As you may have noticed, music is a major part of me and my daily life. For the last several years, a style of music known as techno, specifically, the sub-genre of vocal trance, has captivated me.
Unfortunately, and I do honestly apologize for this, my writing is not nearly good enough to convey the type of emotional build that my favorite pieces may convey. For the vocal pieces, I can copy the lyrics here and attempt to convey some of the emotional richness that permeates these tunes, but even then, I’m still just trying to go after windmills.
So, in our ongoing exploration of who I am, and what actually embodies my embodiment, this is, in a nutshell, what music does to me…
It’s more than just a pounding beat that syncs up perfectly with your creative energies, rhythmically tapping in your ears as you rhymthically tap on the keys. It’s more than just the swelling crescendo of an upward traversing chord progression that lifts you up and makes your soul soar before it crashes down into some barbaric, primitive thundering hoofbeat of song.
It’s more than the swelling lyrics that describe perfectly what you feel, deep within.
So, the $64,000 question… What is it? What is this thing, this concept just beyond grasp that no language can contain?
It’s been said that a picture is worth a thousand words. Therefore, music is worth a thousand pictures. And I, the writer only capable of $10 words and no substance, could write on and on towards those million words about the complex mathematical equations hidden deep within the music, the powerful range of genres, the best and the worst of composers and artists, and I would never approach even the most mediocre of tunes in their ability to captivate, control, clarify and confound.
We must assume then, that like any good creative work, music captures a piece of the artist’s blood, sweat, tears, and soul, and packages it up into a neat little sonic saga, but it’s more than that.
It is easier for us to find solace in the unspeakable, the unshowable, even… the unknowable.
So, again, I ask, what is it? The tonal blending of the perfect string instruments, underlying drum beats, alien harmonic syntheized tones just out of reach of conciousness, complex melodic leads, and the aural radiant ambience of perfect blend of voice on tonal upsurge whirlpool together to create cacophonic perfection.
In many vocal trance songs that I listen to, the key element seems to be the melodic, melancholic musings of a female voice, built resonatingly into the tune. Often, the voice perfectly fits the thematic tone of the tune. For instance, in a hard pounding, get-your-attention, make you move song, the voice draws you in, and seems to allow you to intimately know the woman singing; a true mating of ear and voice. Whereas in a mysterious, sighing breath of a song, the voice is distant, faded, and cautious, as if it to hide the true soul behind the singer from the prying ears of the listener.
But whatever the key element in the song, the end product of voice, melody, harmony, and beat melds together in a sonorous soulful sound to produce the blissful blend of aural escape.
And whatever the indescribable liquid-like emotion that fills my being, there is ever a song somewhere to fuel me, power me, recharge me, or at least understand me, for yet another day.
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