Now I know Altrincham hasn’t changed, so it must be something in me. There is music in the air, or so it seems, I can hear it in my heart and soul It is a sign I have space in my life that I am particularly enjoying these encounters at the moment. Been several lovely ones this week. I have also enjoyed the beautiful music in the air, breaking through the silence. Like most towns Altrincham has its fare share of buskers, of mixed ability. Recently we have been blessed by the most talented cellist. I have from time to time stopped to listen to him play, rather than just walk on by. He is a lovely American guy, I haven’t yet asked him what brought him, but I am glad he is. I have felt a stillness in my heart the last couple of weeks and silence in my mind and my soul has been filled with both music, joy and laughter, for this I am deeply grateful.
Music, joy and laughter has been in short supply over the last couple of years, well in a communal sense, music, joy and laughter that we share together. We are all missing it I know. I think one of the reasons that the Brass Band concert was enjoyed so much this December is that such joy and music has been in short supply. Doesn’t life need to be enlivened by it? It needs such shared expression of joy, our souls needs to sing and it needs to laugh, we need creativity, art and poetry, just as much as we need peace and stillness. All work and no play makes all us pretty dull.
I have been thinking of music of late. I mostly listen to it while driving, not at home and not in the gym, or even out walking. Most folk have headphones on, or actually in your ears, but I don’t like them, it blocks me off from the world and that is the last thing I want. I want to be awake to the world, more connected, to hear the music of the world, so no earphones for me.
My soul seems to have a new space of late. Music like most of life is as much about space, silence, emptiness as it is about sound. The skill is what we fill and surround the emptiness with, what we create within this space. This brings to mind the following poem “On Music” by Rainer Maris Rilke
Music: breathing of statues. Possibly:
stillness in pictures. Speech where speech
ends. Time upright and poised
upon the coastline of our passions.
Feelings for whom? You are the transformation
of all feeling into – what? . . . audible landscape.
You stranger: music. Heart’s space
that’s outgrown us. Innermost us
which it’s scaled, surmounted, gone beyond
into holiest absence:
where what’s within surrounds us
the way the most skillful horizon does,
or the other side of the air,
pure,
immense,
no longer lived in.
translated by William H. Gass
There is something about music, and all creativity really, that moves Rilke says “as the other side of the air”, it takes us to another place, that helps us better inhabit this place. For me it is not about escaping reality, but truly inhabiting it, with the whole of my being. It is not about transcendence, but transformation. This for me is the essence of the spiritual life, its purpose is to enable us to live better in this life and one aspect of this is to truly enjoy this life, not simply endure it. The arts certainly help with this, it beautifies our existence.
I am no musician. My brother is. He is an excellent teacher these days and was for many years a working musician. He never made much money, but he made a living and lived a life. My brother is also very much a mathematical person, his children are basically mathematical geniuses, as well as excellent musicians themselves. It seems that music is more than mere creativity, it also mathematical. I suspect that this is probably why I am no musician. I’ve got the music in me, I’m just not sure I’ve got the maths. The music is in my soul, but perhaps not my brain.
This brings to mind one of those figures that we all learnt about in maths lessons as children, good old Pythagoras and his theory about triangles. You may recall it: that the sum of the square of the hypotenuse of a right angle triangle is equal to the sum of the square of the opposite two sides (by the way I didn’t remember that, I had to look it up). It is now thought that he did not originally come up with this theorem that it had been around for some four hundred years, dating back to ancient Babylonia. In fact, some scholars question everything that is attributed to him, suggesting that it was actually discovered by others. Not that it matters really, this is classic mythos, which is not really about fact and actual truth, but deeper universal truth. What really matters is the wisdom itself and not which individual discovered it first.
Another idea attributed to Pythagoras is “Musica Universalis” which is the idea that the universe is composed entirely of numbers, and that these numbers correspond to music. Therefore, the whole of reality, including us, is composed of music and numbers. That everything resonates its own frequency. He believed that each of the planets created their own frequency and sent it into the universe, hence the phrase “Musica Universalis” or “Harmony of the Spheres”. Now it wasn’t that we necessarily heard the music with our ears, rather that their cosmic vibration resonated with us, impacted upon us, like all music can. Perhaps like a deaf person enjoys music not by physically hearing it, but by experiencing the vibrations of music (Good, good, good, good vibrations). Isn’t music felt as much as it heard. Pythagoras believed that our souls were both nourished and purified by the vibrations of music, which kept us spiritually healthy, just as food and exercise kept our bodies healthy. I was thinking of this as I noticed all the new people in the gym at this time of year. Yes, they are taking care of their bodies, but I wonder how many and spending as much time and energy on exercising their souls.
There is an account by Iamblichus’s that describes how Pythagoras made his discovery about the music of the spheres, no doubt it is apocryphal, it is classic mythos. One day Pythagoras strolled past a blacksmith’s forge and was captivated by the sound of the many hammers pounding in a pattern that suddenly sounded harmonious. He rushed into the forge and immediately began investigating the cause of the harmony, testing the various hammers in various stroke combinations — some producing harmony, others discord. After analysing the patterns and weighing the hammers, he discovered a simple mathematical relationship between those that produced harmony — their masses were exact ratios of one another’s.
From this, it is said, he developed “Musica Universalis”
I wonder how “Musica Universalis” awakens your lives, how it exercises your soul? What music makes you smile instantly? What makes you want to dance? What opens your heart, for a love realised, or perhaps one unrequited? What do you turn to in time of loss, in deep grief? What stirs those darker parts of your being, when it seems all too much? What do you turn to in times of joy and celebration? What are your redemption songs? What is your favourite overpowering noise, when you need shaking out of something? Or what do you turn to when you need to return to stillness, to peace?
What nourishes, purifies, restores, energises or perhaps exercises your soul? Maybe something to consider in the coming weeks, as we live through this winter and move toward Spring and hopefully better days of joy and celebration, fun and laughter.
The music is in all of us, we have to sing it, to play, to join in the harmony of life. We sing our own tunes, but by joining together our own voices we create something beautiful we play our role in the “Musica Universalis”. We need to express the music in us and we need to experience it in all of existence.
Music though is as much about silence, as it is about sound. Just as most of life is emptiness and space, the best music understands the importance and use of silence, Pythagoras reputedly said "Learn to be silent. Let your quiet mind listen and absorb the silence." In order to engage in the great harmony of life we need to learn to be still and silent, to know when we need to engage in our sound and to listen to the sounds that surrounded us, that we are part and parcel of. If we become quiet enough in our hearts we may just open the door to “Musica Universalis” then our song will become a part of the greater reality.
Now one of my favourite and perhaps the most beautiful of all musical vibrations is that of laughter, something that often burst through the silence. A friend said to me the other day “I was coming to a place unfamiliar to me and then I heard your laughter and instantly knew it would be ok, it suddenly felt familiar and welcoming.
Parker J Palmer claims that “Laughter and silence are among our most reliable guides on this magical mystery tour called life.
On the surface, the two may seem to have little in common, but their kinship is soul-deep. Both make us vulnerable by penetrating our illusions and taking us closer to reality, grounding, renewing and redeeming us as they do.
Silence deprives us of distractions, forcing us to face the gnarly emotions that can arise when we stop yammering for a while. Laughter often reflects our foibles and flaws, holding up a mirror to how ridiculous we can be. We have a name for people who trust each other enough to risk the vulnerability that comes with sharing silence and laughter. We call them soul friends.”
Like music silence and laughter are essential to our souls. We need to renew and nourish our very human being. We need them to fully engage in the harmony of existence, to play our role and to be fully a part of life. We need them to engage in the Divine Harmony in which we play a small but vital role. We got the music in us, we got the joy and laughter in us and we need to be truly silent in order to feel fully a part of all of this.
So come and join with me in the “Musica Universalis”, let us join together in the Divine harmony and sing the joy of living in all its mystery”
Below is a video devotion based
on the materal in this "blogspot"
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