Artistic expression is an intangible thing in the sense that I cannot explain to you how it happens, exactly. Anything I say about the process, the inspirational idea, that essence that is the beginning of the creation of the given piece of work, will fail to capture, to explain what it is and how it came to be. But, being as how I am given to a streak of masochism, as all artists are, I will attempt to explain what it is to create something from nothing using the raw materials that are available to all, but applied by few.

For a song, it's hard to say what triggers the initial idea, the first chords. I've tried to follow the process, to identify that moment of inspiration, but it is so elusive. Maybe it's just me, but I "miss" that instant of the appearance of the idea, the germ, the seed that becomes a song. I can certainly explain the circumstances surrounding the moment, even show you evidences of the initial idea that I may have written down. But it isn't the thing itself, the very instant of inspiration.

Sometimes I sit down at an instrument shortly after waking in the morning, before anything intrudes into my mind, and start playing. I don't think about what I'm playing, I just play. And the next thing I know, I've come up with something, a riff, a progression - an idea. If I'm smart, I write it down immediately, especially if I can't dwell on it to get it into memory or more fleshed out. This way I can come back later and pick it up again. I'll make other little notes on the side about feel, whether it swings or whatever I need to remind me of the moment, the whole thought behind the progression.

When I find that elusive idea, one of the first things I do after deveolping it enough to have an identity is to really listen to it. Does it sound like something I've heard before, is it an unintended plagarized idea? If it does sound like something already extant, I start to tweak it so it will begin to have its own unique identity. We do not want to get sued, especially in a culture that will sue someone just for looking at them funny.

So the real question is: Where do these ideas, these brilliant insights and their wonderful result, come from?

Here is the question that philosphers, artists, even scientists, have been seeking to answer for centuries, even millennia. The simple answer is: Who knows? But that isn't very satisfying, and it really deflects from the underlying need in all creative people to know something about where it comes from, these incredible and often unfathomable things that one moment ago didn't exist, to the degree that they had never been considered, and then suddenly, it's here in front of us, tangible and touchable, knowable in the sense that we can now think about this thing that never occurred prior to the moment of inspiration.

You see the trouble I'm having here, explaining something that is so difficult to point to, to say, "There, right there! That's the moment of 'creation' for this idea", this invention, this approach, this new thing - whatever it may be.

The spirit, mind and the soul conspire, I think, to work out something they all wish to express, a kind of co operative anarchy between existence and emotion, divine love and semi-conscious thought. These three parts of our being work furtively behind the scenes, waiting for their time and opportunity to burst forth with their conspiratorial idea(s) into our waking life, taking us by surprise. It is a sneak attack on our senses and logic, defying everything rational, for art is not particularly rational, though it can refect ultimate rationale and logic. It just can't live there, the artist can't live there or it becomes so devoid of "life". I know some may disagree, and that is their right, but even M.C. Escher, incredibly precise and methodical as he was, only used logic as a means to express what was conceived far afield from logic.

You may have heard an artist speak of his or her Muse and wondered what they meant. The Muse is borrowed from Greek mythology. There were nine muses, born as the daughters of Zeus, leader of the Olympian gods, and Mnemosyne, the Titan goddess of memory. They were Calliope, Clio, Erato, Euterpe, Melpomene, Polyhumnia, Terpsichore, Thalia and Urania. They were believed to inspire all artists, especially poets, philosphers and musicians. And as you know, musicians can be all of these. It was Polyhumnia who was the muse of musicians, particularly religious hymns. So when a musician speaks of his or her Muse, they knowingly or not are referring to Polyhumnia.

We joke that our Muse is really working for us today when we are having a particularly creative time. And we may lament that the Muse has abandoned us during times of low or no creativity. Such is the way of the Muse, we will say. We don't really mean it, but some of us take comfort in the idea that our creations are really not of our own making, but rather given from outside ourselves.

And there is another view of how these things, these songs, paintings, writings, philosophies, scienctific discoveries, drawings, inventions, come into our possession; we don't really create them at all, we simply apprehend them from outside ourselves. It's akin to a metaphysical and mysterious manifestation that we happen to be present to receive.

If I may be so bold...

I am a Christian. I believe in the God of the Bible. Now, before you groan and click away, bear with me. I'm not here to preach to you, but to share with you the truth, as I mentioned at the beginning of this "book". It would be wrong for me to withhold from you things germane to my experience - which contribute to the process of creativity I engage when I sit down at the piano, the guitar, the bass, even the drums, to enter the process of creative expression.

It seems okay to talk of "spiritual" things in many creative circles, as long as Jesus is not part of that conversation. But I want you to be clear that when I speak of spirituality in a context specific to me, I am indeed speaking about Christ as the author, the source, of my inspiration and creative process, my artistic expression.

Many truly wonderful artistic works in history are attributed to God as the source of the inspiration behind the work in question. The Cistine Chapel at the Vatican is perhaps one of the most incredible works of art ever produced, along with the Pieta sculpture and the statue of David - all by Michaelangelo. All these works he was very clear came from God as the source of his inspiration. Classical music composers from Bach to Schubert to Brahams, all attributed their success to the Almighty.

And so many artists speak of a spiritual connection to the creative process, their artistic expression. They may not be referring to God, specifically, but they are referring to some source, some power apart from themselves, which some have called the "Universal Mind", as the originator of their work, from whom they received the produce of their labours.

And people talk about the spirit of music or artistic works. We know they aren't talking about the spirit "in" the work, but the spirit "behind" the work, the thing that inspired the work, even as the source of the inspiration. They don't mean anything specific in most cases, just some nebulous conception of something outside ourselves that we tap into to get the inspiration or concept. But the basis is there for acknowledgment of an external force or consciousness because the discussions are framed in such a way as to not preclude such a thing.

It isn't my intent to get so abstract that we depart from the core of this thread, that many artist acknowledge ignorance about how they get their ideas. So they dress the description up in fanciful language, even borrowing from mythology, as mentioned earlier. This saddens me because if we're going to accept some external source as the originator of the ideas behind our creations, we should therefore also be willing to explore that relationship.

Speaking solely for my own experience, it isn't that I can't conceive of and create artistic works, whether music, writing or physical artistic works; I can. But I also see a difference between the work I create from within my own experience, my own wisdom, knowledge and experiential base and the works I generate that I believe come from the Spiritual realm. There is a marked qualitative difference between the two. My creations are good, some even great. But I see the works I create as a result of the Spirit handing them down to me as more than merely great; they are sublime. They are beyond my ability to have crafted based on my abilities and background, my knowledge and my experience.

Perhaps people might think I'm being overly modest, even disingenuously humble about my music and artwork. Okay, I understand this. But another artist will see my position as absolutely genuine. You know the phrase, "It takes one to know one"; well, in this case, it really is true. A person who is not an artist really has a hard time understanding just how truly overwhelmed we are when something truly amazing comes forth from our hands, our minds, our spirit, our soul.

I've likened the creative process to giving birth to a child. Many artists view their work as children they've birthed into the world. I can attest to that feeling, that connection to the work as being similar. The process is oftentimes quite laborious and oftentimes very arduous and long. Some songs I've written have taken years to finally come to fruition. Years.

Thomas Edison went through ten thousand filaments during the creation process for the light bulb to find the right one, the right formula that would work and sustain the ability to create the light in a way that made the bulb last longer than just a few days or weeks. We measure their duration in hours. This bulb has 2000 hours of life, that bulb has 1200 hours of life. Fluorescent bulbs boast up to 7500 hours of life. That's astounding. And, ironically, there are legendary bulbs in existence that have been burning continuously for decades, countless years beyond their rated lifespan.

So an artistic work does not pay attention to time. It gets finished when it gets finished. I can't tell you how many times I've heard songs on the radio that I knew were not done, but were jotted down, recorded and released anyway. My own reactions have been anything from "Oh, I can't believe this got on the air" to "What a great idea, but they blew the line". All of them weren't finished. The musicians who wrote them weren't listening!

And if there was one aspect to the creative process that is not discussed enough, if at all, in my experience, it is the ability to listen.

This is a problem that exists everywhere and in every quarter of society. I watch it every day, people not paying attention, even refusing to listen to what is going on around them, what is happening in their own lives. I would even say it's criminal.

And when an artist does not listen - or worse, doesn't know how to listen - it's just tragic.