Music is part of us, and either ennobles or degrades our behavior.
Interpretation
Music profoundly influences human behavior, shaping it positively or negatively.
Boethius emphasizes the intrinsic role of music in human life, suggesting that it is not just an art form but a significant factor that can uplift or undermine our actions and character. This dual potential of music reflects its power to inspire noble behavior while also having the capacity to lead to degradation, highlighting the importance of the music we choose to engage with.
In practice
During a speech about the importance of arts education in schools, this quote can emphasize the impact of music on behavior.
And no renown can render you well-known:_x000D_ For if you think that fame can lengthen life _x000D_ By mortal famousness immortalized,_x000D_ The day will come that takes your fame as well,_x000D_ And there a second death for you awaits.
Man is so constituted that he then only excels other things when he knows himself.
He who has calmly reconciled his life to fate, and set proud death beneath his feet, can look fortune in the face, unbending both to good and bad; his countenance unconquered.
Every man must be content with that glory which he may have at home.
For in all adversity of fortune the worst sort of misery is to have been happy.
I who once wrote songs with keen delight am now by sorrow driven to take up melancholy measures. Wounded Muses tell me what I must write, and elegiac verses bathe my face with real tears. Not even terror could drive from me these faithful companions of my long journey. Poetry, which was once the glory of my happy and flourishing youth, is still my comfort in this misery of my old age.
From a technical viewpoint, I have certain things I'd like to present in my solos. To do this, I have to get the right material. It has to swing, and it has to be varied.
Painting is the frozen evidence of a performance.
Language is the most massive and inclusive art we know, a mountainous and anonymous work of unconscious generations.
I figured as long as the music stayed hot and important and good, that there would always be a reason for 'Soul Train.'
Every time I get in the studio, I feel like I wanna have some fun. My fun is not doing the easy work. My fun is doing what's me.
I don't go into the studio with the idea of 'saying' something. What I do is face the blank canvas and put a few arbitrary marks on it that start me on some sort of dialogue.
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