music: “River,” Enya
If someone asked me what I loved most in the world, more than anything else, I would say musicality.
My mother told me that I’ve always had a sense for that sort of thing. I can’t necessarily create it, but I can always spot it in someone or something else. Musicality… the artistic flow, a stern and intoxicating grasp on some soulful vein that subtly connects the more exquisite parts of life. I expect that it accounts for my love of so many different things, because musicality has such flexibility.
I suppose I’ll have to give examples of this, or you’ll never grasp the idea. Granted, it’s somewhat of an ambiguous one. But I’ll try.
Of course, the most drawing venue is music. My idea of an artistically sound song is one that compels me to stop everything I’m doing, close my eyes, and just.. breathe the music. These include “Canto Alla Vita,” by Josh Groban, “Music of the Night,” [from Phantom of the Opera], “Watermark,” by Enya [and countless other songs of hers], and so many instrumental pieces. I consider music to be the foremost art, because it supersedes human fallibility and creates an utterly perfect expression of human emotion. Music is magical.
A very close second to music is the written word. I actually began my love affair with language long before that of music, and it has remained very close to my heart. I came to truly realize the beautiful melody that words can create in authors such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, Virginia Woolf, and Lucy Maud Montgomery. I know I’ve found a great author when I reread certain passages aloud, quietly to myself, not for comprehension but simply to hear the velvet petals dance in the air, to breathe life into them and smile at their loveliness. Many authors, while writing excellent works, are guilty of a formulaic or contrived writing style. The three writers I mentioned in particular, naturally in the company of many others, slashed such boundaries and created literature that is as musical as it is lush and memorable.
Of course, one cannot forever chase harmony and poetic flair without an ultimate source of comparison. Mine is Nature. I can judge anything if I heave it suddenly into the perfect natural world. I believe that Nature, when unaltered by humans, is the most beautiful and perfect thing that will ever exist, in this world or in any other. Having had the privledge of living and traveling to so many exotic and dazzling locales, I have the protection of first-hand experience to defend me against any who may beg to differ.
Ultimately, when humans create art, it is to inspire in another person their deepest feelings, emotions that reach so deep into the soul that communication of them to another seems a veritably impossible task. That is why it becomes so important, so profound, when it is achieved.
There are, additionally, two levels toward this mean. One is the connection between two people. The other is the connection between one person and the essence of the universe that surrounds him. The first is very difficult to create, but it leaves a lasting, intimate connection between those involved. More often than not, this can be achieved without even the personal encounter between the two – it comes through the work of an artist. Because art, literature, and even music can be preserved posthumously, someone can create a connection with that artist even after they have ceased to exist. A very good example of this is Virginia Woolf, who wrote such a volume of work throughout her life that I feel sometimes as though I know her, and she is in fact a deeply intimate friend of mine who understands me completely, without my even needing to utter a word.
The second level is rather easy to encounter. It merely takes a striking religious experience, a private encounter of some spring in the woods, some lone daisy growing between the cracks in a sidewalk. It is the feeling of amazement, of connection, of safety, belonging, and awe all at once.
I imagine people would ask why I would choose musicality over a certain person, a favorite book.. it is because musicality is simply the soul and essence of true beauty. As long as I am able to unearth it everywhere around me, I will be content, even without those I love nearby. Why? Because the beauty and originality of the people close to me are immortalized in it, and I will be forever connected to them, not perhaps in body, but in soul.