I've always thought of a genius as someone who is able to do something creative, unusual, and meaningful (sometimes profoundly so) with the materials at hand. These materials could be the rules of Renaissance counterpoint as in the case of Palestrina, or the rules of Baroque harmony and counterpoint as in the case of JS Bach, or the accepted norms of "pop" music as in the Beatles--or simple paint and canvas or the words of a particular language. . .In other words, to me, an artistic genius is one who can take the same materials available to anyone else, along with their inherent limitations, and having a strong inner vision, they are able to manipulate these materials in a way that is unusually good at drawing people into their vision.
According to my own definition of a genius, they might or might no be recognized by the public at large, especially at first. In his lifetime, Bach was recognized by some as a truly great genius, but by others, no. Some of Brahms' greatest works, like the 4th Symphony and his German Requiem, were greatly disliked at first. Often people have personal agendas that prevent them from recognizing genius in work that does not conform to their particular agenda. It seems that sometimes at first truly creative works of genius are seen as a threat by other artists, or sometimes they're just ahead of their time and it takes the world in general some time to catch up to the artist's vision and technique.
I would pragmatically argue, however, that for a work to be categorized as a work of genius, it has to have inherent meaning and relevance to people, and perhaps it has to be recognized eventually. (In other words, does a tree falling in the forest when no one is around make a sound?) There are experimental pieces of art from, say, the 1960s that I wonder about--I wonder if they will ever make it past the "just plain weird" stage into the "wow, what a vision" stage. To me, a work of genius cannot be simply different, it has to be based on a strong, clear vision, and be produced in a disciplined way where the medium is manipulated with the INTENTION of communicating that vision. It takes intelligence to do this, but to me, intelligence is only one factor in works of genius.
Notice that I'm not talking about any person as a complete genius. This, I believe, does not exist. A person may create works of genius and be a complete failure in other parts of his/her life. As a matter of fact, Bach took GREAT exception to being called a "musikant" or in a way, "street musician." He not only was not one, did not want to be one, but became angry at being called one.
I very much enjoy reading biographies of artists we generally consider to be "great" or "geniuses," because their stories show that they were great in only parts of their lives, and were like the rest of us in others. Kind of makes the musician in me feel less weird!
Thomas Dressler
