I've come to realise that, just as every painting, every piece of pottery or glass art, and every photograph in my apartment has a memory and meaning, so does every piece of familiar and loved music to which I listen. I was looking up quotations about music as a healing power, and I was spoiled for choice. I think the one I liked most was from one of my favourite musical heroes, Louis Armstrong. He said, simple and eloquently, "Music is life itself." Chris and I had great passions for so many things, but perhaps our greatest shared passion was music.
He had an advantage over me when it came to music. He could play instruments, I could not. I never heard him sing, but I would imagine he could. That is something I can't, but so deeply wish, I could do. His mother played the violin in her youth, my stepdaughter is a professional pianist; music was and is very much part of his family. Our love of music meant that it accompanied us everywhere we went in every moment. Like me, Chris' taste was vast; there were few genres of music he didn't like. And we would sit quietly, doing whatever we were doing, with music always on in the background.
I hear certain pieces of music, and I remember a place and time and feeling. We had music we listened to when driving, and I often remember our road trips when I hear the album "Play by Moby." I remember sitting in our living room and listening to "Revelator" by Tedeschi Trucks Band. I am transported back to our cottage in Moffat when I hear Karl Jenkins. Then there are the pieces of music I discovered, or rediscovered, in the days when I was most deeply affected by the sadness and loneliness of Chris' absence. All of these pieces fill my heart. Whether they leave me in tears of sadness or joy, they leave me with a heightened sense of being in the moment remembered or the present moment.
Recently, my old friend, Francis Collins, retired director of the NIH (National Institutes of Health in the US) was on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. Francis, who grew up surrounded by the arts, has always been someone closely connected with music. You can look up videos of him with guitar in hand, serenading graduating classes for whom he had been the invited speaker. Francis' parents were once referred to as the Oberon and Titania of our little town in Virginia - these amazing pied pipers of the arts who gathered those of us lucky enough to be in their inner circle like family. But I digress. Francis was explaining on the television show how there is a great deal of research being done now into how music is a strong and natural combatant of depression and anxiety. These are Francis' words:
"When you listen to a piece of music that really moves you - whoa! It gives you a chill. It causes you to suddenly feel transported. You just dumped a whole bunch of dopamine into your ventral striatum. And wow! That is the whole field of music therapy."
I've met people over the years who approached music with a take-it-or-leave-it attitude and I not only never understood that, but I wondered how life could render any pleasure at all without music. It changes everything. Would our favourite movies be half as pleasurable without the amazing music that accompanies pivotal scenes? Many of my favourite pieces are film scores. The theme to "To Kill a Mockingbird," "The Deer Hunter," or "Schindler's List" can move me to tears as standalone compositions. To love music is to always be able to feel any emotion more deeply in any given moment, simply by listening to a piece that fills you with joy or sadness or inspiration or even fear.
I knew someone who didn't go to the movies because they didn't like being emotionally manipulated by the music. What a strange and sad way to feel about music. Making us feel is one of music's primary purposes. Without it, how empty would life be. Like paintings or sculptures or theatre or dance, music is, for me, as essential as oxygen or water or food. I simply couldn't live without it. Neither could Chris. And we surrounded ourselves with music always as I still do. It was played to remember him at his memorial service and a year later as we scattered his ashes. That is what he would have wished and I hope music will accompany me to the hereafter when my time comes. The problem is choosing which of the hundreds of pieces of music that I love to play when I go.
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As important as music was to Chris, I was surprised to find that there were no images related to music. I found this image on Pixabay.
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