SPF: Using classical music as a balm.

[Ataraxia]

 

[North Star]

Where's the 'Some other fruite' option?

[some guy]

I need notification about what "classical music" means to you.

What it means to me is "music that generally has a lot of contrast." There are plenty of classical pieces with very little contrast, but they're a special category, and they still have other things in common with other classical pieces, things I haven't mentioned yet, no. Good of you to have noticed that.

Anyway, I prefer using classical music as a bomb.

(Kumquat is a "fruite.")

[North Star]

(Kumquat is a "fruite.")

Yes but I'd much rather vote some other fruit.

[some guy]

Oh, who wouldn't.

[Hattoff]

In that case, remember The Clockwork Orange and Beethoven?

[MDL]

WM2:   We must see him.  We have brought presents.
Mandy: Out!
WM1:   Gold, frankincense, myrrh.

(Mandy changes direction, smooth as silk.)

Mandy: Well, why didn't you say?  He's over here ...  Sorry this place is a
       bit of a mess.  What is myrrh, anyway?
WM3:   It is a valuable balm.
Mandy: A balm, what are you giving him a balm for?  It might bite him.
WM3:   What?
Mandy: It's a dangerous animal.  Quick, throw it in the trough.
WM3:   No it isn't.
Mandy: Yes it is.
WM3:   No, no, it is an ointment.
Mandy: An ointment?
WM3:   Look.
Mandy: (sampling the ointment with a grubby finger).  Oh. There is an animal
       called a balm or did I dream it? 

[starrynight]

Many younger people who are new to classical music seem to see pieces as evoking specific moods and ask for recommendations based on that.  It does seem a limited way of looking at the music to me.

[Opus106]

Many younger people who are new to classical music seem to see pieces as evoking specific moods and ask for recommendations based on that.  It does seem a limited way of looking at the music to me.

Of course it will seem limited -- it's because they are new! You can't expect everyone to have read up on the sonata form or serialism before listening to classical music. Music's first point of contact with the human mind is in emotion and the moods, as you put it, it evokes, at least until one becomes pompous, pop-classical-busting know-it-all. . [Does that last bit classify as an unpopular (and maybe even unscientific) opinion? <-- EDIT: I thought I was in another thread.]

[starrynight]

I think my way into classical music was melody, which for me is a more concrete way than whether it is a mood.  Mood can imply something more interactive like feeling deeper emotions but often it seems to imply just wallowing in a mood like background music.

[Opus106]

I think my way into classical music was melody, which for me is a more concrete way than whether it is a mood.

I would say that too, but only in hindsight. I think, for the newbie a mood is easier to define -- more concrete, if you will -- than a melody.

Mood can imply something more interactive like feeling deeper emotions but often it seems to imply just wallowing in a mood like background music.

But one can't deny that a lot of 18th century music was essentially that.

[starrynight]

Well maybe the classical period was more dramatic than the baroque.