Music, when combined with a pleasurable idea, is poetry; music, without the idea, is simply music; the idea, without the music, is prose, from its very definitiveness.
Interpretation
Music gains depth and meaning when paired with evocative ideas, turning it into a form of poetry.
In this quote, Edgar Allan Poe illustrates the profound relationship between music and ideas. He suggests that when music is enhanced by a pleasurable concept, it transcends into poetry, which evokes deeper emotions and connections. Conversely, music without an accompanying idea lacks this depth and remains merely a sound, while ideas alone, devoid of musical expression, become straightforward and definitive like prose. This highlights the artistic intertwining of emotions, music, and intellectual concepts in creative expression.
In practice
During a poetry reading event, one might say this quote to emphasize the connection between musicality and poetic expression.
But evil things, in robes of sorrow, Assailed the monarch's high estate; (Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow Shall dawn upon him desolate!) And round about his home the glory That blushed and bloomed, Is but a dim-remembered story Of the old time entombed.
Most writers - poets in especial - prefer having it understood that they compose by a species of fine frenzy - an ecstatic intuition - and would positively shudder at letting the public take a peep behind the scenes.
...the agony of my soul found vent in one loud, long and final scream of despair.
Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best have gone to their eternal rest.
I could have clasped the red walls to my bosom as a garment of eternal peace. "Death," I said, "any death but that of the pit!" Fool! might I have not known that into the pit it was the object of the burning iron to urge me?
In our endeavors to recall to memory something long forgotten, we often find ourselves upon the very verge of remembrance, without being able, in the end, to remember.
Art supplies constantly to contemplation what nature seldom affords in concrete experience - the union of life and peace.
I'd been painting rats for three years before someone said 'that's clever it's an anagram of art' and I had to pretend I'd known that all along.
Deep Listening is listening in every possible way to everything possible to hear no matter what you are doing. Such intense listening includes the sounds of daily life, of nature, or one's own thoughts as well as musical sounds. Deep Listening represents a heightened state of awareness and connects to all that there is. As a composer I make my music through Deep Listening
For my art, there is a common theme most of the time: it is using the things we can see to search for the world we cannot see.
I'm a storyteller who wants to tell untold, meaningful, universal stories in unforgettable ways. I want to do it all, study it all, and find my place in it.
I heard someone from the music business saying they are no longer looking for talent, they want people with a certain look and a willingness to cooperate. I thought, that's interesting, because I believe a total unwillingness to cooperate is what is necessary to be an artist β not for perverse reasons, but to protect your vision. The considerations of a corporation, especially now, have nothing to do with art or music. That's why I spend my time now painting.
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