Forget to eat.

Music is one of the all encompassing factors of my life. Perhaps of life in general. Music is cultural and indicative of a person's very core set of traits. Music holds the potential for great power over a person.

Confucius (Kong Qin, circa 551-479 BCE; philosopher, possibly the greatest influence on Chinese life for the past two millennia; Founder of Confucianism) was said to have been so absorbed and moved by a single piece of music that he (at least once) forgot to eat for three days. I realize of course, that this is an uncommon reaction to music, but it is an example that I find fascinating. To be so affected by a single piece of music that you would simply forget to eat for days? It seems unlikely, but it is recorded in the history of Confucius to be true. It's absurd, but potent and wonderful at the same time. The passion it must have instilled to cause such a response is staggering.

And then I began to think: What is the song that made me "forget to eat"? Not literally of course, but do I have a piece of music that moves me so deeply that it causes more than just a signal to go flying through my brain? I was listening to my iPod while I mused about this. Trying to think of my "favourite" song. Just when I decided that I didn't have a set favourite, the song changed.

The first movement of Tchaikovsky's Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D Major.

Now, you may assume I listen to a lot of classical music now, but I really don't, I love it, but it isn't the only thing in my library by a long shot. I generally say, when asked about my taste in music, that I am "eclectic". This doesn't feel like quite the right word, but it's the closest I've got so far. I really do listen to just about everything now and rely on music every day. But this particular piece, no matter how many times I hear it, fills me with something words simply cannot describe. I must have listened to it a thousand times by now, but as I sat on a chair in the campus coffee shop, staring at my black coffee, tears came to my eyes. I'm not much of a crier, and I hate to do it in public, but I sat there for fifteen minutes with glassy, damp eyes, in the middle of a Second Cup. I forgot about the reading I had intended to do during my time there, I forgot I was in a public place, and when the music surged to the first coming-together of the entire orchestra, I forgot my whole life. For that instant, I was with the music like the air is with the wind. If I were to die in that moment, I feel as if it would be painless and without fear.
I forgot to eat.

Have you ever done this? Found a specific piece of music that changes your state of mind or state of being for a moment? Have you ever forgotten to eat?
What is your essential music?

No longer crying in public,
M.G.

"You're a snob. And that's okay." A Rant

The Gage Canadian Dictionary (c) 1997 defines 'Snob' as "n. 1 a person who cares too much for rank, wealth, and position, being too anxious to please or imitate people above him or her and too ready to ignore those below him or her. 2 a person who is contemptuous of the popular taste in some field, and is attracted to esoteric or learned things for their own sake: a literary snob, a musical snob."

Whomever it was who decided that being a snob would have such negative connotations should be tarred and feathered (in my most snobbish, condescending and humble opinion).

Today I was having coffee with a friend. The following is an excerpt of our conversation:

M.G.: "You sure are a snob." (spoken as a simple observation in the same way, "The sky is quite a nice colour today," might be intoned)

A: "Thank you. You're a dilettante and a snob."

M.G.: "Thank you." (mutual, appreciative smiles followed by questioning looks from the man sitting nearby)

I like to consider all my friends to be snobs. One is a welding snob. One is a music snob. One is a gay-intellect snob. My sister is a car snob. My cousin is a sports snob. The list just goes on, and I love them all. In the case of some of my best friends, the fact that they immediately came off as a snob was what caught my attention in the first place; if not for their "contempt" and desire for "esoteric or learned things," I would have never befriended them.

What would the world be like without snobs? Would art be raised to the status it is? Would music have come this far? I think perhaps it is the snobs who force us to pay attention and appreciate the immense value of some things. Some snobs are remembered for their tremendous impact on culture. They drive it forward and perpetuate the snob cycle:

Snobs become involved in something out of the norm > That thing becomes classified as 'edgy' > Which pushes it to popularity in "the scene" > Which carries it to generally accepted popularity > At which point, the new generation of snobs find that thing (which was originally esoteric) low-brow and must seek out something else that is unusual or Delphic to focus their unseeded passions on; Therefore, the cycle comes full circle and will continue on as long as there is a portion of the populous that craves the intellect and art that resides in snobbishness.

So, be a snob. Because that's okay.

M.G. (Dilettante/Renaissance woman and proud snob of eclectic taste)