own future shined brightly in her eyes.
When deciding to choose a career in music, most musicians are met with the reality that their future will be filled with competition and little success. Through Lydia’s ease of speech and no true fear when it comes to her job prospects in the future, the idea that all musicians should take on this mentality arises. In fact, the stress of finding success would be taken away. In turn, the artists can truly focus on honing in on their craft and know that, as long as they are creative, there will be use and bigger purpose. Lydia reminds herself constantly that her actions now will result in something larger than herself later. Passionately and with full confidence, she urged, “Always look for the bigger picture and bigger purpose, taking risks, and knowing that things will not always work out the way you want, but other things will work out in ways you can’t even imagine. . . . There are people watching your career now that will help you with your career that you don’t even know yet.”
Despite this excitement towards her future, Lydia divulged with a laugh of embarrassment that sometimes she didn’t always handle the pressure of competitions well and the idea of performing. Sharing a large chuckle between us, she eventually flashed a smile that showed the depth of her stress with these competitions: “There were quite a few times where I would tie all my self worth into competitions.” Lydia shook her head and rolled her eyes at her past self. Speaking with clear annoyance, Lydia noted, “Looking back I’m like, ‘Lydia, honey, what are you doing?’” Shoving all her self worth into competitions didn’t make any logical sense. In the past, musicians would be discovered through winning competitions and land positions through orchestras due to there being only two major solo competitions. Today on the other hand, there are hundreds of competitions that have no clear criteria to determine a winner. There is no key to winning them, seeing as winning is all based on the judge’s personal opinion. By placing all of her self worth into these competitions, Lydia lost the correct viewpoint of what success is to her.
Lydia swore off music if her playing didn’t land her winning the competition, but nonetheless she found herself itching to get back to playing and finding her purpose on the cello. “I need to play,” Lydia passionately said while gesturing to herself. Her movements were confident and controlled, showing that she meant everything she said: “I’m not me without playing.” Lydia noted that when she would take breaks from playing due to not performing well in a competition or even due to injury, she spiraled into a depressive state because she wasn’t pursuing her purpose– Music. Purpose to Lydia is giving back in some way to society as well as herself. Through music she found an outlet that tackles social issues as well as explores connection amongst humans. When having this purpose of sharing music with others, it’s no wonder Lydia struggled to remain happy without it.
Enter the COVID-19 Pandemic.
The life of a musician is hectic and in the mindset of “go-go-go” all the time. When COVID-19 struck, Lydia was hit with the thought: “What was it [music] all for?”
The pandemic led Lydia to not practice for weeks on end and lose the drive to find her bigger purpose as a cellist. She practiced only because of lessons, but other than that she didn’t have anything to look forward to. Comedically, Lydia reenacted her thought process when forcing herself to practice: “I was like okay,” she pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes as if to seem extremely serious, “‘you do not need to practice for three hours.’” She shook her pointer finger as if scolding her past self: “‘You just need to practice for fifteen minutes then take a break.’ Normally if I can get myself to practice that fifteen minutes, that leads to an hour. I just had to get myself into that fifteen minutes.”
The pressures that COVID-19 brought on musicians are ones that shut most of them down– Lydia included. There didn’t seem to be an immediate purpose to practice, and after living the life of completing performances quickly and having instant gratification, it frustrated Lydia that she couldn’t shift her mindset at first: “I had to sit down and tell myself, ‘There will be a purpose for this in the future. You will be able to share it with other people in the future.’” Throwing her hands up as if in frustration she concluded with truthful annoyance, “‘But right now you just gotta do what you gotta do.’” Lydia’s frustration is understandable, seeing as the generic purpose of a musician is to share their music with the world. During a pandemic there is little opportunity to accomplish that, thus Lydia and fellow musicians felt extreme loss of purpose. The loss of purpose, although seemingly tragic, actually sparked Lydia to assess what she is doing and find the true purpose for music. The loss of live performances took everyone for a whirl, but overall stapled the need for music in society despite music being labeled prior as a “useless elitist job” (Rhea).
Lydia scoffed at the mention of the general public’s thoughts on what it meant to be a musician in this “elitist” career during a pandemic. Practically seizing with annoyance, she defended that music isn’t anything elite or excluding of others. “When you look at music or think of it in this narrow, classical framework,” she trailed off, furrowing her brows slightly as she pondered her next thoughts. Her eyes lit up as she realized the profound idea that makes music embedded in humanity: “Music didn’t start off as this elitist occupation. It started off as people pounding on wooden, African drums. . . . It has always been something that people do.” Lydia truly believes that society doesn’t understand what life would be like without music. “There is music at every large moment in your life,” she announced with a baffled laugh. Her rant continued as she painted the picture of life without music. Nobody would have music at weddings, in movies, and especially not during their Netflix binges during quarantine. Monumental moments that build us as humans would lack the emotional depth that music brings. Although STEM gives life security and solutions, Lydia attests that music and art make life worth living.
Throughout my experience with Lydia, she emphasized the importance of being creative in order to make life worth living. Music is not a career choice that is straight cut, but she lives by the ideology that as long as she is creative enough to build opportunities for herself, her career will fare well. Musicians just starting off their careers are in a tight boat of judgement on themselves as well as that of society. Seeing as the life of a musician isn’t something that comes in a textbook, musicians have to become creative and thoughtful when building their career.
Being a young cellist starting off her quest to make her career, Lydia is constantly looking towards the future of music. She believes that playing with purpose is what makes music continue to thrive and have connection with audiences. When playing a piece by composer Eugene Rodger entitled “Seven Last Words of the Unarmed,” Lydia recalled feeling an immensely strong connection with the audience. The piece is modern and inspired by police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement.
Normally, musicians are at a disconnect with emotions while playing. They are there to present their art and get a job done. There isn’t time to get caught up in emotion, despite having studied how to perfectly portray the correct emotion in their music. The audience and musician are on separate wavelengths emotionally during the performance.
This performance was much different.
Lydia’s own voice took a turn from being pepped up and full of life to being soft spoken and somber within seconds as she remembered hearing the sobs of the audience ring throughout the concert hall. Her fellow musicians teared up, and it took all her willpower to not break down herself.
This is the future of music.
Having a connection with the audience and taking them through emotions that music brings is what the future holds.
The life of a musician isn’t an easy one. It is filled with self doubt and lack of opportunities if one doesn’t have a creative outlook. What makes any career worthwhile is having creativity in one’s purpose and knowing that their purpose is larger than themself. Having characteristics similar to Lydia Rhea through being critical as well as excited for the future will help musicians find necessary balance in order to succeed. At the root of musicianship is the connection between music and emotion. That emotion, such as shown through Lydia’s own experiences, can connect the audience to the performers and teach both about the brilliance in simply feeling. As the conversation dwindled down to her final thoughts on music as a career, Lydia left me with this advice for future musicians: “For classical music to have a strong foothold in the future, or if you want to be a classical musician in the coming centuries, you need to take a hard look at the music you are playing. The way you are going to be able to relate more to people is not by bringing them to you, it is by you going to them.”
Works Cited
Rhea, Lydia. Virtual/Zoom Interview. 11 Sept. 2021.