Quote:
Originally Posted by RallyMcnally  They thought loud sounds beautiful and massed effects interesting. They strove for new and rare tonal effects, for notes which no ear had ever heard hitherto. They sought to surpass each other, and overstepped all bounds.
"The cause of the degeneration of the Chu state was its invention of magic music. Such music is indeed tempestuous enough, but in truth has departed from the essence of music. Because it has departed from the essence of real music, this music is not serene. If music is not serene, the people grumble and life is deranged. |
This is interesting enough, but so far removed from how I perceive things that I'm really just plain not going to agree with it. If the only form of happiness we can hope for is "serenity", then fine, "been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, *yawn*, check please". I think the healthy and alert mind can have a perfectly good relationship with much more unusual and stimulating art forms, and since that's what I've been passionate about all my life, I'm not going to flush it all down the toilet and replace my record collection with George Winston CDs.
With all due respect, I file the quoted philosophy in the same bin wherein lies the bit I once read about rock music being proven
bad for plants (and therefore for all living things) because of its "unnatural" emphasis on beats two and four.