The Emotional Muse, Help or Hindrance?

How exactly did my personal life come crashing down back in the day?  It was pretty simple, although when you are engaged in it you are not able to step back and objectively see what is happening to you.  The first half of my life I lived with my heart.  Back in the l980's the cultural dynamic in America supported such an existence.  Movies were about romance.  Music was about romance.  It was the expected protocol.  You looked for your soulmate.  You expected to be in love.  It was what we did in America.  I would learn years later living such a way actually can kill you.  When you come to expect all of those things from another person, suddenly when you do not have them you can fall apart.  Actually what happens is when you have a great deal of emotional and spiritual interaction with another person, when you lose the ability to be able to actualize those same feelings, depression occurs.  Depression is like a dark blanket of nonexistence.  It happens because of a human being's inability to feel emotion.  Now that's a predicament.  We are made human because of this ability to feel emotion, yet it is powerful enough to kill us.  It took me quite a long time to figure this out.  Among other things I suddenly did not have the outlet for sexual expression which for me at that time was intertwined with both my personal and artistic expression.  Really it all was the same thing.  It was nice while it lasted, but it didn't.  Having to contend with a sudden lack of sexual expression in addition to losing my once viable musical career created my personal wave of depression that last almost four years.  I was able to start a new phase of music by enrolling in the D.M.A program in composition at The Ohio State University.  It was difficult moving to Columbus, but I stuck it out.  To solve my depression dilemma I had to change myself.  I had to change my 80's type of romantic notions in lieu of something more relevant.  I discarded love as I had known in in a romantic capacity, and took control of my life.  From now on I got to chose what feelings I would feel.  This was a catharsis emotionally and musically.  This choice greatly augmented my compositional ability.  No longer did I harvest what I was feeling with no conscious control of it.  Now I would make myself feel the way I wanted.  Not to say I stopped harvesting positive emotion when it was available.  When I began composing again while working on ships, I used the close quarters of the ships and thus the crew to inspire me to write music.  I would find a woman with a positive vibration or aura an try to personify that in a piece of music.  Therefore I ended up with quite a few pieces named after women.  "Adrienne," "Ana," "Callifornia," "Erin," and more.  These spiritual vibrations were very important providing inspiration for each work.  I will never forget when studying with Dr. Dick Goodwin at the University of South Carolina how he scorned me for recognizing an inspiration as a viable basis for composition.  Without a concept how can one write anything?  Without a plan, an idea, or a desire what you write inevitably will be contrived as was some of his music.  Fervently but quietly I disagreed and continue writing music that had a deep emotional connection with myself.  Was this selfish, or was it Romantic as in the traditional definition of this style of European music?  Screw it. I was the composer, so I could do what I wanted.  That's part of the beauty of it. In a contemporary music program, one does not have to adhere to the rules of schooled composition or rather the methods of J.S. Bach.  Many people over the years have felt Bach's extreme piety was oppressive, and that is understandable.  Expressing the trials and tribulations of Jesus is lofty subject matter.  Many also never really understand the crucifixion of God's son Jesus was an example of humanity's ultimate sacrifice.  This was a sacrifice when compared to those of our own.  Having a concept in one's music is what makes it logical and therefore discernible by human beings.  There is an affective, spiritual, and emotional side of human beings that we completely do not control. Grappling with this quality which is professed by Jesus to make us more God-like is a life long's work.  It has been for me because without it, what would music be?  Boring.  At the same time it has been troublesome, especially when the emotional expression becomes anachronistic.  The world around us evolves as do we.  Therefore we constantly must monitor our emotional selves for controversy.  At times we much change.  What has become difficult for me is that several valid forms of music at which I excel rapidly are fading from America.  For this reason many jazz musicians see Paris, France as a more nurturing environment for their art.  This is aggravating to me.  Why should I have to move to a foreign country to pursue my music career?  Like your emotional psyche it seems we also can outgrow our countries.  The only logical conclusion I can draw about my musical output is that it is suited for film.  That is the only medium which openly allows and promotes the expression of deep feeling, except for traditional theater.  Of course poetry seeks to do the same thing, and often there is music involved.