The Subjective Response to Music

An earlier essay on music.

In my experience, individual response to music can be highly varied.  As an example, I enjoy the works of the guitarist Joe Satriani, but many consider his music to be too cerebral, and they enjoy the works of Carlos Santana or Jimi Hendrix with far more feeling and gusto.  I might try to argue with them that Rubina's Blue Sky Happiness or The Forgotten (part 2) are both intensely emotional experiences, but in the final analysis, their subjective response cannot be denied.  It just is, and emotions cannot be argued with.

We appreciate music for many reasons.  We may be in a certain mood and a song just captures our feelings in a beautifully poetic way.  A song or composition might bring about a feeling of nostalgia and rekindle long-lost memories because of how and when we listened to it for the first time.

Some songs that I listened to while I was a little child (on a gifted radio-cassette player) continue to be favorites because they evoke in me memories of the first home that I lived in, of the room that had that player, and of the very bed that I sat on while listening to that. Sometimes they bring about memories of the people who were with me when I listened to them.  Their musical excellence can be doubted, their production values can be critiqued, but the subjective experience that results from them is indubitable.

Music is also perceived to have therapeutic effects.  A melody may soothe our nerves, or it may invigorate and uplift us.  It may make us dance, or it might be an aid to contemplation.

To add to the complexity, there are genres of music that appeal to us, while we are immune to others.  Each genre of music can contain a whole spectrum of moods, and I speculate that after a certain age, we are resistant to develop an appreciation of unfamiliar genres.

Certain eras have a context to their music.  The 60s and 70s in India hadn't really seen an urban boom and late nights, so music was less inclined toward dance and was more melodious and hum-worthy.  That is not to say that today's music is in any way inferior.  In many ways, today's music is vastly more innovative.

Contrast these three songs, having a similar theme from different eras.  The pace increases, and a variety of technologies and instruments are introduced, as the compositions become more modern:

For another take on context, consider Jazz or Soul.  People who grew up in small towns and who have listened to live bands in small taverns or restaurants might naturally have a deeper appreciation for it.

Contrast that with Gangsta Rap.  Like Jazz, Gangsta Rap has strong elements of improvisation but is obviously more of an urban ghetto phenomenon: full of strong words, expletives, rebellion and violence.  Finer feelings are typically absent, and alienation and rage rule.

We continue to have fondness for the genres that we grew up with, or with those whose general rhythm and acoustics resonate with our personality type.

Extroverts will perhaps find the following composition "boring" and slow:

And contemplative minds might abhor techno or trance music, because it is typically associated with hedonism, parties, raves and intoxication:

Being a somewhat contemplative mind, I nevertheless find techno music, using nothing but digital instruments, supremely musical.  The imperfection or the human element might be missing, but then one remembers that no machine (at least for the foreseeable future) could create such music.

For example, the following composition, though short, shines through with a mood (subjective, again) of strength, of being re-born, of rising from the ashes:

Even if the composition be energetic, it need not deter soulful souls.  As examples, these two composition, though having a fast rhythm, can create a reflective, somber mood:

If the general perception of a particular genre does not appeal to me, I try to find out if there is something in it that creates a response.  Invariably it does.  It is not that difficult to flow with the artist and his experience during the creation.  The only requirement is that one put aside one's preconceived notions and prejudices.

This way, one can experience new vistas, while continuing to have a cherished musical home where one can again and again experience the familiar.

Do not go gentle into that good night

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night (Dylan Thomas, 1951)

...

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

While there be notions of reincarnation, it is doubtless that something ends at death.  The memories, the familiarity, the history of interactions, the face and its expressions, the nostalgia of the childhood and of the home one lived in, ... all that comes to an end.  To begin again in a different form and frame, perhaps, but to end as one too.

After a certain age, most of us become resigned to our ongoing momentum and inertia.  Inertia and momentum are, as physicists since the time of Newton have known, the same thing.  Steady motion in the same direction is not different from stillness.  To change direction is the nature of life.  To apply force is the nature of the will.  To fall and slide down requires no effort.  To get up and to again push back against the earth, does.

Like a candle that burns even more fiercely as it nears its end, let old age not be emblematic of embers, but of a fiery passion that knows the end is nigh.  And therefore let the old age be of days lived with a fullness that is absent in youth.  The youth has time on its side, and is full of hubris and a lazy postponement of one's dreams and passions.  In old age the dreams at night must be no more, for the clock is ticking, and the ticks of the clock must act as knocks on one's closed doors and windows.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Man, unlike other animals, seeks to change his environment.  To sculpt the earth and others' minds.  But the idealism of youth, the possibility of revolution and the fierceness of a fearless hope give way to resignation as we realize the limitations and hear cautionary tales about foolhardy men who thought they could change the world and suffered from their bravado.

But as death comes close, the fear of death must vanish.  What have the old got to lose?  A couple of years?  A young man can be frightened of a long suffering or of death, but an old man must be fearless and must, like a wise fool, rush in where the unknowing timid fear to tread.

If they were unable to ignite a spark back in the day, now is the time to firebomb and to light a fuse under the armchairs made of safe, wooden compassion occupied by bored, distant, comfortable slacktivists.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

The end of dreaming must not mean an end to action.  It must mean a graver understanding of the impediments and therefore more insightful and effective action.  Because the acts could not flourish in an environment of harshness, old men might become bitter and cynical.  Is a different outcome possible?  Is it possible to have passionate hope tempered with wisdom?

There are examples.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Men who weren't afraid to fly and fall, who weren't afraid to marry danger and who didn't want to fight a small skirmish but who wished to go all out, guns blazing...  Who wanted to seek truth and meaning and enlightenment... And who thought their light and passion would ignite the world but who saw nothing change as the dawn turned into noon and then to dusk.  They grieved and cried because they thought their lives have had no effect, that there hadn't been any lasting change, justice hadn't won over injustice in their lifetimes.  How could they peacefully pass away?  They must rage, rebel against death, rebel against defeat.  For they, at the front-lines of humanity, are not yet defeated.  They are but passing the swords, sharper than ever, to the next line of soldiers, ready to fight.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,   
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

With their vision sharpened through a lifetime of discarding one illusion after another, it may be weak in the light it can capture, but it is piercingly sharp because of the light it can impart.  It is blind and blinding at the same time.  Like meteors, the blaze of the knowledge is soon to get extinguished, but their light is not thereby less spectacular.  They are hurtling toward nothingness, and in that final journey they might shine a light on something which was hitherto hidden.  The finality of that final journey need not be a source of sorrow, it can be a joy of the kind that only comes with knowing that one did not hold back, that one was not trying to be safe anymore.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Any sign of life in one's dying beloved, even if it be a curse, is a blessing.  At that height of aloneness, where another breath can blow away the wispy frame from all that one held dear, let there be no forgetting, let there be no inertness even if it means pain and heartbreak.  For these are the final moments of a setting sun, and the none can dare look at anything else but the strange beauty of it.

Death in the end ... but let there be no death till then, till the very end.

The Ride

It was still dark when he woke up.  The stars were shimmering and there was only the very bare outline of the sky becoming lighter in the east.  It was, as the ancient sages declared, the time for meditation.

He got up from his bed, half alert and with a chaotic grogginess.  The house was quiet, except for the hum of the fan and the occasional sound of a car cruising on the nearby highway.  He switched on a light in his bathroom and slightly squinting, looked at himself in the mirror: his ashen face, his disheveled hair and the two day old stubble on his jaw.  As he turned on the faucet in the basin, the sound of water filled his ears.  Soon the water was warm, and he splashed his face and his eyes.  As he brushed his teeth, the invigorating fragrance of mint and cloves filled his nostrils.

The sun was still a few hours away from the horizon.  He came out of his nightclothes and put on a cold gray t-shirt, his black jeans, and the waterproof wrist watch.  The distance to the outside of his house was only twenty feet, but it was a journey not unlike that of a monk preparing to go inside his pagoda and to sink deep into timelessness.  He put on his cushioning socks, his ankle-high boots, and put on his rather heavy leather jacket.  In the left jacket pocket went his garage remote, and in the right pocket he carefully put in his wallet.  The jacket was almost too heavy, but his heart was slowly unburdening itself.  He inserted the foamy green plugs into his ears to protect them from the noise of the wind-stream and took in his left hand the helmet and his gloves  from the wooden table next to his door.

As he stepped outside and locked his door, he was a man composed.  The fragrance of the trees hit his nostrils, and the cool air stung his still moist face.  The hair on his arms stood up, and he instinctively closed his right palm as if to prepare for a vague battle.

Steadily, and with a silent poise, he descended delicately.  Everybody else must have been still asleep and he was careful to muffle the clank of his boots on the concrete stairs.  The parked cars were wet after a night of rain. In what seemed to be an automatic movement, he transferred the helmet to his right hand, took out the garage remote and pressed the button.  The garage door motor whirred into life, the garage light switched itself on, and there was his motorcycle on its side stand, inclined toward the left.

He circled the motorcycle once, as if examining his horse.  The tires were rounded in their fullness, there was not a speck of dust on the windshield, the chrome was brilliantly reflective.  With a deft and practiced movement, he unlocked the handle-bar and turned the key to ignition.  The battery in the intestines of the motorcycle awoke from its slumber and tiny LED lights glimmered on the instrument panel.

He put on his helmet.  It felt warm and snug.  The gloves were now on as well.  The inside of the gloves felt rough and cold and he rubbed his hands together to generate some much-needed warmth.  He got on his motorcycle from the left and slowly and silently wheeled it out of the garage.  He turned the bike to face away from the garage door and pressed on the remote one last time.  The garage door closed, as if signaling to himself that the only way now open to him was the open road.

He took a quick breath.  He looked down on his lifeless speedometer, and after what seemed like an inordinately long time, turned off the engine kill switch.  It was time.  The meditation was about to begin.

The needle gracefully swept the speedometer dial toward the extreme right, to 160 mph, and then back to zero.

His hands gripped the handle bars, and with his left fingers pulling on the clutch lever, his right thumb resolutely pressed the engine starter.  The motorcycle's 800cc V-twin rumbled to life.  It was the roar of a wild animal roused from its sleep by a sudden jerk.  The engine's sound was a steady thump.  The vibration made him sit up straight and stretch his back.  The monk would have closed his eyes after sitting on his cushion, but the rider's eyes were now intently focused ahead of him.

The motorcycle started to move.  It was still waking up and in the first gear, and it glided smoothly while overcoming the numerous bumps.  As he exited the private street and turned toward the empty county road, his trance was deepening.  The sound and the vibration of the motorcycle was entering his muscles.  First gear quickly gave way to neutral, the green light briefly flickering, and then it was on to the second gear, and then the third.  As he approached the red traffic light, he slowed down.  He was barely able to control his motorcycle which was almost sulking at being forced to stop.  The traffic signal magnets in the road surface didn't detect his ethereal presence, and the traffic light remained a glaring red.

He looked around.  There was not a soul in sight.  The motorcycled roared again and he acceded to its unreasonable demand.  The red lights stared angrily at him in his peripheral vision, but after the turn, his mirrors showed the orthogonal green lights, as if grudgingly confirming his rash decision.  He felt slightly amused.  But the monk knew that the first few minutes of meditation are the hardest, with strange thoughts and memories of unfinished dreams still flashing across the mindscape.

The sign ahead said: "Freeway Entrance.  Pedestrians, Bicycles, Motor-driven cycles prohibited."  He had once wondered at the distinction between a motorcycle and a motor-driven cycle, but now it didn't even cause a whiff of anxiety.  The sign was a warning to other wanderers who were just starting to venture into the unknown, not to him.  He belonged there.  Just as the monk felt at home on his cushion, so was the rider at peace with the empty, high-speed highway that lay ahead.

The wind was now strong on his face.  He brought down the helmet visor with his left hand.  His face was now shielded from the elements and from the occasional projectile.  He was going at fifty miles per hour, now in the fourth gear.  As the motorcycle leaned on the on-ramp, he smoothly accelerated.  He could feel his MSF training in his bloodstream.  The bike leaned to its limit but he leaned it still more.  The right foot-peg scraped against the hard pavement and golden sparks flew in the darkness.  These were the screeching fireworks, welcoming him home.

The motorcycle was giddily accelerating now.  50 miles per hour, 60, 70 and now 80 miles per hour.  It was finally in top gear.  There were no more gears to be changed.  The vibrations were smooth and stable, his hands were lightly resting on the handlebar, and his feet firmly on the pegs.  His jacket was tightly wrapped around his torso, and only his neck and a small part of his wrists were feeling the cool morning air.

His body was relaxed but straight.  His vision was acutely aware of the wide empty highway that stretched ahead for miles.  His mind was now quite alert.  His legs were tightly hugging the sides of the motorcycle and the hem of his jeans was fluttering in the wind.  There wasn't any traffic, not at that unearthly hour.  The roar of the V-twin and the intense whoosh of the wind were anything but silent, but the silence inside of him was deepening.

To ride, he had to be wholly mindful.  He had to mind the surface of the road, he had to frequently check his rear view mirrors, he had to look far ahead for any potential dangers, he had to intently listen to the engine's roar, and watch his speed.  All without moving his head.  Only his eyes could move.  His body had to keep the 600 pounds of metal under him in balance.

The road was smooth, but for an occasional crack in the pavement.  The motorcycle weaved slightly when it went over this occasional crack, only to regain its graceful movement again.

As he glanced down at the fuel gauge, he faintly smiled.  He could go on for another one hundred and fifty miles before needing to stop.

His mindfulness was now reaching its peak.  He was now fused with the machine.  The thump in his heart, the rhythm of his lungs, the movement of the pistons, the shuddering of the speed needle, the steady grip of his wrists, and the boom of the exhaust were all part of one organism now.

He felt like he had come a long way, but the road ahead was endless.  There was no GPS, no map and no destination.  The sun was now up in the east.  The wind thundered around his face and swirled around his body and around his motorcycle.  His arms had lost their stiffness and were fluid and the hot air from near the engine was warming his legs.  There were no more thoughts.  The silence within him was complete.

The wind was him, the smells and the fumes were him, the road was him, the buildings and the trees and the valleys and the hills and the lakes were him.

He was no more, and he was everywhere.

And Death Shall Have No Dominion, part V

Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV.

The last stanza:

And death shall have no dominion.

And the ashes of death will cease to tyrannize and menace those consumed by the fires of their passions.

As I once heard:

अगर है शौक़ मरने का ,तो हर दम लौ लगाता जा,
जला कर खुदनुमाई को, भस्म तन पर लगाता जा.

(If you are passionate about death, let the blaze of that passion burnish every moment of your existence,
As that blaze turns your self-centeredness to ashes, let those ashes then adorn your body.)

No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;

After the men are gone from the earth, perhaps there will come a time when other forms of life too slowly pass into oblivion. Birds and oceans may cease to exist. There was a time, billions of years ago, when life on earth was only in the future. But the wonder is that life sprang from that apparent lifelessness. Lifelessness did not endure eternally. There might be another ice age, another deluge, another apocalypse, but, so what?

Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;

"The strength and the beauty of a tender leaf is its vulnerability to destruction. Like a blade of grass that comes up through the pavement, it has the power that can withstand casual death." (Krishnamurti's Notebook)

What is that power? What is that brave facing of an ending but an implicit, intrinsic, inherent, intoxicated determination that life shall begin again. That this ending is but a hiatus.

The beauty of life - the birds, the waves, the flowers - may fall into lifelessness, but this passage is life itself. There will be further waves, further life forms, even stranger trees. Life is the arrow of time, as it moves forward from chaos to order to chaos again.

Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;

And even though the soil and earth contain death and a seeming chaos and insanity, that insanity camouflages and hides the seed that gives rise to heartbreaking beauty when new life blossoms forth. Perhaps the myriad forms of death are what give shape to the myriad forms of life.

Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,

And this dance of life and death and then life again will continue to witness and be witnessed, till the stars and the nebulae and the galaxies and the constellations scatter away, into dust, into vacuum, into darkness.

And from that apparent void and darkness and nothingness shall again come matter and light and life and little children and singing and the beauty of creation in all its forms.

And death shall have no dominion.

"To me the honour is sufficient of belonging to the universe — such a great universe, and so grand a scheme of things. Not even Death can rob me of that honour. For nothing can alter the fact that I have lived; I have been I, if for ever so short a time. And when I am dead, the matter which composes my body is indestructible — and eternal, so that come what may to my 'Soul,' my dust will always be going on, each separate atom of me playing its separate part — I shall still have some sort of a finger in the pie. When I am dead, you can boil me, burn me, drown me, scatter me — but you cannot destroy me: my little atoms would merely deride such heavy vengeance. Death can do no more than kill you." (W. N. P. Barbellion, in The Journal of a Disappointed Man)

And death shall have no dominion.

And Death Shall Have No Dominion, part IV

Part I, Part II, Part III.

Before I move on to the final stanza, allow me to share a rendering of the first stanza in the voice of George Clooney.  This is from the film Solaris, as mentioned in Part I.

The music is by Cliff Martinez, one of the outstanding soundtrack artists of our time.  His music for two films by Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive, and Only God Forgives) is very creative and modern.

And Death Shall Have No Dominion, part III

Part I, Part II.

And death shall have no dominion.

And death might take away one man or a million, but it shall not rule the earth.

Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;

The winds of change appear and disappear, on the surface of life. But deep down, at the foundations of existence, there exists a stillness and a calm. Neither sorrow nor joy, neither ebullience nor grief, neither dance nor wail exists at that depth. The sea and winds and the struggles and the battles roar only at the surface, but as men sink down into death, they are still, motionless, silent. Though dying be painful, death is not.

On a digression, I recommend a story apparently about dying, and the great peace that comes once you accept death: Death of an old, old man by Roald Dahl.

Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;

The agonies of living and dying ages our bodies, breaks our hearts and diminishes our minds. We gain only to lose. We stand, learn to walk, fall and rise again, undertake journeys, get lost, find our way again, or perhaps find ourselves forgotten and lonely. The flesh can be torn, the frame can be tortured, but throughout history there have been men whose spirit has withstood all this and who have transcended pain. For them, death was not the final calamity, but only the final test. Jesus of Nazareth of course, but many sung and unsung heroes before and after him. They had a fire and a passion which was stronger than the desire to survive. For them, living was not the highest value, their spirit was.

Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;

Faith is both a flame in the spirit, as well as how it expresses itself in our acts and our years while we are alive. The expressions of faith can be imprisoned, they can be broken apart, temples can be brought down, hands and tongues cut from the bodies, books can be burnt, paintings and sculptures and schools and homes and fireplaces and little cups of porcelain can be destroyed. The evil of destruction coexists with the fire of creativity. Creations can be destroyed, but creativity endures in other forms, only to create again. Faith in the hands can be snapped, but faith in one's heart can be eternal and indestructible.

Split all ends up they shan't crack;

Splitting is separation, while cracking is the admission of defeat. One can defeat an army, separate mothers from sons, husbands from wives, an artist from his creations, but how can one defeat bravery, motherhood, love, and art? One cannot. These are eternal.

And death shall have no dominion.

And Death Shall Have No Dominion, part II

Part 1.

I present the first stanza, line by line.

And death shall have no dominion.

Death shall not conquer us. It will not vanquish the power of life. There is no denying death, but it will not, cannot, take away the myriad forms and processes of everlasting life: the rejuvenation, the re-birth, the budding and blossoming of flowers in the spring, the melting of ice and the formation of clouds and the rain and the rebirth of a parched earth. Death shall come, but it shall have no dominion.

Dead men naked they shall be one

In death there is no distinction. In life we are distinguished. In death we are of the soil: naked, unadorned, simple. And as all earth is one, so are dead men. They don’t stand tall any more, ready to fly away from earth, but are the very earth itself. The color of skin is like the color of one’s dress: ephemeral and superficial. In life we might be fair or tan. In death, we are all the color of the soil.

With the man in the wind and the west moon;

The disintegration of the body is also its scattering. Once scattered, what is to distinguish a man who once lived in a mansion from one who lived under the moon? One who felt the cool air through the whirl of a cooling fan from one who felt the very wind caress his cheeks?

When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,

As the body disintegrates, it gets reduced more and more to its essence: from movement to stillness, from form to mere structure, from accumulation and adornments to being bare and Spartan.  From breath to blood to flesh to bone to dust.

They shall have stars at elbow and foot;

Restored to glory, restored to being part of the wind and the sky, restored to space, released from the confines of flesh, they are now earth, the moon, the sun, and the constellations.  They are once more part of the glory of nature, while earlier their vanity and pride made them meek and puny.

Though they go mad they shall be sane,

The knowledge gained through a lifetime shall be no more, and there will be a seeming chaos and noise where there was once a lullaby and a symphony. But there is music in the wind, there is a rhythm in the river, and the beat of waves and the thunderclouds reverberates even through the deaf. Chaos is not disorder: a tree in the forest is exactly where it should be, a flower blooming is not answerable to any higher order but its own existence, a dead fallen fruit is life-giving or it may just rot away. And that implicit way of being, where there is no becoming, is the peak of understanding.

Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;

Death puts us down, when we can no longer walk or fly or reach out to hold a hand, but as we scatter, darkness becomes light, the dead nourish the living, one life gives away to another, and the circle of life continues to shrink and expand. We accumulate the weight of our memories, and then we are unburdened once more. The power of life is irrepressible. A seed breaks through the soil, the little bird hatches through the egg, the blade of grass is crushed only to become straight again and to feel the sunlight shimmering on it.  And they all contain the scattered remains of what was once dead.  They cannot but rise to life, for life is in essence a push against randomness, against fate.

Though lovers be lost love shall not;

The unique forms can disintegrate and transform, but the formation cannot. If love is what gives birth to new forms, to new life...  If love is what formation is ... Then love is eternal. The coming together and the scattering and then coming together again can no more stop than the earth can stop circling the sun.

...

And death shall have no dominion.

And no, death shall not conquer us.

And Death Shall Have No Dominion, part I

After searching in vain for a somewhat poetic analysis of this moving poem by Dylan Thomas, I decided to attempt one myself.  I came to know of this poem while watching the equally moving film Solaris (Steven Soderbergh, 2002), which film is itself a remake and a homage to the earlier film of the same name, directed in 1972 by the iconic Soviet auteur Andrei Tarkovsky.

The poem is called "And Death Shall Have No Dominion".  It was written in 1933, and the title finds its inspiration in St Paul's Epistle to the Romans: 

Knowing that Christ rising again from the dead, dieth now no more, death shall no more have dominion over him. (6.9)

Here's the poem, in full:

And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.

And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.

And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.

In three subsequent posts, I will present my understanding and appreciation of this poem.