It seems to me that in every culture I come across a chapter headed 'Wisdom.' And then I know exactly what is going to follow: 'Vanity of vanities all is vanity.'
Luxury is the wolf at the door and its fangs are the vanities and conceits germinated by success. When an artist learns this he knows where the danger is.
The symptoms of fascist thinking are colored by environment and adapted to immediate circumstances. But always and everywhere they can be identified by their appeal to prejudice and by the desire to play upon the fears and vanities of different groups in order to gain power.
Even if you're improvising the fact that beforehand you know certain things will work helps you make those improvisations successful. It really helps to have a certain amount of knowledge about musical structure.