Have you ever stepped outside for a brief second, say from some party or the office or even walking to your car, and been utterly stopped dead by the sight of a beautiful sunset or the misting fog through a far off mountain range or even the mere patter of rain upon your head? Stopped dead but unable to admit to yourself or others that you wish you were out there on some hill or at the edge of the ocean, viewing the dying sun or simply absorbing the silence of a breathing forest. I wonder why these times hold such a mesmerizing presence upon me. Even before I took up hiking and camping, I remember times when I stepped outdoors at parties only to be struck upon the head by countless stars, almost unwilling to venture indoors again, too overwhelmed with the natural world.
For a period, after work, I would venture to this one hill to catch the last rays of sunset. I did this for close to a month, never missing a day and was utterly entranced by its display. I remember thinking "why can`t this be my entertainment instead of T.V. and movies?" Why does the magnificence of sunset and sunrise hold little to no interest for most of the world? These are the births and deaths of day and link are lives together through them. I have seen a total of three days in my entire life, of both sunrise and sunset, fully enjoyed and those have been the days of my life. Perhaps it depends upon what you consider special and important but I think like great art and music the scenes of the natural world are reserved for the hearts seeking a slice of the sublime and those things of the world that though seperate from humanity, possess the quality of inspiration to our lot.
Friday, January 8, 2010
The strike of a note
I'm no musician and yet when I hear a strumming bow over the strings of a violin or the rise and fall of so many ivory keys of the piano I don`t get lost in the romantic or melodious nature of the music. Instead I hear positions and movement, like I can almost picture the musician moving a hand or shoulder to strike a note. The combined notes are beautiful in blended harmony but when I close my eyes and listen I hear the mind of the player floating through a chart of music or two sets of hands jumping over black and white keys.
For me this makes classical music even more incredible as it loses the "intellectual connotation" that kept me away from it for so many years. Once when downtown near Westlake Shopping mall I happened to sit down next to a street musician playing the violin. I leaned back against the wall and closed my eyes, just listening to the sound bouncing around the courtyard. It was the first time I realized that note after note builds upon each other, creating separate "chapters" of music yet all the chapters when heard sequentially unite to form another grander "chapter." Im at a loss as to what to call these sections or blocks of mini-melodies but they are like the individual scenes in writing where you recreate life for a space of a few pages yet those scenes build upon each other to create a story. I have much respect for the musician who can play in a kind of freestyle, that while playing the musician is thinking 3 or 4 verses down the road, changing his music to fit the future notes.
Once I went a long time without listening to music and had forgotten the feel of it. When I thought about what classical music sounded like I instead had the acute impression of a melody of thoughts and ideas flowing around each other but ordered on some central theme that radiated throughout. This, I think, is in response to a mind more used to expressing thoughts as words and concepts than music but it seems the same. There is a harmony in the purest sense there, a transition between notes that is the long result of a thinking mind. We, as children and inattentive listeners pick up on this subconsciously and find a good composition pleasing to the ear. This is the reason.
If I could not write out the thoughts that sometimes haunt my waking world I would wish to be a music composer and thus able to color my feelings through the vibrations of chords and great blasts of air. Its speculation but I wonder if not all music is composed through the filter of at least some strong emotion. Even the sounds of pop music, which by virtue of being the quickest to grasp of understanding fail the greatest in my mind, must have at least been composed with strong emotion; say avarice, greed, pride, sloth etc. all the feelings that characterize short attentions spans with which we view the world. I have been guilty of listening to such when all I want is the equivalent of some minor gnat buzzing to distraction. But when I feel the need to be reminded of the greatness we can achieve or the true subtlety and rich flavor of creative power then I listen to classical music. Just listen to one great composer with the thought that they plucked each note, each pitch and turn of a tune out of the very air of their minds and not be amazed.
For me this makes classical music even more incredible as it loses the "intellectual connotation" that kept me away from it for so many years. Once when downtown near Westlake Shopping mall I happened to sit down next to a street musician playing the violin. I leaned back against the wall and closed my eyes, just listening to the sound bouncing around the courtyard. It was the first time I realized that note after note builds upon each other, creating separate "chapters" of music yet all the chapters when heard sequentially unite to form another grander "chapter." Im at a loss as to what to call these sections or blocks of mini-melodies but they are like the individual scenes in writing where you recreate life for a space of a few pages yet those scenes build upon each other to create a story. I have much respect for the musician who can play in a kind of freestyle, that while playing the musician is thinking 3 or 4 verses down the road, changing his music to fit the future notes.
Once I went a long time without listening to music and had forgotten the feel of it. When I thought about what classical music sounded like I instead had the acute impression of a melody of thoughts and ideas flowing around each other but ordered on some central theme that radiated throughout. This, I think, is in response to a mind more used to expressing thoughts as words and concepts than music but it seems the same. There is a harmony in the purest sense there, a transition between notes that is the long result of a thinking mind. We, as children and inattentive listeners pick up on this subconsciously and find a good composition pleasing to the ear. This is the reason.
If I could not write out the thoughts that sometimes haunt my waking world I would wish to be a music composer and thus able to color my feelings through the vibrations of chords and great blasts of air. Its speculation but I wonder if not all music is composed through the filter of at least some strong emotion. Even the sounds of pop music, which by virtue of being the quickest to grasp of understanding fail the greatest in my mind, must have at least been composed with strong emotion; say avarice, greed, pride, sloth etc. all the feelings that characterize short attentions spans with which we view the world. I have been guilty of listening to such when all I want is the equivalent of some minor gnat buzzing to distraction. But when I feel the need to be reminded of the greatness we can achieve or the true subtlety and rich flavor of creative power then I listen to classical music. Just listen to one great composer with the thought that they plucked each note, each pitch and turn of a tune out of the very air of their minds and not be amazed.
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