Sunday, January 23, 2011

MUSIC

    Music is such an important part of life that when the question is posed "Which would you rather be - blind or deaf ? "- I can't decide.  The obvious is deaf because you could still live life almost unhampered. But the thought of living without music is terrifying.  (I am bypassing the subject of deaf musicians and Beethoven etc.  to make a general point about my dependence on my own level of hearing and my need for music in my life)*    I don't actually play a musical instrument.  Not well anyway.  I do dance and in that way absorb and re-express music as I hear it.  But music is a form of expression and communication that far exceeds anything verbal or even visual (in my very opinionated opinion).

  This is a strange time in history with so many luxuries and improvements to daily life but the stand out invention of the past decade is the ipod.  Absolutely everybody has one.  Or two or three.  And every kind of musical style and genre is accessible to everyone.  Even the worst, most tasteless, untalented crap can be downloaded and stored on your ipod or comparable device.  Which points to the fact that even people with no true appreciation for the art of music still love to listen to some form of rhythmic, lyrical composition while going about their day.

  It's more than likely that people whistle less these days.  They do sing along with their recorded music and that's probably good, but they may gather together to sing with a piano less.  I am not sure of the social implications of the pocket sized bottomless cup of music in everyone's pocket but it does prove that listening to music is a vital need to most people.
  Being happy to have music in my pocket does not interfere with my love of live performance or the fun of dancing with a room full of people to a dj.  But owning a library of 369 days worth of music does encourage me to compile lots and lots of playlists if for no other reason than to keep some kind of order. But the playlists are more than that.  They have names like "Sweet and Salty" "Flaming Moe" "Beat Pharm" "Lypo Sukt" "Better Days" "Craptacular" "Con Queso"  " Mind Fuck" "Quite Pleasant" "One AM" "Weds Oct 20"...  They are bursting with memories, emotions, mood swings, detail.  I know which ones will pick me up from a down mood or keep my chill mood going or get me psyched for an event or hold me and softly encourage a good cry.

  Music is magic.  Classical music is high magic.  Cultural/World music is a blessing.  Music calms the savage beast, it wakes up the sleeper, it sparks ideas in the genius, it moves the artist, the sculptor, the dancer.  It is in nature as well as technology.  It's in a heartbeat and the hum of the city. 
  Music is medicine and I am an addict !


* that sounded like a legal disclaimer; scary...

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