{"id":1126,"date":"2017-08-29T18:52:56","date_gmt":"2017-08-29T17:52:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/?p=1126"},"modified":"2017-11-21T22:33:54","modified_gmt":"2017-11-21T22:33:54","slug":"an-italian-connection-and-the-power-of-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/an-italian-connection-and-the-power-of-music\/","title":{"rendered":"An Italian Connection and the Power of Music"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tim

Tim Arnold at L’Arena, Verona, Italy<\/p><\/div>\n

David Byrne recently published a brilliant article on technologyreview.com<\/a> detailing the current changes we\u2019re all facing regarding technology\u2019s role in removing human contact. \u00a0<\/em>Automated services from Facebook to Sky, Apple and beyond have become so advanced that many of us interact with algorithms more than actual real actions.\u00a0 Having worked at Apple, I have witnessed the sheer delight that big tech companies have when it comes to creating shortcuts designed to apparently \u2018enrich\u2019 our lives.\u00a0 I always found it interesting how they re-appropriate words to persuade the public.\u00a0 When I studied English literature, \u2018Intuitive\u2019 was a word I associated with the earth\u2019s sacred energy fusing itself with our feminine side in a spiritual awakening for well being.\u00a0 Now it means making a machine drive you to work and back, feeding you dinner and turning on your favourite box-set exactly where you left off.<\/h3>\n

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Is it any wonder there\u2019s a rise in mental health problems? Britain\u2019s police force received a phone call relating to mental health every five minutes last year.\u00a0 The ambition of tech companies to make life easier is outstripping our ability to cope with the life that particular ambition creates.\u00a0 As a teenager, I was fortunate to attend a low-tech school (I might add – at a reduced rate for my single mother who sang in Spanish nightclubs to pay the school fees). \u00a0It was a Rudolf Steiner school, where importance is placed on introducing TV, IT and electronic devices during a certain<\/em> time in a child\u2019s mental, emotional and spiritual development. \u00a0Sometimes, scrolling through the pointless newsfeed of Facebook leaves me quite jittery actually, but thankfully I am not as fragile as a child or a teenager.\u00a0 I have a fairly good sense of what it should feel like to be human, <\/em>thanks to growing up with limited \u2018intuitive\u2019 technology around me.<\/h3>\n
\"Tim

Tim Arnold, Rudolf Steiner School, aged 16, 1991<\/p><\/div>\n

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Apple founder Steve Jobs was a low-tech parent. Silicon Valley tech executives and engineers enrol their kids in no-tech Steiner Schools. Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page went to no-tech Montessori Schools, as did Amazon creator Jeff Bezos and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales.\u00a0 However, many parents still feel it\u2019s okay to use an iPad as a babysitter.<\/h3>\n
\"Tim

Tim Arnold with Ricky Cavrioli and family, Verona 2017<\/p><\/div>\n

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My recent trip to Italy brought the tech takeover into sharp focus as I trod a very real, organic and rich human experience for three days solid.\u00a0 I had never performed in Italy before.\u00a0 My first album with my first band (Jocasta \u2013 No Coincidence<\/a>) had, without me realising, been heavily promoted in Italy back in 1997 when the record was released.\u00a0 If I had known at the time, perhaps it would not have taken me 20 years to go there to sing.\u00a0 Ricky Cavrioli – a fan of the band contacted me several years ago, through Facebook.\u00a0 Along with a few more fans, he personally arranged two performances for me this Summer, and it was one of the most enriching experiences I have had in my life.<\/h3>\n

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Upon arriving, Ricky, his wife and son welcomed me with the Italian meal we all dream of (maybe 5 or 6 courses, not including the Limoncello and ice cream).\u00a0 The meal took time to experience.\u00a0 Food as art. Or opera – with repeating motifs, acts, scenes and intervals. With three complete strangers who I now know as friends.\u00a0 And all because of the power of music.\u00a0 No, I haven\u2019t had 1 million streams on Spotify.\u00a0 But I felt like a million dollars after feeling real <\/em>on that first night in a small apartment in Verona, the city of winged lions where human contact was made in all it\u2019s precious ways.<\/h3>\n

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The next day Ricky took me to the train station where I travelled to Ferrara to take part in the International Busker\u2019s festival for it\u2019s 30th<\/sup> Anniversary. Upon arrival, I made my way to the Il Molo.\u00a0 Il Molo<\/a> is the Italian name for \u2018The Pier\u2019 \u2013 named after Brighton Pier by the venue\u2019s owner Davide Franchini \u2013 a Britpop aficionado.\u00a0 Where once I had lived on Frith Street next door to Bar Italia in Soho\u2019s Little Italy, I now found myself in Little Soho.\u00a0 In Italy.<\/h3>\n

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\"Tim

Tim Arnold and Davide Franchini, Il Molo, Ferrara 2017<\/p><\/div>\n

To push the poignancy right down my throat, Davide presented me with a 7\u201d Limited Edition single he had purchased in 1995 by my band Jocasta.\u00a0 My first single.\u00a0 22 years later on the cobbled streets of Ferrara, I signed it for him and then performed the song and many others for 2 hours on those cobbles.\u00a0 People stopped and sat on the pavement to listen.\u00a0 Renatta Bignozzi – the artist who runs the Amor Gallery in Ferrara, brought out a candle and hung bundles of dried chilli behind me for good luck before I began my set. This was a reality I dream of every day.\u00a0 Genuine connection. <\/em>And chilli.<\/h3>\n

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I sang until midnight and the stream of people coming and going was so uplifting that I ended up singing for longer than I had intended.\u00a0 To be a stranger in a strange place and meet so many warm hearted people is exactly what the heart strives for. Sure, Davide and I are connected on Facebook, but the circumstances of our meeting resonates deeply with my mission to feel more human.\u00a0 This is what I seek and search for through my music. Person by person. Mind by mind.\u00a0 Heart by heart.\u00a0 Ferrara is a beautiful place, full of cyclists who smile as they glide past you in the streets.\u00a0 Needless to say, the inspiration is now packed into an almost full notebook and clutter of voice notes.\u00a0 New tunes tend to pour out of me when the soul is this aroused.\u00a0 When I shall find the time to dig through them and begin to sculpt is anybody\u2019s guess.<\/h3>\n
\"Tim

Tim Arnold performing at Cohen, Verona 2017<\/p><\/div>\n

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The next day I returned to Verona to perform my new album I Am For You at Verona’s newest music venue, Cohen<\/a>. \u00a0Before the show, Ricky and I talked about his work over lunch (Penne Arrabiata). For the last 15 years he has assisted with psychiatric evaluations for people who suffer with mental health.\u00a0 Getting to know families and their ongoing struggle to survive whatever hardship that life has brought to them.\u00a0 It turns out that these days, he frequently assesses teenagers who are struggling to connect emotionally to other human beings.\u00a0 What these teenagers all have in common is that they are super humans when it comes to social media, whilst living the life of emotional cripples when it comes to actual human interaction.<\/h3>\n

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How could this be possible in a city full of culture that cross pollinates the medieval with the ancient?\u00a0 The river Adige decorated with padlocks of love and messages of romantic connection?\u00a0 The tourist attraction of Romeo and Juliet?\u00a0 Shakespearean atmosphere at every corner?\u00a0 Dante\u2019s statue and his words that blow between the beautiful battered buildings: \u201cThe secret to getting things done is to act!\u201d.\u00a0 In action<\/em> \u2013 there is deliverance to a better life.\u00a0 And yet I think of Ricky\u2019s story of the teenager who cannot and will not leave his bedroom.\u00a0 Or his iPhone. \u00a0All action has been chiselled out of his muscles. \u00a0By the profit driven power of so called progress. \u00a0<\/em><\/h3>\n
\"Tim

Writing a sonnet on the wall at Juliet House, Verona 2017<\/p><\/div>\n

The only action is to survive this.\u00a0 Not to fight it.\u00a0 One cannot fight progress, but be mindful where it makes us regress<\/em>.\u00a0 In times like this, I think of Oscar Schindler. A man who could not change the unjust and inhumane world he was a part of, but tried with all his might to save as many hearts and souls as he could from perishing in that world.<\/h3>\n

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To me, that is a powerful parallel to the world we find ourselves in today.\u00a0 The corporate tech giants\u2019 billboard may tower a mile high with a slogan that includes the word \u2018connection\u2019.\u00a0 You see them every day.\u00a0 But negligence always has its comeuppance. \u00a0One day, tech corporations may have be held to account in their very own Nuremberg trial.\u00a0 Until then, I recommend smuggling as much humanity into your pockets as you can.\u00a0 We\u2019re going to need it when we come through the other end. Naturally, I took my iPad with me to Italy. \u00a0But it never made it out of my suitcase.<\/h3>\n

With thanks to Ricky Cavrioli and my friends in Verona for making me feel as a human should feel. Grazie.<\/h3>\n

Subscribe here\u00a0<\/a>to receive updates on more TA blogs.<\/em><\/h3>\n
\"Ricky

Ricky Cavrioli and Tim Arnold, 2017<\/p><\/div>\n

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David Byrne recently published a brilliant article on technologyreview.com detailing the current changes we\u2019re all facing regarding technology\u2019s role in removing human contact. \u00a0Automated services from Facebook to Sky, Apple and beyond have become so advanced that many of us interact with algorithms more than actual real actions.\u00a0 Having worked at Apple, I have witnessed…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1130,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[36,31,37,25,45,27,35,26,30,28,40,33,42,41,32,44,39,43,29,38,34,46],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/LArena.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1126"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1126"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1423,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1126\/revisions\/1423"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timarnold.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}