There’s a museum in France near the famous painted caves of
Lascaux and other prehistoric places.
There’s a museum in France near the famous painted caves of Lascaux and other prehistoric places.
The museum contains objects and explanations of the long history, of which our understanding is still evolving, of the humans in the area.
One of the objects that I remember best was a tiny piece of reindeer bone, carved into a whistle.
In other words, evidence that our unimaginably ancient ancestors, who didn’t have agriculture, or cloth, or domestic animals, or the wheel, had music.
If we needed evidence that music is an integral part of being human, this must surely be it.
I was thinking of this because Sting made a lute album.
I’ve only heard one song from the album but it’s all songs from the 16th century by a singer-songwriter named John Dowland.
The thing that struck me about this, besides the beauty of the song I heard, was the ability of music to take us in new, unexpected directions.
Sometimes it’s simply hearing a tune we haven’t heard for a long time that can bring us back to the exact moment we first heard it: We are 18 again, it’s summer, the window is open and we are straining to hear if the words we heard are really “yellow submarine.”
Sometimes it’s hearing a familiar tune in a new way that opens our ears and our hearts.
“Chega de Saudade” (translated as “No More Blues”) is a Brazilian song written by Antonio Carlos Jobim. My introduction to the tune was through a jaunty version by Dizzy Gillespie. It’s the kind of music that makes you wiggle and tap your feet wherever you are, knowing that blues are a thing of the past.
Then I came upon a version with Yo-Yo Ma and a female vocalist. The first few times I listened, it sounded jaunty, too. But eventually I started to really hear the cello solos, and its sinuous harmonies added doubt and depth, a question mark, an edge, to the jauntiness of the melody.
This time of year, we may be hearing more music but enjoying it less, since it’s trite or predictable holiday music piped into every imaginable moment, every space, every transaction.
It’s too bad, because some of the seasonal songs are wonderful. Away in a manger, we learn of hope and miracles.
Find music that can transport you, surprise you and transform you. We will never know what music was played on the many-thousand-year-old bone whistle, but we are the children of the player, and we have not lost the music that coursed through his heart.
