Eight Songs (from Chris' Blog) 1.0
I am so happy to see my name (alongside the dashing Brian's) at Sandalstraps, I cannot resist the opportunity to respond: what are 8 songs that have been important to me, had meaning or impact?
I have interpreted 'songs' very broadly, and I know Chris will not mind.
1) Beethoven's Ninth Symphony (especially the famous Ode to Joy in the final movement).
If there is a finer melody in western culture besides the Ode, I am not sure I know it. I have known this music for many years, and while my appreciation of classical music is very pedestrian, two times in my life this particular piece of music impacted me come to mind: The first was when I was hospitalized, before this blog even began, for a vicious inner ear infection. I had the spins so bad I could not open my eyes for a week, and I spent three days in the hospital. It was, quite simply, the sickest I have felt physically in my life. Because my wife works in the hospital, I was given the private room, the one used for people with tuberculosis or other communicable diseases, and a huge air filtration unit ran over my head continually. I was behind a closed door, isolated completely except for when my i.v. was changed or my loving wife came to visit. All she could do was talk to me, and I was really too sick to say much back. But she brought my discman (long before I had an ipod) and it held only one cd: the Ninth. I listened to that piece of music over and over for many hours as the sun's light came and went far from where I could see or feel it. What did I decide? That the music was perfect. Now, it probably is not perfect, it cannot be (I am still half a Platonist, you know) but its exquisite, and deeply romantic, construction reminded me then, and now, of Beauty rising from Chaos. For the beginning of the symphony, and the beginning of the fourth movement where the tremendous Ode eventually dominates, are wildy disordered in my view. And then the Great Theme appears fitfully until it takes complete center stage, the Goddess, the Form, of Beauty itself, rising from the emotional holocausts of the earlier bars.
On a happier note: when my wife and I were married in a little Episcopal church in so. cal., chosen merely because it looked so lovely, the priest would not allow secular music at all. That includes Wagner. So, while I have forgotten our entry music (probably Bach) our exit music was tremendous: the theme from the Ode. We snuck that in, of course, because it has been used for the Christmas Carole Joyful Joyful We Adore Thee! As we were pronounced man and wife, the very sweet organist pulled out the stops (if this is the correct term) and blasted, I mean blasted, the Ode out of that giant pipe organ. When we were outside, I heard her playing it on electronic bells. Yes. The Ninth has to go into the list.
2) Here I cheat and name a class of songs: Christmas songs. I love many: God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, O Little Town of Bethlehem, Good King Wencelas...these little hymns hold theology more pure and true, reflect trust and peace more adequately, than most of the theological volumes in my library.
3) Springsteen's The River. I am not particularly a huge Springsteen fan; I have never even owned an album. I was much more into the blues of Zeppelin or the post punk of Nirvana. And I didn't get my girlfriend in high school pregnant or make love with her beside any lake (or really, fully, make love with her at all). But the poignancy of this song, the sense of doom in the young couple, can I use the term literary naturalism...oh, I would listen to this and cry sometimes when she and I were in conflict. The song gave me strength to continue, to go to Heartwell park and pick a bunch of those little white lawn daisies and carry them to her when we spoke there after a fight. That kind of song. Doom and hope. We knew both.
4) Sarah MacLachlin's Angel. You know, I don't even know what this song is really about. But I don't think I have heard a lovelier ballad in the world. And the line...something like...'there's always a reason to feel not good enough, and it's hard at the end of the day' pretty much sums up half my emotional life. The constant fight against the withering inner critic. The fatigue that brings. And the elation, release, the catharsis I feel whenever I hear this song. It brings a physical change.
Part Two, the second four, comes tomorrow :)
I have interpreted 'songs' very broadly, and I know Chris will not mind.
1) Beethoven's Ninth Symphony (especially the famous Ode to Joy in the final movement).
If there is a finer melody in western culture besides the Ode, I am not sure I know it. I have known this music for many years, and while my appreciation of classical music is very pedestrian, two times in my life this particular piece of music impacted me come to mind: The first was when I was hospitalized, before this blog even began, for a vicious inner ear infection. I had the spins so bad I could not open my eyes for a week, and I spent three days in the hospital. It was, quite simply, the sickest I have felt physically in my life. Because my wife works in the hospital, I was given the private room, the one used for people with tuberculosis or other communicable diseases, and a huge air filtration unit ran over my head continually. I was behind a closed door, isolated completely except for when my i.v. was changed or my loving wife came to visit. All she could do was talk to me, and I was really too sick to say much back. But she brought my discman (long before I had an ipod) and it held only one cd: the Ninth. I listened to that piece of music over and over for many hours as the sun's light came and went far from where I could see or feel it. What did I decide? That the music was perfect. Now, it probably is not perfect, it cannot be (I am still half a Platonist, you know) but its exquisite, and deeply romantic, construction reminded me then, and now, of Beauty rising from Chaos. For the beginning of the symphony, and the beginning of the fourth movement where the tremendous Ode eventually dominates, are wildy disordered in my view. And then the Great Theme appears fitfully until it takes complete center stage, the Goddess, the Form, of Beauty itself, rising from the emotional holocausts of the earlier bars.
On a happier note: when my wife and I were married in a little Episcopal church in so. cal., chosen merely because it looked so lovely, the priest would not allow secular music at all. That includes Wagner. So, while I have forgotten our entry music (probably Bach) our exit music was tremendous: the theme from the Ode. We snuck that in, of course, because it has been used for the Christmas Carole Joyful Joyful We Adore Thee! As we were pronounced man and wife, the very sweet organist pulled out the stops (if this is the correct term) and blasted, I mean blasted, the Ode out of that giant pipe organ. When we were outside, I heard her playing it on electronic bells. Yes. The Ninth has to go into the list.
2) Here I cheat and name a class of songs: Christmas songs. I love many: God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, O Little Town of Bethlehem, Good King Wencelas...these little hymns hold theology more pure and true, reflect trust and peace more adequately, than most of the theological volumes in my library.
3) Springsteen's The River. I am not particularly a huge Springsteen fan; I have never even owned an album. I was much more into the blues of Zeppelin or the post punk of Nirvana. And I didn't get my girlfriend in high school pregnant or make love with her beside any lake (or really, fully, make love with her at all). But the poignancy of this song, the sense of doom in the young couple, can I use the term literary naturalism...oh, I would listen to this and cry sometimes when she and I were in conflict. The song gave me strength to continue, to go to Heartwell park and pick a bunch of those little white lawn daisies and carry them to her when we spoke there after a fight. That kind of song. Doom and hope. We knew both.
4) Sarah MacLachlin's Angel. You know, I don't even know what this song is really about. But I don't think I have heard a lovelier ballad in the world. And the line...something like...'there's always a reason to feel not good enough, and it's hard at the end of the day' pretty much sums up half my emotional life. The constant fight against the withering inner critic. The fatigue that brings. And the elation, release, the catharsis I feel whenever I hear this song. It brings a physical change.
Part Two, the second four, comes tomorrow :)
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