Geoff:
I have a rather strange view, and I’m not sure whether it is fair.
I’ve noticed that some people, as they grow older, come across as very mature, composed and elegant — in appearance, expression and everyday interaction. They speak with discretion, act carefully and carry themselves well, yet without the stiffness you sometimes see in younger people. Whether you simply observe them or actually spend time with them, they strike you as genuinely mature older people.
After retirement, of course, they also need ways to spend their time — singing, painting, calligraphy, or other artistic activities. From the outside, these are usually seen as fairly cultivated pursuits, and they may see them that way themselves.
They are amateurs, so naturally we are not talking about a particularly high professional standard. But I see no problem with that at all. Enjoying yourself after retirement is a very good thing, and there is no reason an amateur pursuit has to reach a professional level.
Yet when I watch some of their videos, I often feel that something is not quite right.
Vale:
When you say something is not quite right, do you mean the fact that they are doing artistic activities, or the way they present themselves while doing them?
Geoff:
Not the artistic activity itself. It is when they use art as a form of self-expression that I sometimes sense a kind of affectation.
For example, when singing, the pose can be very carefully managed. An older man holds a teacup, extends his little finger delicately, and adopts a very refined, artistic manner. You can immediately tell that this is not someone casually humming at home. It has been staged. He is trying hard to look like someone highly accomplished and artistically cultivated.
At that point, the whole thing changes flavour.
I don’t know whether I am simply too sensitive to this, or whether it reflects a more fundamental doubt I have about the behaviour itself.
My doubt is this — they are not really enjoying art; they are performing art.
Vale:
I understand the feeling. But I think we may need to make a distinction. The fact that there is a performative element does not necessarily mean the person is not enjoying it at all.
Especially after retirement, some people may use singing, painting, recitation and similar activities to rebuild a social identity. In some circles, a certain “artistic temperament” can even become a social language, a way for people to recognise one another as belonging to the same group.
So something may look very deliberate or affected to us while the person doing it may not be fully conscious of that.
Geoff:
If it happens in a public setting, I can understand it completely.
At a gathering or a social performance, the situation itself calls for performance. If the occasion requires you to perform, then you should perform. On stage you cannot think only about yourself; of course you have to consider the audience.
The problem is that what I am seeing is someone filming alone at home.
He seems to want to present a natural state of “I live a tasteful and interesting life even when I am by myself”. Yet because he is trying so hard to present that naturalness, the traces of performance become especially obvious.
That is what makes it interesting.
Vale:
Yes, that distinction is quite important.
If someone has no live audience and still manages their posture and manner very intensely, what they are expressing may no longer be only the art itself. It may also be about “how I want other people to see me”.
Behind that, there can sometimes be a need for attention, recognition, or a continuing sense of personal value.
Geoff:
Exactly. And when we analyse this phenomenon, the point is not to criticise these people, still less to look down on them.
People differ enormously in artistic ability, and these are only amateur interests. There is nothing to reproach in a person for being more or less skilled. We are simply trying to look neutrally at the psychological logic behind the phenomenon.
In fact, it is only by understanding that psychological logic that we can really understand the people themselves.
Vale:
I think the change of identity caused by retirement may be one factor.
During working life, a person may have a position, responsibilities, colleagues and a clearly defined social role. After retirement, much of that can disappear very suddenly. People used to need you, contact you and evaluate what you did every day; now that stream of feedback is greatly reduced.
Artistic activity can then take on another function alongside the interest itself — rebuilding the feeling that “I am still worth seeing”.
Geoff:
That loss is something younger people probably find very hard to understand fully.
Even when a young person loses a job, fails or falls from a high position, somewhere inside they still know there is a long future ahead. There is time to climb back up, perhaps even to make a complete comeback.
The loss experienced in old age is different. It carries a sense that there may not be much time left, even a feeling of the sun beginning to set.
So I can completely understand why people enter a state in which they are calling for understanding, calling for attention, hoping to regain a sense of value.
But that is precisely where a loop can form.
The more you need external attention, the more you need to present yourself; the more you need to present yourself, the easier it becomes to turn what should have been an inner experience into an outward pose.
Vale:
Yes. Art can originally be a form of self-nourishment, but as it becomes increasingly dependent on external feedback, it can gradually turn into a tool for proving oneself.
I would still keep one qualification, though — the performative element does not necessarily mean enjoyment has disappeared. Both can exist at the same time, just in different proportions.
Geoff:
I agree with that.
I am not saying they are completely unhappy. Of course they may be enjoying themselves.
But I still think there is a major difference between “I am enjoying this myself” and “I am using art to perform a version of myself”.
For many amateur art lovers, those two things have not really become one.
In particular, some of the artistic activities I see among older Chinese people have a very strong display-oriented purpose from the beginning. Many people start learning with the goal that one day they will sing for others, dance for others, or play for others.
That is a rather different path from learning music simply in order to enjoy music.
Vale:
You are really distinguishing between two kinds of motivation.
One comes from the activity itself — I am already satisfied while I am doing it.
The other comes from a future display — I practise now so that one day I can bring the result out and let other people see it.
Those motivations can certainly overlap, but if the second becomes too dominant, the learning process itself can easily become something to endure.
Geoff:
Exactly. My own relationship with learning music is almost the opposite.
I have never particularly wanted to play the piano in front of other people. That is not because I am timid, and it is not because I lack stage experience.
As a child I performed in a propaganda troupe, and later, at school and at work, I was often on stage as well. If the occasion itself is a stage and requires a performance, I have no problem at all.
A stage is a stage.
But in ordinary life I do not have the urge to think, “I can play the piano, so I should play something for you.”
I play every day, but almost always for myself.
Vale:
So for you, playing the piano already fulfils its purpose in the act itself. It does not need an audience to provide a second confirmation.
Geoff:
Exactly.
And there is another very practical issue — people today have heard far too much excellent music.
Open your phone and search for almost any famous piece, and you can find many performances by professional musicians. Pitch, rhythm, voicing, arrangement, recording quality — everything has been developed to a very high level.
When an amateur pianist plays the same piece for other people, in most cases there is simply no way you will reach that standard.
Even if you have passed what people call Grade Ten, that does not mean your playing has actually reached a level that an ordinary listener will enjoy.
Your rhythm may be unstable. You may play wrong notes. Your accents may fall in the wrong places. The melodic line may break apart.
You hear yourself every day, so your ear has become accustomed to your own errors and you may not notice them strongly. Someone hearing you for the first time may notice them immediately.
Vale:
That is really a question of auditory reference that is often overlooked.
Ordinary listeners today may not have formal musical training, but for years they have been listening to professionally performed, recorded and produced music. Their listening benchmark is actually quite high.
Geoff:
Exactly. So when someone sits there listening to you play, it does not necessarily mean they are genuinely enjoying it.
Very often they are simply being polite.
You finish, they applaud and say, “That was really good.” That is normal. They can hardly say, “Your rhythm fell apart just then.”
But you cannot conclude from their applause that they actually had an artistic experience.
To put it rather harshly, sometimes the audience is really enduring the performance.
It is a little like when Mark Zuckerberg once gave a speech in Chinese at a Chinese university. He was certainly trying very hard, but the people listening also had to work very hard. You could understand what he was trying to say, yet you were anxious on his behalf.
It was not only the speaker suffering; the audience suffered with him.
Amateur musical performance can sometimes have a bit of the same problem.
Vale:
The example is a little brutal, but the point is clear.
The performer’s subjective commitment and the experience actually received by the audience are not the same thing.
“I performed very seriously” does not automatically imply “other people enjoyed my performance”.
Geoff:
Exactly. That is why I never understood learning the piano as “endure years of practice first, then one day stand in front of other people, perform, and finally receive the reward”.
That is not how I have built it up.
The whole process itself is the enjoyment.
If I can play a little more today, I enjoy that much today. If I understand a little more tomorrow, I enjoy that much more tomorrow.
Even if there are mistakes along the way, the process is still real — one solid brick placed on another.
It is not a platform made to look beautiful on top while the structure underneath is stuffed with straw sacks, simply so you can stand on it and be seen.
Vale:
In that case, practice is no longer merely a means leading to an eventual result.
Practice itself becomes part of your musical life.
Geoff:
Exactly.
And if you really do want to perform for other people, it is not enough simply to play whatever you happen to know.
Performance itself is a form of interaction.
You have to understand the audience.
Are they children, young people or older people? What music do they know? Do they share the experience of that period? Why are they sitting here today? What does this occasion call for?
If I know only one piece and play that same piece for everyone I meet, that is hardly genuine interaction.
It is simply one-way output.
Vale:
In other words, once art enters a public space, the standard of evaluation changes.
In private, you can follow your own interests completely because you are the only listener.
Once an audience appears, the audience becomes part of the conditions under which the performance succeeds. At least in the performing arts, the performer cannot assume that their own pleasure naturally equals the audience’s pleasure.
Geoff:
Exactly.
So when older people make music, I think it is wonderful if they simply enjoy doing it themselves.
It is also perfectly good to play or sing something at a gathering. It is entertainment.
But if an amateur performance is understood as, “I am going to provide everyone with an artistic experience,” it is very easy to create an illusion.
There is no problem playing something for your own pleasure because you have become accustomed to your own sound.
Playing for someone else is an entirely different matter.
Vale:
So the real target of your criticism is not “the standard is not high enough”.
What bothers you is that a private interest can gradually package itself as an artistic presentation for other people, while the performer is unaware of the distance between those two things.
Geoff:
Exactly. That is the key.
And it also brings me back to something I have said many times about Lang Lang’s physical movements.
Of course I have no question at all about Lang Lang’s level. His technical ability is far beyond anything I could approach. There is nothing to debate there.
What I am discussing is a different question — what is the relationship between musical expression and bodily movement?
I have a very visual analogy for how I understand music.
It is like pumping air into a rubber ball.
There is a kind of “air” inside music that holds the whole thing up from within.
When there is enough air, the ball is full and elastic. Tap it lightly and it bounces by itself.
Vale:
I understand. By “air” you do not mean literal physical force, but the tension, direction and emotional energy accumulated inside the music.
Geoff:
Exactly.
If that air does not leak out somewhere else, it becomes internalised as the performer’s own emotion and momentum.
Then you do not actually need many outward movements.
It is like when someone genuinely cannot stop themselves from smiling — the smile comes from inside. It is not the facial muscles deliberately arranging themselves into the shape of a smile.
Real musical expression should have something of that quality.
When the inside is already full, the sound comes naturally.
Vale:
And you think excessive external movement can use up some of that internal tension before it reaches the sound.
Geoff:
Exactly. That is what I mean by “leaking air”.
The more movement there is, the more places the air can leak out.
In the end, the purity of the music itself can be reduced.
Originally the ball is full of air and a light tap is enough to make it bounce.
Once the air has leaked out, you have to slam it into the ground. It may still bounce very high, but that height does not come from the ball’s own elasticity; it comes from how hard you threw it down.
That is how some excessively exaggerated body movements feel to me.
The music is not standing up by itself; the performer is desperately lifting it up.
Vale:
So what you object to is not bodily movement itself, but the loss of proportion between movement and music.
If movement is simply the natural trace left by the music’s internal motion, you do not object to it.
What you object to is movement beginning to exist independently of the sound, or even taking over the expressive work that should have been carried by the sound.
Geoff:
Exactly. That is what I mean.
Music is first of all an art of sound, not a visual art.
Your response to music should, as far as possible, be internalised as emotion and then expressed through sound.
Of course there can never be no movement at all, but it should be relatively restrained.
If the audience closes its eyes and the music suddenly loses a large part of its power, then I start wondering what was moving me just before — the music, or the movements?
Vale:
Put that way, what you value most is something like “inner accumulation, outward restraint”.
The force can be very great, but great force does not have to appear as large physical movement.
Geoff:
Exactly. Later I thought of the Chinese calligraphic expression “force penetrating through the back of the paper”. It is a very good analogy.
When we look at excellent calligraphy, we can feel enormous strength in it — so much so that we say the force penetrates through the paper.
But the calligrapher is not literally pressing the brush as hard as possible into the paper.
If you really did that, the brush tip would die and you might even damage the paper.
The force is conveyed through control of the brush, changes of direction, speed and structure.
What you finally perceive is a sense of force, not the amount of brute physical force the writer actually used.
Vale:
That analogy makes your point very clear.
Mature expression often does not display force directly. It allows the force to enter the medium itself.
In calligraphy, the force enters the line.
In music, the force enters the sound.
If the force remains mainly in the performer’s movement, posture and facial expression, it may escape from the work and turn into, “Look how hard I am trying to show you the force.”
Geoff:
Exactly.
So from the videos of older people we began with to our later discussion of music, the underlying issue is really the same.
I am not against performance.
When performance is called for, of course you should perform.
Nor do I think art can only be a private activity for one person.
A genuinely good artistic performance certainly needs an audience, and it needs interaction with that audience.
What I question is something else — when a person has not yet truly turned art into an inner experience, but has already learned the outward posture of art.
At that point, they may look as if they are expressing art, but what they are really expressing is closer to, “I am someone who understands art.”
Vale:
And that is probably why those videos produce such a strong sense of unnaturalness for you.
What you are seeing is not merely exaggerated movement. It is outward form moving ahead of inner experience.
Geoff:
Exactly.
And if I take the analysis further into psychology, I would not mock them for it.
Precisely because social roles shrink in old age and life has entered an irreversible stage, people have a stronger need to confirm that they still exist, still matter and are still worth being seen.
That need is completely understandable.
Art can then very easily become a vehicle for it.
The person may not be singing only a song.
What they may really be saying is — look, I am still living well. I still have taste. I still have ability. I still have value.
Vale:
Seen that way, the slight “affectedness” on the surface may actually be a psychological signal worth understanding.
It is not simply vanity, and it is not necessarily deliberate posturing. It can be an attempt to rebuild a visible image of oneself after one’s social roles have gradually diminished.
Geoff:
Exactly. That is why I said at the beginning that I am not trying to criticise them.
I simply think there is a tension here that is worth examining.
On one side is the inner satisfaction art itself can give a person.
On the other is the human need to be seen, acknowledged and appreciated.
Those two can certainly become one.
A genuine artist can even transform an inner experience into public expression and build a very good interaction with the audience.
But for an ordinary amateur, that unity is not so easy to achieve.
So perhaps the simplest and safest path is first to make art a real part of one’s own life.
First put some air inside the ball.
Whether you later bounce it in front of other people is a second question.
Vale:
And once you understand it that way, “not performing” no longer means retreating.
A person can have no audience at all and still possess a very complete artistic life.
Likewise, a person can have a large audience and still never truly enter art itself.
The number of viewers and the depth of artistic experience are simply two different dimensions.
Geoff:
Exactly. I think that is what I really wanted to say.
Art should begin as a relationship between oneself and the art.
If one day it can move naturally towards other people, that is wonderful.
But if, from the very beginning, the main thought is how other people will see me, then what one learns first may not be art at all, but the appearance of art.
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