Power of Music...For Those Who Love the Low End from a Bassist

Music, as an art form, moves man to delight in the emotions and passions which the music evokes. The repeated listening to a certain kind of music becomes habitual in the strictest sense of the word: the emotions clothe themselves with a habit, either a virtue or a vice, according to the quality of the music one habitually listens to. In this regard Aristotle wrote: ". . . emotions of any kind are produced by melody and rhythm; therefore by music a man becomes accustomed to feeling the right emotions; music has thus the power to form character, and various kinds of music based on the various modes, may be distinguished by their effects on character —
Music can imitate a reasonable, ordered, honorable, virtuous emotion, in which case music helps dispose man to the virtuous and honorable ordering of his life. However, music can also imitate an unreasonable, disordered, dishonorable, vicious emotion. The old saying that music calms the savage beast may be true of old music, but it would hardly hold true for many forms of modern music, whose purpose often is to release the beast. In the Old Testament, when King Saul was troubled by an evil spirit he was calmed and delivered by David's harp playing. Should David have played upon the war drums or had he sounded the battle horns for attack, one could hardly expect Saul to have been calmed and brought back to his senses by such music. Is there any serious doubt in the mind concerning the category into which the modern electrified instruments would fall?
Many people think that the goodness or badness of music can be judged simply by its lyrics. It cannot be doubted that the lyrics themselves may be good or bad. Bad lyrics certainly magnify the depravity of bad music, and also vitiate otherwise good music. For example, if a composer writes a very solemn, beautiful hymn, and puts blasphemous words to it, great would be the perversion. So also if a composer wrote a piece of music which inspired great fortitude, and accompanied it with a lyric which called for the annihilation of a particular race or class of people, this obviously would be an evil song. For this reason, if the words are bad, then the music is especially to be avoided regardless of whether a person listens or pays active attention to the words, because the human mind is influenced nevertheless.
But the point of our present argument is, as Marshall McCluhan observed: "The medium is the message." That is to say, the music: its melody, harmony and rhythm, all by itself disposes man to virtue or vice by moving the emotions. Therefore, the way in which they move the passions should serve as a principle basis for judgment on whether any given piece of music is good or bad.
It is so very important to realize that it is not simply the lyrics that will affect man, but the music itself enters into the deepest recesses of the soul to influence man even more profoundly. Words must first be understood by the mind, but music is immediately grasped by the emotions. 
In Closing, Good Music lifts the soul and human spirit (encourage, give confidence and hope, bring out thankfulness, challenge to live right) and orders the soul and human spirit to remove or lessen confusion, put emotions in proper Perspective with truth, and give PEACE.
Thank you for reading....

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Toby Keith - Cryin' For Me (Wayman's Song)

Is there a difference between a Farmer and a Gardener?