(Music) (Applause)
(Muzika) (Aplauz)
Thank you very much. (Applause) Thank you. It's a distinct privilege to be here.
Hvala vam mnogo. (Aplauz) Hvala. Velika je privilegija naći se ovde.
A few weeks ago, I saw a video on YouTube of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords at the early stages of her recovery from one of those awful bullets. This one entered her left hemisphere, and knocked out her Broca's area, the speech center of her brain. And in this session, Gabby's working with a speech therapist, and she's struggling to produce some of the most basic words, and you can see her growing more and more devastated, until she ultimately breaks down into sobbing tears, and she starts sobbing wordlessly into the arms of her therapist. And after a few moments, her therapist tries a new tack, and they start singing together, and Gabby starts to sing through her tears, and you can hear her clearly able to enunciate the words to a song that describe the way she feels, and she sings, in one descending scale, she sings, "Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine." And it's a very powerful and poignant reminder of how the beauty of music has the ability to speak where words fail, in this case literally speak.
Pre par nedelja sam gledao na Jutjubu video o kongresmenki Gabrieli Gifords u početnim fazama njenog oporavka od jednog od onih onih strašnih projektila. Jedan je u ušao u njenu levu hemisferu mozga i uništio joj Brokin centar, centar za govor u mozgu. U dotičnom tretmanu Gabi radi sa govornim terapeutom i bori se da proizvede neke od osnovnih reči i možete da primetite kako joj je sve teže i teže, sve dok se na kraju potpuno ne slomi i počne da jeca bez reči u naručju svog terapeuta. Nakon nekoliko trenutaka njen terapeut pokušava sa novom tehnikom i počinju zajedno da pevaju i Gabi počinje da peva kroz suze i možete da čujete kako je u stanju da jasno izgovara reči pesme koja opisuje njene osećaje i ona peva, u silaznoj skali: "Neka sija, neka sija, neka sija." To je vrlo snažan i dirljiv podsetnik o tome kako lepota muzike ima sposobnost da govori tamo gde reči podbace, u ovom slučaju ona bukvalno progovori.
Seeing this video of Gabby Giffords reminded me of the work of Dr. Gottfried Schlaug, one of the preeminent neuroscientists studying music and the brain at Harvard, and Schlaug is a proponent of a therapy called Melodic Intonation Therapy, which has become very popular in music therapy now. Schlaug found that his stroke victims who were aphasic, could not form sentences of three- or four-word sentences, but they could still sing the lyrics to a song, whether it was "Happy Birthday To You" or their favorite song by the Eagles or the Rolling Stones. And after 70 hours of intensive singing lessons, he found that the music was able to literally rewire the brains of his patients and create a homologous speech center in their right hemisphere to compensate for the left hemisphere's damage.
Gledanje ovog snimka Gabi Gifords me podsetilo na rad doktora Gotfrida Šlauga, jednog od istaknutih neurologa koji proučava muziku i mozak na Harvardu, Šlaug je pobornik terapije nazvane melodijsko-intonacijska terapija, koja je sada postala vrlo popularna u muzikoterapiji. Šlaug je otkrio da osobe pogođene moždanim udarom i zahvaćene afazijom, koje nisu bile sposobne da formiraju rečenice od tri ili četiri reči, ipak i dalje mogle da pevaju reči pesme, bilo da se radilo o "Srećan ti rođendan" ili o njihovoj omiljenoj pesmi Iglsa ili Roling Stonsa. Nakon 70 sati intenzivnih časova pevanja, otkrio je da je muzika bila u stanju da bukvalno ponovo promreži mozgove njegovih pacijenata i da stvori odgovarajući centar za govor u njihovoj desnoj hemisferi da bi nadoknadio oštećenje leve hemisfere.
When I was 17, I visited Dr. Schlaug's lab, and in one afternoon he walked me through some of the leading research on music and the brain -- how musicians had fundamentally different brain structure than non-musicians, how music, and listening to music, could just light up the entire brain, from our prefrontal cortex all the way back to our cerebellum, how music was becoming a neuropsychiatric modality to help children with autism, to help people struggling with stress and anxiety and depression, how deeply Parkinsonian patients would find that their tremor and their gait would steady when they listened to music, and how late-stage Alzheimer's patients, whose dementia was so far progressed that they could no longer recognize their family, could still pick out a tune by Chopin at the piano that they had learned when they were children.
Kao sedamnaestogodišnjak posećivao sam laboratoriju doktora Šlauga i jednog popodneva me proveo kroz jedno od vodećih istraživanja o muzici i mozgu - o tome kako su muzičari imali iz temelja drugačiju strukturu mozga u odnosu na ne-muzičare, kako muzika i slušanje muzike, može jednostavno da osvetli ceo mozak, od prednjeg mozga pa sve do malog mozga, o tome kako muzika postaje neuropsihijatrijski metod za pomoć autističnoj deci, za pomoć onima koji se bore protiv stresa, anksioznosti i depresije, kako se teško obolelim od parkinsonove bolesti primetno smirivalo podrhtavanje i hod postajao stabilniji kada bi slušali muziku i kako bi oboleli od Alchajmerove bolesti, čija je senilna demencija toliko uznapredovala da nisu više prepoznavali svoju porodicu, još uvek mogli prepoznati Šopenovu melodiju za klavir koju su naučili kada su bili deca.
But I had an ulterior motive of visiting Gottfried Schlaug, and it was this: that I was at a crossroads in my life, trying to choose between music and medicine. I had just completed my undergraduate, and I was working as a research assistant at the lab of Dennis Selkoe, studying Parkinson's disease at Harvard, and I had fallen in love with neuroscience. I wanted to become a surgeon. I wanted to become a doctor like Paul Farmer or Rick Hodes, these kind of fearless men who go into places like Haiti or Ethiopia and work with AIDS patients with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, or with children with disfiguring cancers. I wanted to become that kind of Red Cross doctor, that doctor without borders. On the other hand, I had played the violin my entire life.
Ali imao sam još jedan razlog za posetu Gotfridu Šlaugu, a to je: nalazio sam se na raskrsnici svog života, pokušavajući da izaberem između muzike i medicine. Upravo sam završio svoj redovni studij i radio sam kao asistent u laboratoriju Denisa Selkoa, proučavao sam Parkinsonovu bolest na Harvardu i zaljubio sam se u neurologiju. Želeo sam da postanem hirurg. Hteo sam da postanem doktor poput Pola Farmera ili Rika Hodsa, tih neustrašivih ljudi koji su odlazili na mesta kao Haiti ili Etiopija i radili sa obolelima od SIDE sa tuberkulozom višestruko otpornom na lekove ili sa decom koja su se raspadala od raka. Hteo sam da postanem takav doktor Crvenog krsta, takav doktor bez granica. Sa druge strane, svirao sam violinu celog svog života.
Music for me was more than a passion. It was obsession. It was oxygen. I was lucky enough to have studied at the Juilliard School in Manhattan, and to have played my debut with Zubin Mehta and the Israeli philharmonic orchestra in Tel Aviv, and it turned out that Gottfried Schlaug had studied as an organist at the Vienna Conservatory, but had given up his love for music to pursue a career in medicine. And that afternoon, I had to ask him, "How was it for you making that decision?"
Muzika je za mene bila više od strasti. Bila je opsesija. Bila je kiseonik. Imao sam sreću da studiram na Džulijardu na Menhetnu i da sviram svoj prvi koncert sa Zubinom Mehtom i Izraelskom filharmonijom u Tel Avivu i ispostavilo se da je Gotfrid Šlaug studirao orgulje na Bečkom konzervatorijumu, ali je odustao od svoje ljubavi prema muzici da bi nastavio karijeru u medicini. Tog poslepodneva sam morao da ga pitam: "Kako ti je bilo kod donošenja te odluke?"
And he said that there were still times when he wished he could go back and play the organ the way he used to, and that for me, medical school could wait, but that the violin simply would not. And after two more years of studying music, I decided to shoot for the impossible before taking the MCAT and applying to medical school like a good Indian son to become the next Dr. Gupta. (Laughter) And I decided to shoot for the impossible and I took an audition for the esteemed Los Angeles Philharmonic. It was my first audition, and after three days of playing behind a screen in a trial week, I was offered the position. And it was a dream. It was a wild dream to perform in an orchestra, to perform in the iconic Walt Disney Concert Hall in an orchestra conducted now by the famous Gustavo Dudamel, but much more importantly to me to be surrounded by musicians and mentors that became my new family, my new musical home.
Odgovorio je da i dalje ponekad zaželi da svira orgulje kao što je to nekada radio i da u mom slučaju škola medicine može da čeka, a da violina to jednostavno ne može. Posle još dve godine muzičkog usavršavanja, odlučio sam da pokušam nemoguće pre nego što se pojavim na prijemnom ispitu za medicinu i upišem se na fakultet kao poslušan indijski sin kako bih postao novi dr Gupta. (Smeh) Tako sam odlučio da pokušam nemoguće i pojavio sam se na audiciji za cenjenu Los Anđelosku filharmoniju. To je bila moja prva audicija i nakon tri dana sviranja, probne nedelje iza scene, ponudili su mi mesto. A to je bio san. Bio je neverovatan san biti član orkestra i svirati u kultnoj Koncertnoj sali Volta Diznija, u orkestru kojim sada diriguje poznati Gustavo Dudamel, ali za mene je bilo još daleko važnije to što sam bio okružen muzičarima i mentorima koji su postali moja nova porodica, moj novi muzički dom.
But a year later, I met another musician who had also studied at Juilliard, one who profoundly helped me find my voice and shaped my identity as a musician. Nathaniel Ayers was a double bassist at Juilliard, but he suffered a series of psychotic episodes in his early 20s, was treated with thorazine at Bellevue, and ended up living homeless on the streets of Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles 30 years later. Nathaniel's story has become a beacon for homelessness and mental health advocacy throughout the United States, as told through the book and the movie "The Soloist," but I became his friend, and I became his violin teacher, and I told him that wherever he had his violin, and wherever I had mine, I would play a lesson with him.
Ali godinu dana kasnije, sreo sam još jednog muzičara koji je takođe studirao na Džulijardu, koji mi je posebno pomogao da pronađem svoj način izražavanja i oblikujem svoj muzički identitet. Natanijel Ajers je bio kontrabasista na Džulijardu, ali je kao dvadesetogodišnjak imao seriju psihotičnih epizoda, lečen je hloropromazinom u Belvjuu i 30 godina kasnije je završio kao beskućnik na ulicama Skid Roa u centralnom Los Anđelesu. Natanijelova sudbina je bacila novo svetlo na beskućništvo i na prevenciju mentalnog zdravlja u Sjedinjenim Državama, kao što je prikazano u knjizi i u filmu "Solista", ali ja sam postao njegov prijatelj i postao sam njegov učitelj violine i rekao sam mu da gde god bude imao svoju violinu i gde god ja budem imao svoju, da ćemo održati naš čas.
And on the many times I saw Nathaniel on Skid Row, I witnessed how music was able to bring him back from his very darkest moments, from what seemed to me in my untrained eye to be the beginnings of a schizophrenic episode. Playing for Nathaniel, the music took on a deeper meaning, because now it was about communication, a communication where words failed, a communication of a message that went deeper than words, that registered at a fundamentally primal level in Nathaniel's psyche, yet came as a true musical offering from me. I found myself growing outraged that someone like Nathaniel could have ever been homeless on Skid Row because of his mental illness, yet how many tens of thousands of others there were out there on Skid Row alone who had stories as tragic as his, but were never going to have a book or a movie made about them that got them off the streets? And at the very core of this crisis of mine, I felt somehow the life of music had chosen me, where somehow, perhaps possibly in a very naive sense, I felt what Skid Row really needed was somebody like Paul Farmer and not another classical musician playing on Bunker Hill.
U mnogim trenucima u kojima sam video Natanijela na Skid Rou, video sam kako je muzika mogla da ga povrati iz njegovih najcrnjih trenutaka, iz onoga što je meni i mom neuvežbanom oku izgledalo kao početak šizofrenične epizode. Svirati za Natanijela, muzika je dobila dublje značenje jer se tu radilo o komunikaciji, komunikaciji tamo gde su reči zakazale, komunikaciji poruke koja treba da prodre dublje od reči, koja je upisana u osnovnom nagonskom nivou Natanijelove psihe i koja dolazi kao istinski muzički poklon od mene. Postajao sam sve ogorčeniji zato što neko poput Natanijela može da završi kao beskućnik na Skid Rou zbog svoje mentalne bolesti i koliko ima još desetina hiljada drugih koji su sami tamo na Skid Rou, sa podjednako tragičnom sudbinom, ali za razliku od njega nikad neće imati knjigu ili film o sebi koji bi ih mogli skloniti sa ulice? U samoj srži te svoje krize, osetio sam kako je muzički život izabrao mene i nekako, možda verovatno u vrlo naivnom smislu, osetio sam da je Skid Rou zaista potreban neko poput Paula Farmera i ne još jedan klasični muzičar koji svira na Bunker Hilu.
But in the end, it was Nathaniel who showed me that if I was truly passionate about change, if I wanted to make a difference, I already had the perfect instrument to do it, that music was the bridge that connected my world and his.
Na kraju, Natanijel je bio taj koji mi je pokazao da ako sam zaista posvećen tome da nešto promenim, ako sam zaista hteo da napravim razliku, već sam imao savršen instrument za to, muzika je bila most koji je povezao moj svet sa njegovim.
There's a beautiful quote by the Romantic German composer Robert Schumann, who said, "To send light into the darkness of men's hearts, such is the duty of the artist." And this is a particularly poignant quote because Schumann himself suffered from schizophrenia and died in asylum. And inspired by what I learned from Nathaniel, I started an organization on Skid Row of musicians called Street Symphony, bringing the light of music into the very darkest places, performing for the homeless and mentally ill at shelters and clinics on Skid Row, performing for combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder, and for the incarcerated and those labeled as criminally insane.
Postoji lep citat romantičarskog nemačkog kompozitora Roberta Šumana, koji je rekao: "Poslati zrak svetlosti u tamu ljudskih srdaca, eto to je dužnost umetnika." To je posebno dirljiv citat jer je i sam Šuman patio od šizofrenije i umro u utočištu. Inspirisan onim što sam naučio od Natanijela, osnovao sam organizaciju muzičara na Skid Rou nazvanu Ulična simfonija, koja donosi svetlost muzike u najmračnija mesta, koja svira za beskućnike i mentalno bolesne u prihvatilištima i klinikama na Skid Rou, koja svira za ratne veterane sa post-traumatskim stresnim poremećajima i za zatvorenike i one koji su označeni kao kriminalno ludi.
After one of our events at the Patton State Hospital in San Bernardino, a woman walked up to us and she had tears streaming down her face, and she had a palsy, she was shaking, and she had this gorgeous smile, and she said that she had never heard classical music before, she didn't think she was going to like it, she had never heard a violin before, but that hearing this music was like hearing the sunshine, and that nobody ever came to visit them, and that for the first time in six years, when she heard us play, she stopped shaking without medication.
Posle jednog od naših koncerata u Državnoj bolnici Paton u San Bernardinu, jedna žena nam je prišla i suze su joj tekle niz lice, a imala je paralizu, tresla se, ali je imala i taj predivan osmeh i rekla je da nikad ranije nije čula klasičnu muziku, nije ni pomišljala da bi joj se svidela, nije nikada ranije čula zvuk violine i slušanje ove muzike je bilo poput slušanja sunčeve svetlosti, nikada niko nije došao da ih poseti, i da je, prvi put u šest godina, kada je čula naše sviranje, prestala da se trese bez pomoći lekova.
Suddenly, what we're finding with these concerts, away from the stage, away from the footlights, out of the tuxedo tails, the musicians become the conduit for delivering the tremendous therapeutic benefits of music on the brain to an audience that would never have access to this room, would never have access to the kind of music that we make. Just as medicine serves to heal more than the building blocks of the body alone, the power and beauty of music transcends the "E" in the middle of our beloved acronym. Music transcends the aesthetic beauty alone. The synchrony of emotions that we experience when we hear an opera by Wagner, or a symphony by Brahms, or chamber music by Beethoven, compels us to remember our shared, common humanity, the deeply communal connected consciousness, the empathic consciousness that neuropsychiatrist Iain McGilchrist says is hard-wired into our brain's right hemisphere. And for those living in the most dehumanizing conditions of mental illness within homelessness and incarceration, the music and the beauty of music offers a chance for them to transcend the world around them, to remember that they still have the capacity to experience something beautiful and that humanity has not forgotten them. And the spark of that beauty, the spark of that humanity transforms into hope, and we know, whether we choose the path of music or of medicine, that's the very first thing we must instill within our communities, within our audiences, if we want to inspire healing from within.
Iznenada, ono što smo otkrili uz ove koncerte, daleko od bine, daleko od svetlosti pozornice, daleko od smokinga, je da su muzičari postali sredstvo za davanje neverovatnih terapeutskih koristi koje muzika daje mozgu publike koja nikada ne bi imala priliku da uđe u ovu sobu, nikada ne bi imala pristup toj vrsti muzike koju mi sviramo. Kao što medicina služi da bi lečila više od sastavnih delova samog tela, snaga i lepota muzike nadilazi "E" u sredini našeg voljenog akronima. Muzika nadilazi samu estetsku lepotu. Sinhronizacija emocija koju doživljavamo kada slušamo Vagnerovu operu ili Bramsovu simfoniju ili Betovenovu kamernu muziku, prisiljava nas da se setimo naše zajedničke ljudskosti koju delimo, duboko javno povezane svesti, empatične svesti za koju je neuropsihijatar Ian MekGilkrist rekao da je jako prožičena u desnoj hemisferi našeg mozga. Za one koje žive u vrlo nehumanim uslovima mentalne bolesti unutar beskućništva i zatvoreništva, muzika i lepota muzike pružaju priliku da nadiđu svet oko sebe i da se podsete da još uvek imaju sposobnost da dožive nešto predivno i da ih čovečanstvo nije zaboravilo. Iskra te lepote, iskra te ljudskosti se pretvara u nadu i znamo, bez obzira da li smo izabrali put muzike ili medicine, upravo to je prva stvar koju moramo usaditi unutar naše zajednice, unutar naše publike, ako želimo da potaknemo lečenje iznutra.
I'd like to end with a quote by John Keats, the Romantic English poet, a very famous quote that I'm sure all of you know. Keats himself had also given up a career in medicine to pursue poetry, but he died when he was a year older than me. And Keats said, "Beauty is truth, and truth beauty. That is all ye know on Earth, and all ye need to know." (Music) (Applause)
Voleo bih da završim citatom Džona Kitsa, romantičarskog engleskog pesnika, poznatim citatom za koji sam uveren da ga svi vi poznajete. Kits je takođe odustao od medicinske karijere da bi se bavio poezijom, ali je umro kada je imao godinu dana više od mene. Kits je rekao: "Lepota je istina, istina je lepota. To je sve što znate na zemlji i sve što treba da znate." (Muzika) (Aplauz)