The Sound of Music

My sister healed herself with music once.  She was very sad after an unexpected miscarriage and the simple act of putting a CD player and some CD’s on her kitchen counter slowly helped her come to terms with her loss.  New genres and old favorites wafted through her kitchen as she went through the motions of feeding her family.  The music she chose eventually lifted her spirits and helped her realize how blessed she was and how bright her future was.  Although it didn’t make her forget her loss, she felt better able to cope with it.  She still loves music more than anyone I know.

I don’t think I was born with the right kind of ears for music.  I like it but I don’t have to have it, at least not all the time.  The subtleties and nuances in music never seemed to make much of a difference to me and most of time I have classical music playing softly in the background or just peaceful silence.

For years I’ve been listening to a Boston classical station and I have learned a lot about that music.  A lilting, tinkling piece playing in my car or as I pad around my bedroom in the evening cheers me but I wouldn’t say music brings me the joy it brings my sister.  I also like showtunes and anything that reminds me of the easy-listening music my grandparents had on their old hi-fi at dinnertime.  Songs from high school are fun sometimes but for a very long time I couldn’t listen to love ballads – they made me feel things I didn’t want to feel anymore.

But I’ve abandoned some old notions about music this year.  At one of the many bric-a-brac shops around town, I found a used copy of the soundtrack to the film Mona Lisa Smile and I swear I can hear the movie theme speaking…not in words, but in strains and inflections.  There is one part that seems to be telling a story about something lost and the next part – the lilting aria part – gives back that everything will be alright.  It’s uncanny that I hadn’t known before that music could do that.  And when I wait for the deliverance … that hopeful answering part … my heart aches just a little bit.  It is truly beautiful…

Now I feel it with lots of music – soft harmonies that are filled with substance and meaning… and promises of good.  Some of it leaves hollow echoes that I can’t quite define and yet, I always feel better for having listened.  These are the pieces that give back an intimate feeling to the listener and make us feel less alone.  My sister was right…music can heal and like a good book, it connects us to the composers themselves, the very authors of music.

Robert Frost once said that a really good poem starts with a lump in the throat.  I think the same could be said for certain music too.

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For lumps in the throat, listen to:

To Kill a Mockingbird soundtrack

Peyton Place soundtrack

John Williams – Saving Pvt Ryan

Ennio Morricone – anything