One of the Pleasures of Life
Posted by evanescent on 14 March, 2008
In my opinion, there are very few pleasures in life greater than music. Okay, there’s friendship, love, sex etc. But I’m not even sure how you’d classify the pleasure you can derive from listening to a song you love. A great song, a great voice, great lyrics, can be pleasurable emotionally, intellectually, and even physically.
It is so hard to pin down exactly what it is about music that can make it so addictive and why humans would evolve to invent and then appreciate it, that it seems almost magical, almost irrational. But I believe it is anything but. If there is anything to be said for the human soul, it can be found, and evoked, in music, as in other forms of art (something that is seriously lacking in the world today). After all, animals have no appreciation for music. Music has meaning, and songs have power, but only to a being that can draw inferences from sound, and tie lyrics and tunes to memories, emotions, and fantasies. In other words, it takes a conceptual mind. It takes a rational mind, an intelligence.
A life without art, without music, would be no life at all. It would be soulless.
14 March, 2008 at 9:07 pm
I totally agree with you. Nice point there.
Actually, music is very essential for me in ways that it serves as my every soundtrack for every mood, and events that happened every day.
Music is life.
http://3critical.wordpress.com
15 March, 2008 at 3:04 am
Granted that music is one of the pleasures of life, I presume that when you further claim that A life without art, without music, would be no life at all. It would be soulless. you are being rhetorical.
Everydayman: I’m pretty sure I could live without music. Or, to rephrase, taking music away from my life would not take my life.
15 March, 2008 at 9:34 am
Actually, if you read The Romantic Manifesto, you’ll get a good idea of the essential importance of art in human life. A phrase in it goes, “Art is the technology of the soul.” Art, literally, is nourishment for the human soul just as food is nourishment for the human body. And since man is an indivisible entity of consciousness and body, art is integral to the wholistic nourishment of man, that is, of survival as man qua man, not just survival as man qua physical brute.
There is so much more to say about art, I’d highly recommend The Romantic Manifesto to get a greater appreciation of its importance to human life.
15 March, 2008 at 11:37 am
I’m a big fan of music. I’m always pleased / grateful that I live here and now, when music is available pretty much on tap.
16 March, 2008 at 11:44 am
Ergo Says: 15 March, 2008 at 9:34 am Actually, if you read The Romantic Manifesto, you’ll get a good idea of the essential importance of art in human life. A phrase in it goes, “Art is the technology of the soul.” Art, literally, is nourishment for the human soul [...]
I have read The Romantic Manifesto closely. I don’t recall that sentence about art being the technology of the soul. Could you cite a page? I have the hardback. If you have the paperback edition could you name the section, so that I can find the sentence?