On Music

Something that I read in a book recently has held my subconscious too long to be ignored, and I knew I had to write about it when I discovered that I had something to say. (Actually, this may not be entirely true; I do feel strongly about the issue, but whether or not I have something to say will emerge in the following paragraphs.)

The author in question tried to compare writing in general and prose in particular, to music in all its forms. He postulated that prose is transparent, showing up the writer's imperfections. The nature of prose (he argued) is such that the creator cannot separate himself from his creation; his flawed stamp is visible on each of his offsprings.

Music, on the other hand, transcends the creator. The nature of music is such that it automatically distances itself from whoever wrote it; it is exalted, pure, an embodiment of the truth, existing in a vacuum and frustrating attempts to trace its genealogy.

This was the author's thesis, anyway. I remember reading this and agreeing with it almost immediately (a reaction that I later concluded signified a personal flaw). It was only later when I examined the components of this argument that I found that I took issue with most of the assumptions it made, that the argument itself was deeply inadequate, glib, even, and failed to hold any water under serious examination.

First of all, writing - we will all agree that writing is flawed, and for exactly the reasons listed above. So much has been said about this by so many people so much better at making arguments than I that it would border on impudence to try and add to them; if one needs a thorough primer on how exactly writing is flawed one can easily refer to the Zadie Smith article that I helpfully provided a link to in one of my previous posts.


But music, now; is it unsullied, incapable of adulteration? Does it not bear even a single trace of its creator's imperfections? Is it, in short, divine?

Music as come down to us, some say, from God, and hence is abstract, incapable of being annotated, analyzed, dissected into its component elements; it is a reflection of a being who is simultaneously all-powerful and compassionate. People who believe this about music will also diligently hold that Glenn Gould (who will show up later in these paragraphs) playing the Goldberg Variations cannot be duplicated by a computer hooked up to a piano. The human being is divinity personified when he plays such beautiful music; this divinity is not reflected, cannot be reflected, in something as banal as a procession of zeros and ones.

I used to subscribe to this point of view, but don't anymore; Music possesses a language, by which everything that is abstract about it can be reduced to an almost cabalistic symbolism. It is an incredibly efficient language, a language that enables the composer to separate himself from the sounds of his music, its very flesh, and concentrate on its creation. A language that does not correspond to the idea of most languages we know, a language that cannot be spoken, only understood, but a language all the same.

And because music can be described by a language, it is also subject to its various shortcomings. There is a dichotomy here; The same language that enables the perpetuation of music through the ages and ensures its immortality also imprisons it; a treble clef here, a C minor chord there, a few crochets everywhere, and look - there is Glenn Gould, in all his majesty. Or rather the computer, playing Glenn Gould. Can you tell the difference? Almost certainly not.

It follows that any music that is written can be flawed, and can carry with it all the quirks of the person that wrote it. Two examples immediately spring to my mind -

Glenn Gould, when once asked why he didn't play Mozart, chuckled a tiny bit and apparently said that his music was simple and derivative.

Joe Satriani, in this
interview, says of the song Hella Good (by No Doubt) - "They're in the wrong key, and that bugs me. They've got all this support from this great pool of talent, they've got all this money, everything is set up for them to do this right, and then you hear a vocal line singing a melody that doesn't mix with the chord progression."


These people are clearly making a point, though I can't really see it. I've listened to Hella Good dozens of times, but don't detect anything wrong . And Mozart? Who can dare call his music "simple", of all things?

People who know more about it than I do. And here is the epiphany, the moment of revelation, almost timid in its simplicity - we cannot perceive flaws in music because we understand it not at all. When a piece of music plays, we love it, but cannot hope to understand what is being said. Somewhere buried in the notes and the chord progressions is a true authorial reflection, but we, in our ignorance, cannot see it.

And perhaps this is just as well. Imagine a life where music is as commonplace and well understood as speech; imagine recognizing each musical cliché as it came your way; imagine hordes of effete critics, using all the literary tools at their disposal to annotate, interpret, and pummel into submission a work of flawed excellence.

We would have lost something indescribably beautiful because we strove, in all our innocence, to describe it.