William Theviot is a young autistic musician from France who describes himself as an ‘atypical pianist’. Trained in classical music, he now works as a pianist, giving concerts—including for audiences from disadvantaged areas—and advocating for a greater inclusion of disabled people in the cultural scene.
Question: You describe yourself as an ‘atypical pianist’ on Twitter. When did you become aware of the fact that you were atypical and autistic?
William Theviot: I became aware of being atypical when I realised that my way of approaching music, musical practice and musical study, in general, was not academic and not truly scholarly either, as it is more free and full of artistic byways. This approach is perhaps paradoxically more demanding than the ‘typical’ method, which is an almost athletic type of training, where the student is coached in mechanical movements, or rather conditioned into them, as it is a kind of work that is devoid of passion, muscular and detached from the substance of artistic expression. Of course, these two approaches are not incompatible, but I had the impression that there was little room left for open-mindedness, for being different, for alternative pathways, for the questioning that can bring about work that, at its core, searches for singularity – a type of work that might bring about public success if it reaches a certain universality. The main thing is to find one’s own musical and intellectual honesty, not to lie about one’s own unformatted singularity, [and to stay away] from the eye of the cyclone that would like to carry us away into banality. This strength, which is as much about self-preservation as it is about self-destruction when it comes to staying ‘firmly’ in the place one considers appropriate, can perhaps be found in autism, as it is almost a guarantee of an independent mind.
Question: Has being autistic influenced your music and creative process?
WT: If being autistic has influenced some of the work I tackle on a regular basis, I wouldn’t be able to estimate the percentage as an expert analyst could. I would say that working upholds a mind that can only stand upright when it is over-stimulated, body-built, a bit like in an old type of therapy called ‘patterning’. Rather, I would say that it is the loneliness that comes from being autistic that, because of its very nature and intolerability, leads me to overcome my distress through a kind of hyperactivity and ‘overcompensation’. It is a bit like the characters in Philoctetes or Stefan Zweig’s The Royal Game, who can somehow resist social rejection by developing abilities that they would not have otherwise explored, because, as the expression goes, if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. However, if work equals self-realisation, then when it is not necessary, I am not sure, because being a happy, contemplative person might be better than being somewhat of a prolific and dissatisfied ‘genius’, given the solitude that always follows you and catches up with you in the end.
Question: How do you combine your artistic career with your autism awareness and activism work?
WT: I try to get the cultural and disability worlds to meet. They are both like arrogant mountains, and indeed as they say, only mountains don’t meet. I try to be a pilgrim, going from one mountain to the other, but it is quite exhausting and dangerous. The few initiatives that do exist often put the people concerned, namely autistic people, to the side, when they often have skills which are neglected and not taken seriously, maybe because their spontaneous nature seems insolent, whereas some people spend years doing theoretical study only to end up mostly with a great ego and without a true sense of diversity.
Question: What are your main demands as an activist?
WT: My main demands would be to allow people with disabilities to have a professional access to culture, not only as spectators who fill the seats at festivals, but to enable them to be actors. Artists who know nothing about disability should not be those who are given priority without considering those who are concerned in the first place. […] This January 2023 for example, the County Council of Gironde presented a so-called ‘100% inclusive roadmap 2022-2025’, which did not entertain the possibility of including professional support for disabled artists, who are left to fend for themselves in a world where codes and presentation matter more than coherence, openness and diversity. I would like if autistic people would be made to feel comfortable in airports for example, in places of transit, and that it not be a fake ‘HR policy’, but that projects truly include them, that we support and encourage them constructively in awareness-raising efforts. It would also be good if they were not overly medicalised, and that teachers, people in positions of authority and the general public were more welcoming and less stigmatising towards them. Rather, we should provide them with opportunities to allow them to deal constructively with their anxiety about not fulfilling their true potential.