I'm currently reading Hesse's Glass Bead Game. In the voice of a historian, Hesse speaks of Bach's music as "the ultimate quintessence of Christian culture"—which goes a long way towards explaining the joie de vivre which you and I find in Bach. He's not alone in that estimation. Although I'm also reminded of Karl Barth's remark that while the angels listen to Bach during the day, when they go home at night they play Mozart :).
But more to the point:
Creativity is a magical word, and one that we've much degraded by its association with grant-sponsored "arts" and "artists". But the production of beauty is accessible to every human being in so many tiny consecrated and conscious actions. As for myself, I'm more of the class of Aulë: heaven would be craftsmanship and contemplation.
wrt Bach and Mozart - although I listen to a lot more Bach, I have unwaveringly maintained for more than forty years that Mozart wrote the best musical composition ever, viz The Magic Flute
I read the Glass Bead Game twice - greatly liking it both times: a very thorough and worthwhile book. I still maintain that Hesse is a much better novelist than Thomas Mann; although I much prefer Mann as an essayist.
18 March 2015 at 15:30
*
I see now that when I was (or am) responding to Glenn Gould's playing of Bach, it is a depiction of Heaven in a very detailed sense. I can (sometimes) feel this moment by moment, each tiny decision, nuance; the lines, tones, harmonies asif happening for the first time with surprising inevitability.
I am able to re-experience Gould's ecstatic absorption in his playing, and in the music as Bach composed it - and my condition in Heaven (when I want it) will be to play like Gould and compose like Bach but in my own (unique) way; because if I can respond to it on earth, then I can do it in Heaven.
Primarily, Heaven is a place of love and relationships; but/and Heaven is a place of creativity - the creativity of making and of performance. (It is a place of all positive Goods.)
Each person's creative ability and urge is different, and changed and expanded by experience and in combination. There is no repetition; and the creating can go on for as long as wanted.
"(If you respond to it) Glenn Gould's Bach depicts the *detail* of Heaven"
2 Comments -
Riffing off of your Bach comment:
I'm currently reading Hesse's Glass Bead Game. In the voice of a historian, Hesse speaks of Bach's music as "the ultimate quintessence of Christian culture"—which goes a long way towards explaining the joie de vivre which you and I find in Bach. He's not alone in that estimation. Although I'm also reminded of Karl Barth's remark that while the angels listen to Bach during the day, when they go home at night they play Mozart :).
But more to the point:
Creativity is a magical word, and one that we've much degraded by its association with grant-sponsored "arts" and "artists". But the production of beauty is accessible to every human being in so many tiny consecrated and conscious actions. As for myself, I'm more of the class of Aulë: heaven would be craftsmanship and contemplation.
- radiobeloved
18 March 2015 at 14:04
@rb - Nice comment.
wrt Bach and Mozart - although I listen to a lot more Bach, I have unwaveringly maintained for more than forty years that Mozart wrote the best musical composition ever, viz The Magic Flute
http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/desert-island-discs-record-number-three.html
I read the Glass Bead Game twice - greatly liking it both times: a very thorough and worthwhile book. I still maintain that Hesse is a much better novelist than Thomas Mann; although I much prefer Mann as an essayist.
18 March 2015 at 15:30