Music and Purpose
I do not wish to turn my live journal into a collection of stream-of-consciousness rambles and rants, but before beginning my philosophy paper, I figured I'd do a little writing to get in the mode. It often helps.
I was just listening to Pachebel's Cannon in D major (the famous one at every wedding). It got me thinking about sappiness. Certain pieces of music make me feel like I'm in a movie montage, typing away at a computer while various "characters" from life flit along through scenes. I feel like I'm part of something larger. Or that I have some special purpose predestined or delivered. Everyone in a movie--at least in the mainstream--seems to follow that pattern, afterall. Every scene, for the most part, is a lilly pad to that purpose, that final climactic scene. Each montage is part of a journey.
In real life, that's not really the case. It's fallacious to suppose that sitting in the library, typing at live journal, and watching people go by--that all this is part of a grand purpose. But the music makes it seem so.
I keep asking myself "why?" Is it the fact that I'm bred on films with sappy montages? That makes the most sense, but from reading older bits of writing regarding music, I feel music inherently makes us sappy, or sorrowful, or passionate. It plays our heartstrings like a puppeteer, telling us there is some purpose to grasp--but why? I don't know whether there is indeed some grand purpose, or higher truth/reality, or heavenly being. I really can't fathom such statements. I don't know if I'm just feeling sappy when I hear the moonlight sonata or Chopin's tristesse; or if that's me connecting with some metaphysical force. Beethoven said, "Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy," but he was biased, so I can't believe him.
In the end, I guess I just have to do what feels right. Unfortunately, that sounds quite anticlimactic... Beethoven sounded much better saying "music should strike fire from the heart of man, and bring tears from the eyes of women." I don't think philosophy papers can do that.
I was just listening to Pachebel's Cannon in D major (the famous one at every wedding). It got me thinking about sappiness. Certain pieces of music make me feel like I'm in a movie montage, typing away at a computer while various "characters" from life flit along through scenes. I feel like I'm part of something larger. Or that I have some special purpose predestined or delivered. Everyone in a movie--at least in the mainstream--seems to follow that pattern, afterall. Every scene, for the most part, is a lilly pad to that purpose, that final climactic scene. Each montage is part of a journey.
In real life, that's not really the case. It's fallacious to suppose that sitting in the library, typing at live journal, and watching people go by--that all this is part of a grand purpose. But the music makes it seem so.
I keep asking myself "why?" Is it the fact that I'm bred on films with sappy montages? That makes the most sense, but from reading older bits of writing regarding music, I feel music inherently makes us sappy, or sorrowful, or passionate. It plays our heartstrings like a puppeteer, telling us there is some purpose to grasp--but why? I don't know whether there is indeed some grand purpose, or higher truth/reality, or heavenly being. I really can't fathom such statements. I don't know if I'm just feeling sappy when I hear the moonlight sonata or Chopin's tristesse; or if that's me connecting with some metaphysical force. Beethoven said, "Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy," but he was biased, so I can't believe him.
In the end, I guess I just have to do what feels right. Unfortunately, that sounds quite anticlimactic... Beethoven sounded much better saying "music should strike fire from the heart of man, and bring tears from the eyes of women." I don't think philosophy papers can do that.