Brian’s Reflection: Friday, November 5, 2010

We human beings are tuned such that we
crave great melody and great lyrics. And if
somebody writes a great song, it's timeless
that we as humans are going to feel something
for that and there's going to be a real appreciation.

Art Garfunkel, Musician, and once half of Simon
& Garfunkel; born on this date, 1941; he’s 69!


I loved EVERYTHING they sang!

“Great melody and great lyrics”. I think I’m a stereotype! I absolutely do ….. on every level of Life, on every level for which “great melody and lyrics” is a metaphor. Ives, Schoenberg, Stravinsky (except the Firebird), Rauschenberg, and especially Glass (!), etc ….. they grate on my aesthetic nerves! Oh dear: I’m becoming an aesthetic troglodyte in my old age!

I could list metaphorical “great” throughout the ages – at least in my aesthetic: Lascaux; Chinese cranes; Peruvian gold; pyramids; Monteverdi; Gregorian chant (sung the way I like it sung!); Cellini; Bruch; Murillo; Strauss (The Four Last Songs); Goya; Canaletto; Monet; Rupert Brooke; John Keats; Gordon Lightfoot; Loreen McKenna. I could go on. All these make me feel One with the Beauty of Being ….. i.e., with the Mystery of “God” and Humanity.

I think that a worthy goal for each of us is to be a “great song”. A Old Crone friend of mine at whose ordination I preached and “crowned” her with the title of Crone said to me the other day, “I love getting your Reflections; they are so YOU!”.

Just be YOU. Just be You! It will bless and sweeten the World!

Brian+