In Search of the the "How" of Music

Have you ever asked yourself, "How or Why does a certain piece of music make me feel something?" Recently I was watching a video of a young Filipino boy singing "Dance with My Father," an emotional ballad by the late R&B artist Luther Vandross. Several moments into the song my cheeks were wet with tears and I could offer no better explanation then to say that this young boy's performance and voice had touched me. And this video's excess of upwards over a million views proves that others tend to agree. Opera can also bring us to tears, such as in this painful duet of a mother and son's final farewell, from Handel's Julius Ceasar, performed by David Daniel's and Stephanie Blythe.

Doubtless humans have a natural response to music in minor keys, and skilled musicians have exploited this penchant over the centuries whenever musical dramatics sought to express the sorrow over the Father's rejection of his favorite daughter, the exile of a hero from his beloved homeland, the lover's agonizing separation by the cruelties of fate, or the heroine's tragic death at the hands of a guilty lover. And though these scenes sound too grand for our ordinary world, they in fact grow out of the lamentable reality that man cannot escape from suffering in this lifetime.  Think about the stories we hear on NPR of refugees fleeing their homelands, or reports of a murder done by the hands of a jealous lover, or our own agony when those we love most are cruelly taken away from us before their time. When such horrors happen it would seem that no words can express our deep sorrow. It is then that we must sing. And Opera and Classical Music have provided us an array of arias that ache and a surplus of symphonic movements that sob. But something unique to music is its transformational element from a series of notes into a moving and powerful performance when offered by a gifted performer. In some cases the musical or artistic gift seems to transcend the limits of talent, knocking so loudly upon the door of heaven that one could almost begin to believe that divinity does indeed dwell upon the earth, so overwhelmed are we by their artistry.

One voice that stands out for most opera goers is that of soprano Maria Callas who's own personal sorrows and sufferings sadly rivaled many of the operatic characters she embodied so famously on the operatic stage.  Perhaps it was this personal suffering that helped her inhabit her characters at such a palpable level of flesh and bone, perfectly captured here (at 5:16) in Violetta's emotional farewell to Alfredo and all her happiness, from Act II of Verdi's opera, La Traviata, "The Fallen One." And yet what is interesting to me and which flows from my original question is the general agreement that Callas's voice is not considered by many listeners to be a typically beautiful voice. I even think she herself is quoted in an interview somewhere making this very statement. But her's was definitely a defining and decisive voice for audience goers. You either loved her or hated her, believe she embodied the music or clipped its wings, accepted her for everything she gave or renounced her for everything that she was not. But such are our responses to most things in life that stand in contrast to the ordinary. Of course there will always be a place for beauty as well, cue Kiri Te Kanawa.

Of course Opera, and Classical Music to some level, are genres outside of the modern mainstream itself. Granted most people are familiar with the tunes from Beethoven's "9th Symphony" and Mozart's Overture to The Marriage of Figaro, but the tropes, the tricks, and the language of the music itself are not something that the general public, to my awareness, is schooled in as they are with the modern Pop/Rock/Jazz/Soul and R&B idioms. And sitting down to 5 minutes of music in one's own language, in a style inescapably echoing throughout every corner of our lives including grocery stores, shopping malls, doctors offices and most international calling trees, is a far easier exercise then sitting for 2 minutes to endure an aria in a foreign language, clueless of its context and in a vocal style that has been politely referred to as "the Olympics of Singing." Now I am not here to draw lines in the sand between the arts but make a rather common observation that familiarity with a musical genre and it's particular "musical gestures" including musical forms, arrangements and even awareness as to how a voice can and is supposed to sound within the context of opera might go a long way towards building a bridge between listeners of popular music and opera. I mean in the end are we not all simply searching for the means to express how we feel, whether enraged in fury, embittered by brokenness or engulfed in the flames of passion?

But just as in popular music when one is at a loss to adequetely explain how this singer's voice or that musician's performance touches the caverns of our hearts, so too are we at a loss for words when an artist registers seismic levels of joy for us. Cecilia Bartoli is just such a singer that fans and critics are still unable to come to full agreement over. But like many great artists, whether we speak the language, understand the context or know anything about technique, it is the music that in the end will and shall have the last word.