The Third French Horn

I have been preoccupied with art of late. I find myself thinking about what art is almost incessantly. What is its purpose? What is good art and what is an imposter? What is kitsch? Can we judge works of art objectively? I work in a field in which we speak of the science and of the art, as different entities both encapsulated by the overarching umbrella of medicine. What does that mean exactly?

It seems that real, genuine works of art reveal something about the world that is inherently true-and thus speaks to us all. It reveals something of the metaphysical that otherwise lies hidden just beyond the veil of our phenomenological experience. We suspect it is there but we have such trouble proving it to be so. Our science, as profound and life-changing and absolutely breathtaking as it is at times, has little to say on the subject and yet art winks at us, almost conspiratorially, and whispers "yes, but look at this." Science gives us Newtonian facts that we can apply within the world to achieve fantastic utilitarian ends. Art gives us spiritual circumstantial evidence of a deeper truth that we can apply to ourselves to achieve a greater understanding of our place and our role in the Universe. Art seems to me to be the handmaiden of religion or, at the very least, a key to unlocking our own mystery of being and place in the cosmos.

With at least some type of definition to work with then it seems quite possible to judge works of art objectively. If you like the Rolling Stones Satisfaction more than Beethoven's finale of the Eroica and I the reverse, who is to say that I am right or that you are? Yet, working within a definition of art that helps give it a purpose, it seems quite clear that the Eroica is a stunning artistic achievement that is worthy of the respect of the ages while Satisfaction is a catchy tune and a lot of fun to dance along to-but not anything close to the level of Beethoven's 3rd. Working within a definition of artistic purpose we can clearly say one is a greater achievement than the other. Yet, people do get pretty angry when one judges a work of art they love as less worthy than another which they find to be less appealing. The problem that arises seems to be that people perceive such a judgment as being reflective of their tastes-not of the works of art in question. Righteous indignation often ensues. We seem to forget that when making comparisons between works of art we are comparing the works themselves-not the subjective inclinations of the observers. We have difficulty distinguishing between the two though I suspect that in our hearts we know that we can, and moreover, that we should.

These ideas are far better explicated by people vastly more intelligent than I-people like Sir Roger Scruton in his excellent book Beauty or the famous art critic Kenneth Clark. I found myself thinking of art in a roundabout way as I thought about the art of medicine. The science is generally understood. We can measure it and we objectively compare our knowledge with the tests and the practicals and the myriad of other rulers of scientific intelligence that we have created for that explicit purpose. However, all the science in the world won't save you if you haven't any art. On the other hand, art without scientific knowledge in the field of medicine is a non-starter. So we spend a decade or so acquiring the scientific knowledge and we ignore the art almost completely. We know the best clinicians however not by their requisite fund of medical knowledge but by how they treat their patients and how they diagnose; how they perform a physical exam; how they look and listen and touch and act. And this concept of art within an otherwise rational trade-even one as entwined in the human condition as medicine necessarily is-is not restricted. There is surely an art to the master electrician or the master mechanic. There is a subtle, almost magical, quality that is revealed when observing somebody do something, anything really, with absolute perfection. It looks effortless but only because that skill has been bought at the price of making every conceivable error possible over years and years of practice and, most importantly, learning from those mistakes and remembering them. One has to get up everyday and think that today I am going to give it everything I've got. As Martin Luther King, Jr so eloquently noted in his April 9th, 1967 speech "The Three Dimensions of a Complete Life"

"What I’m saying to you this morning, my friends, even if it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, go on out and sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures; sweep streets like Handel and Beethoven composed music; sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry; Sweep streets so well that all the host of heaven and earth will have to pause and say, 'Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well.'"

This famous passage from the "street sweeper speech" suggests that even street sweeping could produce a master artist. There is, in a peculiar sense, art that can exist in what we do and how we act as much as there is art in the actual works we create. And as there are true, masterful works of art that exist and lesser works of art that exist, there are ways of judging masters in any sphere of human activity-law, medicine, auto repair and yes, street sweeping.

Thus, I am back to Beethoven's Eroica. When first written in the early years of the nineteenth century, Beethoven was recovering from a horrible blow to his psyche. He realized he was slowly going deaf (apocryphally, as he was taking a spring walk one day with his friend who commented on the beauty of the birdsong that Beethoven realized he could not hear). This terribly ironic malady for a composer, must have been a heartbreaking blow to the spirit. Indeed, he noted to friends that he at times considered suicide as doctor after doctor failed to help him. However, instead he wrote to friends in 1802, "only my art held me back. It seemed to me impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt was within me." And so, the Eroica, Beethoven's Third Symphony, was produced. Its heroism is undeniable and indeed it was originally written for Napoleon and entitled "Bonaparte" before Napoleon proclaimed himself as Emperor and disappointed and angered Beethoven.

Apparently, it stunned people at the time. It was so long. It was so technical and complicated. It was so different from most anything else done at the time. There were three french horns! The usual convention was for two. And yet, it grew on people and within a few years it was recognized as the staggering work of genius that it is. Who else but Beethoven could have written the Eroica? Who else had such art, such transcendental truth of the world, to express? Who else would have put that third french horn on stage?

I have tried to think of that extra horn-that little addition that nobody else would have thought to do-as I drive into work now. Perhaps my third horn is taking an extra minute to find that quiet diastolic murmur. Or an extra 30 seconds to get a better history of present illness. Or just a soft touch to the elbow or a warm grasp of the hand before I leave the room-a reminder of our common humanity in an often mechanistic and purely scientific environment-as a nod to the practical art in our own lives.

It's a long symphony but if you have 15 minutes of time I'd recommend taking a listen to the 4th and final movement at the link below. The importance of that third horn becomes self-evident just after the eight minute mark. Sit back. Close your eyes. Enjoy that third french horn.