Music in Being & Thought

Wagner and Nietzsche shared a well known friendship that eventually ended, as Nietzsche found Wagner to be too nationalistic and egotistical. Nietzshe's thinking had matured and outgrown the ideas found in his first book The Birth of Tragedy, of which he dedicated to Wagner. His book, Human, All too Human, was a natural response to his loss of friendship with Wagner, Wagner literally falling for the all too human traps of conceited human thought.

Yet Wagner undoubtedly influenced Nietzsche heavily, and this influence made it logical to choose a work of his for the Being & Thought essay focusing on Nietzsche. The Prelude was chosen symbolically. Ecce Homo, whose work is referenced in the essay, The Paradox of Wisdom, served in some ways as a prelude to Nietzsche's own madness, of which he descended into soon after having written the book. So it is the Prelude of Lohengrin that we listen and read to.

Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber’s Passacaglia is a notable work of the late Baroque period. Built on a repeating ground bass pattern, the defining feature of a passacaglia, it becomes inherently introspective, offering the listener a window of sound through which to contemplate.

The period in which this piece was composed was rich with philosophy: Descartes wrote his Meditations in 1641, and Spinoza published the Ethics in 1677. Spinoza was later described by Bertrand Russell as “the noblest and most lovable of the great philosophers” in A History of Western Philosophy. Biber’s Passacaglia therefore serves well as the accompanying piece for the essay, What Makes a Good Philosopher?

For an essay predominantly concerned with first impressions, it felt appropriate to pair it with a piece from the Impressionist movement. The piece begins tentatively, evocative of a first meeting. It gradually builds, as the two individuals become accustomed to one another and the brain forms an impression. A dance of symbol and meaning follows, and the piece begins to open and flow.

We are reminded of Jung’s famous words in Modern Man in Search of a Soul: “The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.” The music enters a new stage as the transformation takes place and it concludes on graceful yet definite ending notes, with both parties being irrevocably changed.

For the essay highlighting the differences between Eastern and Western thought, I wanted to choose a piece that is in many ways drastically different from Western music, yet still retains a sense of crossover. Western music often feels as though it has direction, with a clear sense of suspense and an eventual ending, where tension leads toward resolution. However, Moored by a River on an Autumn Night is circular and suspends direction, quite literally mooring the listener and shifting the focus away from drama and toward atmosphere.

Choosing a modern piece from 2006 that employs contemporary classical techniques also links it to the Western sphere. In an increasingly globalised and interconnected world, musical traditions no longer exist in isolation, but blend into one another, reflecting the dialogue between Eastern and Western perspectives explored in the essay.

The Croak sounds, at least to myself, as what existential struggling thoughts would sound like: of despair, a certain hint of violence; emotions desperate to produce themselves yet not quite finding their voice. Hence a croak rather than a shout or scream. It could be the introductory piece for East of Eden if it was made into a film, where the themes of freewill and determinacy battle it out through powerful, varied and deep characters.

Writing about Moonlight Sonata is difficult. It is such a famous, recognisable piece, yet the mood it evokes provides the perfect setting for the themes in the Shadowline essay. A nocturnal darkness, beginning with a slow pace that eventually erupts into a feverish intensity in the later movements, feels as though you are musically crossing some threshold, a line of experience. The sonata is the precipice, the calm before the madness and chaos of a great storming sea, like that found in Conrad’s The Shadow-Line or Lord Jim, or Melville’s Moby-Dick.

Falling through the Hour Glass is an ambient piece, with a subtle focus on time, where events sporadically happen, physically and metaphysically. Subtle piano notes mark transitions in the piece, with strings eventually entering the symphony to create a dramatic, deep feeling within the music.

Theres an impression of mystery and discovery in the song and overarching it all is this sense of wonder: at the natural world, at the ideas of others; you get this uncanny feeling of interconnectedness listening to the piece. I think these qualities made it an apt pick for the essay on the philosophy of science, where wonder and curiosity are natural prerequisites to an enquiring mind.

Adagio for Strings carries a sense of tragedy, and a seriousness that asks to be engaged with. In the same vein, it is in some ways tragic that great artists and creators, those who have achieved extraordinary things, are not always the righteous characters we wish them to be. The question of whether this affects their work should be taken with similar gravity.

Adagio has a very particular moment in which it feels as though there is some kind of cathartic reconciliation, a respite from the tragic. Hopefully, the essay on separating the art from the artist conveys a similar feeling: that we can look beyond an artist’s moral dubiousness and still find great value in their work.