Music
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The Worlds Most Beloved Art Form
While watching “Rocky III” a group of men recite lines as if they have viewed the movie countless times. They take turns voicing the most popular lines as if they compete to show who has seen it the most. However, all of a sudden, the mood has changed. Without explanation, they are silent. The movie has taken a turn in its plot. Even though these people have seen the movie many times, they express unsure facial and bodily clues as if the movie can have a different ending than that of which they remember. They now have vigor and liveliness within their manner. Their feet now twitch to a beat as well as their heads. Their faces are mean and stern and their hands in fists as if they mean business whereas not seen previously in the movie. What has happened all of a sudden that could explain this? A simple song has injected itself into the viewers ear; “Eye of The Tiger.” This all too familiar song, designed to demand a response from the viewer, provided the change in mood. Synonymous with the character “Rocky,” this song perpetuates motion and establishes the essential mood for the viewers to understand the characters actions. In movies, music provides a vital element as to the direction and mood of any single point within a film. Without music, a movie lacks the certain something that makes it so enjoyable. Nevertheless, even if an individual has no time to watch a movie, music still finds a way into their daily routine. From the song of an early morning bird to the sound of the alarm clock; even within each individuals head as they walk from here to there, music remains present. To deny anyone music would prove detrimental to the livelihood of that person. Music stirs up emotion and forces recognition. It also soothes the soul and presents a feeling of solitude when needed, anytime, any place. Without music, no matter the culture or form of music, the harmony of life would cease to exist. From the situations that present the performance of music to the ability to appreciate music, I hold true that no one should be denied the pleasures of the everlasting merriment of music.
The form in which music reaches the ears sometimes varies from place to place. Each culture has its own specific twist on any one form of music. For example, the Blues in the United States differs greatly from the Blues in Africa as Dr. Kelly M. Askew pointed out in the Scholars Symposium. In “Sung and Unsung: Musical Reflections on Tanzanian Postsocialisms” Askew states,
Nyimbo za maombolezo span every conceivable genre of Tanzanian music, from traditional dance (ngoma), urban jazz (dansi), sung poetry (taarab) and recitative poetry (shairi and utenzi), to Swahili reggae, choir music (kwaya), steel pan bands, an Indian style Swahili song, and even a song that Tanzanians would refer to as blues, but that would be identified as soft pop by Westerners” (Askew).
Although music performs differently from culture to culture, it still provides the function in which it was intended; entertainment.
Music also performs another function in that it acts as a sort of time machine. If anything has the possibility to rip the fabric of the space-time continuum, music does. Music seeps into the unconscious, tags, and archives the memory of what was happening when the music was heard. While this sometimes puts a smile on some peoples faces, the past memories brought back to cognition by music can hurt or even prove dangerous as in the case of Sigmund Freud. Recognized as the father of psychoanalysis and as one of the most influential and authoritative thinker of the twentieth century, Sigmund Freud was also a physiologist, doctor, and psychologist. Freud, in contrast to many, hated music. While the reasons remain unclear as to his hatred of music, Freud did make a statement as to his opposition towards the art;
Works of art do exercise a powerful effect on me, especially those of literature and sculpture, less often of painting. This has occasioned me, when I have been contemplating such things, to spend a long time before them trying to apprehend them in my own way, i.e., to explain to myself what their effect is due to. Whenever I cannot do this, as for instance with music, I am almost incapable of obtaining any pleasure. Some rationalistic or perhaps analytic turn of mind in me rebels against being moved by a thing without knowing why I am thus affected and what it is that affects me. (Freud)
Inferring that Freuds