Music/art/beauty thread

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Aaron

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Mar 7, 2020, 1:49:04 AM3/7/20
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Here I'd like to start a both serious and casual discussion/sharing of music, art, and other forms of "beauty" that has inspired a profound sense of "something greater".

Personally I'm more predisposed and receptive of the auditory (music) than the visual. It's no surprise that music has since long ago been considered to be intimately related to spirituality and involved deeply in people's "religious experience". Here I share some of my favorites. Note that I do not subscribe to any religious traditions, and don't look up the texts and meanings of these music. I only describe the emotions evoked in me directly through pure sound.

1. The ending of Bach's Mass in B Minor, conducted by Karl Richter.
Karl Richter is one of my favorite interpreters of Bach, especially of his sacred works. He really captures the sense of grandeur, awe and divinity in Bach's music through a dignified, stately interpretive style, which is manifested greatly in this piece.

2. The opening of Mass in B minor and St. Matthew Passion by the same conductor.
These two pieces are musical exemplifications of the struggle and suffering throughout the human/divine life, and the sadness, compassion, and love that underlie them.

3. Jesus bleibet meine Freude from BWV 147 conducted by Ton Koopman.
Ton Koopman is another one of my favorite Bach interpreters. His style, compared with Richter, has a more elegant, playful, and "prettier" touch, and is excellently represented by this piece. When I first discovered it, I was immediately moved by the serene, peaceful sense of love, and a breathtakingly profound sense of purity and beauty that resonated deeply within me.

4. Agnus Dei III from Missa L'homme armé sexti toni performed by The Tallis Scholars.
This "heavenly" piece is part of a mass written by a composer that I'm rather not very familiar with, and was encountered rather randomly. Nevertheless, it's a good representation of polyphonic music of the Renaissance period. People have since long ago ascribed a "polyphonic" quality to God, as if the melodically independent yet interwoven voices that form a cogent and meaningful flow of musical picture is analogous to God's "polyphonic" mind.

5. Finale from Mahler's Symphony No. 3 conducted by Leonard Bernstein.
I was moved to tears the first time I heard this incredible performance. This extremely romantic piece invoked an inexplicable emotion that flows and breathes of the utmost immediacy, privacy, intensity, and sincerity. It speaks of the unspeakableness of life and humanity.


6. The last one is not a piece of music, but rather a segment from the opening ceremony of the 2004 Athens Olympics, a beautifully artistic presentation of eternal themes that underlie humanity throughout the passage of time. Man's duality nature, efforts to understand ourselves and the world, and struggle with our nature and the universe, are elegantly conveyed through a combination of different art forms. It really captures the human spirit in which the Olympics' origin is rooted.


Feel free to share thoughts, inspirations, experiences, favorites relating to music, art, and beauty itself, and their deep connectedness with the human life and spirituality.

Lou Gold

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Mar 7, 2020, 2:07:22 AM3/7/20
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My current favorite is the music of Hildegard von Bingen.

David Samson

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Mar 7, 2020, 5:02:16 AM3/7/20
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Music has a primal way of reaching past our intellects. Sometimes it is not so much a particular piece but the juxtaposition of the piece with a moment in time. My wife & I were "backpack" traveling in mainland China in 1986 when a shopkeeper in Yangshuo enthralled us with an impromptu Erhu concert one night. I once had a lovely driving (& then driveway) experience with this version of Canto Ostinato::


Finding the right version of it just now actually brought tears of pleasure. (it should be noted that this piece is slow to "warm up" but by about 12-14 minutes it becomes more lyrical & less moto perpetuo

Though, at the other extreme I have a great fondness for a number of the musics of King Crimson s.a.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaD7gk7BTwU or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhKJgqxNDD8 or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpZxwe4SXY8 or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVb2tnFN5AA

 & for a piece that runs the gamut it is hard to surpass Holst's Planets: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtphY-4xjQw

Visually, my wife & I once stumbled on a version of Rodin's "Hand of God" in a museum (I believe it was the Metropolitan in NYC) that I would swear had the human figures complete only to later be perplexed that all versions one can find show the human figures as inchoate.

Regarding art in general. I think it cannot be overstated, the extent to which the existence of "civilization" is dependent on art.
The prime necessity for civilization is a common set of myths or ideals regarding the nature of the given civilization & its place in the cosmos. The people most responsible for the creation of these myths are the story tellers (i.e. the artists). Stories are more than just words shared verbally or written on a page. Music, painting & other "artifices" of humanity (from statuary to culinary) are all methods of conveying what it means to belong to a group. Without these "conveyances" the "group" is just a gathering of animals striving for survival.

I would argue that "the artist" is without equivocation, the most essential member of society.

Ben Iscatus

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Mar 7, 2020, 9:40:13 AM3/7/20
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Nice idea, Aaron. My current favourites for that sense of transcendence: 

Sibelius -Symphonies 1,2,3,5,7, Finlandia, Valse triste, The Swan of Tuonela
Vaughan Williams - Lark Ascending, Variations on a theme by Thomas Tallis, Dives & Lazarus
Finzi- Eclogue for Piano
Herbert Howells - Elegy for viola, string quartet and string orchestra

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Finch

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Mar 7, 2020, 10:26:23 AM3/7/20
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Monet: Morning on the Seine 2 https://uploads5.wikiart.org/images/claude-monet/morning-on-the-seine-2.jpg

Chopin: Nocturne Op.9 No.2 (Cheesy I know) https://youtu.be/9E6b3swbnWg

Most of Lawrence of Arabia has beautiful cinematography https://youtu.be/Mvdr-epa1hc

T. S. Eliot: The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock https://www.bartleby.com/198/1.html

Dana Lomas

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Mar 7, 2020, 12:36:04 PM3/7/20
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I love the confluence of metaphysics, poetry and music such us this ... Soon this space will be too small 

David Samson

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Mar 7, 2020, 12:40:15 PM3/7/20
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And let's not forget most anything attributed to Rumi

Dana Lomas

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Mar 7, 2020, 1:22:20 PM3/7/20
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And ... Just about anything from Rainer Maria Rilke

David Samson

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Mar 7, 2020, 2:17:56 PM3/7/20
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And thank-you Dana for the web site on Beauty. I can't help but note that both Rumi & Rilke are referenced in similar numbers on the site & more than anyone else.

Lou Gold

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Mar 7, 2020, 4:22:20 PM3/7/20
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Ditto.

It's worth noting that Rumi, who wrote 700 years ago, is the best selling poet in America.

Here's an extraordinary documentary with his translators and interpreters called, "Rumi: Poet of the Heart" and one of his poems.


I'm Not Saying this Right 

You bind me, and I tear away in a rage to open out
into air, a round brightness, a candlepoint,
all reason, all love.

This confusing joy, your doing,
this hangover, your tender thorn.

You turn to look, I turn.
I'm not saying this right.

I am a jailed crazy who ties up spirit-women.
I am Solomon.

What goes come back. Come back.
We never left each other.

A disbeliever hides his disbelief,
but I will say his secret.

More and more awake, getting up at night,
spinning and falling with love for Shams..


Jeff Falzone

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Mar 7, 2020, 5:10:49 PM3/7/20
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Beautiful post Aaron. Can't thank you enough for those links and descriptions. You've transformed my morning already.

Jeff

David Samson

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Mar 7, 2020, 5:43:39 PM3/7/20
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Lou,

Two of the things I love about Rumi;

People often think of Rumi as a poet of love, but the love of which he speaks is not love for another human but love for "God"
Rumi was too busy experiencing his love to actually write down his poetry. Let us be thankful for Hussam-e Chalabi.

Lou Gold

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Mar 7, 2020, 5:48:48 PM3/7/20
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David,

Yes! I know.

The video is truly excellent. Have you seen it?

David Samson

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Mar 7, 2020, 6:25:04 PM3/7/20
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Lou, I will watch it soon

Steve Petermann

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Mar 7, 2020, 6:44:22 PM3/7/20
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I know that the transcendence found in music is often referenced in classical music (which I love too) but, for me, it comes in so many forms.  What really gets me is when a piece of music expresses the depths and heights of joy, despair, love, hope, longing, etc. Also, the intensity and power of the musician to get across their feelings. So, here are a few that I have found both touching, uplifting, and inspiring:

I love Brittany Murphy's intensity here. I wish I could have that kind of drive.

Wes Hansen

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Mar 13, 2020, 12:45:17 AM3/13/20
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Hey, this is really cool man! I just recently found this crazy good book: Caribbean Visions: Contemporary Painting and Sculpture: Samella S. Lewis: 9780883971185: Amazon.com: Books. The first half is essays discussing how Carnival influences Carribean art and the second half showcases a bit of the work of the artists referenced. The only artist I was familiar with was the Cuban, Wilfredo Lam. My favorite in the whole book was, by far, Leroy Clarke of Trinidad: De Man.

And his stuff is certainly spiritual!

“There’s no mistaking a LeRoy Clarke canvas: the size, the richness, the inimitable style, the recurrence of the basic symbols. LeRoy insists that his work is obeah, a deliberate evocation of untainted African energy and spirituality, both he claims – erased from modern consciousness.

“I paint with an intention for revolution. Every stroke of my painting is a suggestion of destroying the enemies of humanity, particularly African humanity. I paint for enlightenment, to bring us closer to parting the darkness and opening up the way to our origins. If I were a medicine man involved in herbs I’d be doing a similar thing. In earlier periods there were obvious mutilations of the psyche, obvious attacks in terms of reducing the African man’s pride and dignity. But now the tools are extremely sophisticated, wiping out all African sensibility. If you lack a sensibility, then you’re completely open house. I’m terrified of the new weapons being used.””

Warrior Art: LeRoy Clarke | Caribbean Beat Magazine

Wes Hansen

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Mar 13, 2020, 12:49:36 AM3/13/20
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As for music, I'm sure most on here are familiar with Heilung - German for "Healing Process." 

RHC

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Mar 13, 2020, 11:30:06 AM3/13/20
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Wes I really enjoyed Leroy Clarke.  Thanks for posting
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