From: HisSheedness@aol.com
Date: Thu Jan 23 2003 - 06:05:52 GMT
John, All
I really liked this section because I thought it was one of the best
illustrations of the interplay between DQ and sQ. In this case, or so it
seems to me, sQ is given precedence over DQ because it doesn't take
creativity or musical innovation to produce something with DQ, but it does
take those things to produce a timeless work which continually inspires over
the years: across generations, within generations, and within the lifetime of
the individual. However, DQ is the initial starting point for any great
musical work, and I suppose sQ only works as a consequence of it. This made
me ask myself whether there were any musical works possessed of sQ but NOT DQ
that were considered great works. The only thing I can think of is the
national anthem of a given country. I don't think people go nuts when they
first hear their country's national anthem (I will be honest and say I don't
even know all the words to America's), but it does have the ability to
inspire people when played at certain moments, despite being over 200 years
old and listened to hundreds of times in the lifetime of an individual. But
is this appreciation of one's national anthem simply a sort of ideological
assumption; namely, that we are supposed to appreciate and receive
inspiration from this music because of its assocations with the values our
respective countries, and so we do? I have no idea if it is even possible to
prove to what extent these ideological assumptions play a role in determining
its Quality, or if they even do play a role in the first place. Has anyone
ever been inspired by a foreign country's national anthem, one to which they
have no ethnic or emotional ties?
Relating to your experience with the Sting song (which one was it, by the
way?), I am also acted upon by the various music I listen to, which forms
what I can only describe as a catalogue of experiences in my mind. And,
despite what Pirsig says, I am not always overcome by a song by hearing it
for the first time. Many times, it takes careful listening to and a critical
ear towards a song before it can become truly great in the mind of an
individual. I am hit with the DQ of a song usually at some random moment,
not a particularly unique one, but usually after I have heard the song a few
times. To give an example, right now I am listening to Smetana's "Die
Moldau," which immediately conjures up the image of myself sitting in a
classroom two years ago while it was playing through the wall from the room
next door. I could describe that moment in great depth (which I won't do now
to avoid boring everyone more than I already have and already will).
Regardless of how many times I hear a song and in how many different settings
I hear it in, there is one particular experience or setting that will always
come to my mind upon hearing any piece of music which holds any sentimental
or qualitative value in my mind. So, if I hear Dvorak's Romance in F Minor,
I think of standing in a subway car in Japan with the book 'Gangs of New
York' in my hand; when I hear Miles Davis' 'Flamenco Sketches,' I immediately
remember driving home by myself at night after a prayer meeting. It is a
forever growing and evolving canon, because I know that a new experience
might concretize itself and replace the old if the conditions are right for
it. So, the point to all this, if there is one, is the universal theme that
DQ works in mysterious ways, which often depend on our own internal
conditions and, to a degree, the external surroundings contributing to those
conditions.
Rasheed
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