I recently got high with an old friend from High School for the first time at a grassroots marijuana legalization rally and she reminded me that she was often late for orchestra practice because she liked to get high before she played her string-bass since she felt it helped her pay more attention in class and play better.
Marijuana was popular among Jazz musicians in the early 1900’s because “unlike booze which dulled and incapacitated, marijuana enabled musicians whose job required them to play long into the night to forget their exhaustion. Moreover, the drug seemed to make their music sound more imaginative and unique, at least to those who played and listened while under its sensorial influence.”