In Harmony with the World
I've been taking it easy since yesterday (Friday), when I took a day off from work. I have to start using up my leave before year-end, perhaps taking alternate Fridays off.
I rarely take leave that's longer than two days, because I hate catching up with work after a long lay-off. If I leave work, it will be for good. It's something that I've been thinking serious for a while now.
But I guess, I'll always be working, just not work that I have to do as an obligation. It has also been tough for me for the past year as I had to juggle between work and being a care-giver for mum. But I am heartened by the fact that mum has recovered well from her operation and I'm just there to make sure that her daily exercise and meals are well-taken care of.
Today, I'm here in my apartment-library, nicely settled down with a pot of freshly brewed coffee, and as always, listening to some good classical music from my antiquated sound system. Only the other day I found out from ChatGPT that Mozart had written only 18 piano sonatas. I'm very familiar with the 32 piano sonatas of Beethoven, and had always assumed that Mozart had a much larger output of piano music. But now that I know there are only 18 in total, I am taking it as a personal project to get familiarised with each and every one of them, intimately.
I already know Mozart's K457 C minor sonata well, even as a child because my neighbour used to practise that every day, as part of her piano examination piece. I'm eager to enrich myself with the rest of Mozart's sonata repertoire. Every piece of music, especially classical ones, once embedded in my mind, becomes a part of my living soul. It has the same effect as a good book read thoroughly--its thoughts and ideas are intricately woven into my personal philosophy and everyday discourse.
Music, unlike literary works, have a more subtle, but no less enlightening effect on the mind. There are no clever facts to understand or digest, but it provokes an emotional response in us directly. We can't help but be moved by it. And in responding to music, we train our neural networks, to be cognisant of the tug and pull of rhythm and harmonies, which underly all the natural processes in nature. The soul is forever decorated with the motifs and patterns of all the pieces of music you've listened to and know by heart.
In Twelve Night, Shakespeare likens music to the 'food of love'. It fuels and feeds the emotional currents of all human affairs. We can program our minds, evoking different moods for different purposes by feeding ourselves different types of music. Which is why I like to put on Baroque music, whenever I embark on some serious work. It immediately puts my mind in a very relaxed state, allowing good ideas to surface spontaneously.
There's something primal about music and every culture and civilisation has created some form of music before. Music is simply the raw energetic pattern of life. Themes, variations, counterpoint, tension and resolution are all elements of human interactions. When we express ourselves with music, we are just replaying patterns in nature. The better we are in listening and copying them, the more in tune with are with the world. We must all hone our musical sensibilities so as to be able to live in harmony with it.