I do, on the other hand, have friends who have had the opportunity to experience this feeling as their musical profession on a regular basis. In watching them play together, I think, Tim, you are absolutely correct in saying that musicians need to balance their systemizing physical prowess and empathizing emotional intelligence. Each member of the band must work together to form one cohesive sound. Each member also works individually on improving their craft through endless hours of practicing and fine-tuning. The result of this balance is a beautiful medley of parts coming together to make a whole.

My sister runs choir workshops for people who have never sung at all, let alone together. She says it’s absolutely wonderful when after the first 20 or 30 minutes she can see that look going across their faces: Aha! so this is what they’ve been talking about all these years!

You’re also absolutely right that you shouldn’t stop just because you’re not going to make it to the top. I still play, just not the trumpet, as that takes too much practise time each and every day if you’re not going to be making a living at it.

Yes, I think you’re right that empathy or emotional intelligence is more important in jazz than it is in orchestral playing: but then every orchestral player really wants to be the soloist, where it is just as important again. In fact, the difference between someone sitting in the first violin section and the soloist is just that: the level of empathy they bring. The level of technical skill will be exactly the same which was really rather my point.

I would point out that not only does empathy play a crucial role in your success in terms of your ability to interact with your fellow musicians, whether improvising or not, but it is also critical to empathize with your audience. After all, why do we go to hear a band play? To the symphony or the opera? To see one of the jazz greats in a rare show? Because we want to be moved! We want the players, the artists, to take us to a place we’ve never been before and we want to leave with a memory that sticks with us and resonates with us.

However, I’d add that in this spectrum of musicians there is a place for everyone – not all players will achieve the status that drives us, whether because of skill or simple chance, the role of the dice, but to stand in front of an audience even if only your family and play your instrument is a true and valuable thing. So many people wish they could play guitar, the trumpet, the drums and never even try. So even if you are not quite in balance and as a result think maybe you won’t get to that national audience, you still do a rare thing by playing. There can never be enough music in the world!

I only just today took my EQ test and I am not in balance either, however I am astonished to learn that I have above average scores on both scales. Perhaps I possess the right combination of emotional intelligence and native talent to achieve my dreams, but nevertheless I know that people get a kick out of hearing and seeing me play, and I get a kick out of that!

I realized how important empathy was to a musician recently when my husband and I went to a piano festival here locally. The pianist played a “Pictures at an Exhibition” by Modest Mussorgsky. I don’t know if you or your readers know the work–it was my first time hearing it. And wow. Mussorgsky wrote it after attending an exhibition of works by a recently deceased friend, and the piece expresses a wild grief. And the pianist’s phrasing expressed so well the humor, despair, rage, and sorrow. The effect was achieved through perfect timing–like an actor, perhaps.