"spiritual depth" is an experience of one of the consciousness potential layers of experiences not consciousness itself.
Let's talk music, no genre boundaries
This is an offshoot of the jazz thread. I and others found that we could not talk about jazz without discussing other musical genres, as well as the philosophy of music. So, this is a thread in which people can suggest good music of all genres, and spout off your feelings about music itself.
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Prior to my research into the ancient past, I would have agreed with @larsman about the soul. Something like a deep and abiding conscience, which not all people have. Christianity would say, I think, that everybody is born with a soul. Studies of psychopaths would disagree. As I studied ancient humanity, I found out that art and music seem to define humanity (Homos sapiens). Prior Homos species had the same body structure and just as large a brain cavity, if not larger in some cases. But not until about 60,000 years ago (some might say 100,000--it doesn't make a difference for my argument) we find a sudden burst of creativity out of the Homos genus. Tools, jewelry, art. From a Darwinian perspective, why would Homos Sapiens waste their time with art rather than finding food and lodgings? How does art help Homos sapiens in our survival? And yet there it is. Jewelry buried in caskets. Cave wall drawings and paintings. What was that all about? The oldest known musical instrument is a flute made out of an animal's horn from about 43,000 years ago. Most likely, prior to that there were instruments made out of wood and other materials that deteriorate. Like visual arts, music seems to go back to our beginnings, and we must have needed it to give it priority over other endeavors that would add to humans' survival. I think it's fair to assume that dancing may have gone hand in hand with the music. It is my opinion that people decorated their bodies, played music, and danced to celebrate their existence as part of the universe. The first deities of which we find evidence are pregnant female figures known as "Venuses." It makes total sense that early humanity saw femals as the creators, because when they saw animals and humans born it was always from females. I won't go into the evidence, but it seems that females were also the first cave painters. There is strong evidence that those first cave painters were shamans and priests. From what we know of the early feminine religions, they were much different than the later male-dominated religions. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc. believe in a male creator who stood apart from, and outside of the universe. The Torah (Judaic Bible) had no godesses, even though literature that influenced the Bible did have many strong goddesses. Why is this important to the soul and music? The Great Mother (highest feminine goddess) was a part of her creation, unlike the God we know today. She did not exist apart from the universe. So, when people sang and danced to the Great Mother, they sang and danced to the universe and their existence as part of it. Everything was a part of something. There were no individual souls like we have today. So music was joy on the deepest soulful level. Joy at our existence as well as a deep respect for the universe. And this is how I see music tied to the "soul." Although, I don't see the soul as an individual thing, as religions do today. We all share the universal soul with the Great Mother or whatever you want to call the creator who created by being a part of things, not outside and above things. I am sure this is different than how you have seen the soul as something that belongs to you. I see it as a collective thing that is to be rejoiced. Since this, I believe, reflects ancient thinking, very early composers could have written with a soul in mind that is similar to what I have just described. And for me, the deepest music is a reflection of this. |
The "soul" state and existence is not the matter of this thread about music then i will not go further on this...
I will only add this : Before any instrument perhaps with the exclusion of percussive objects, the voice gesture amplifying or resonating with the gesturing body is the simultaneous beginnings of speech as we understand it and of music. The depth of the spiritual expressive content of music is, as in the articles above together demonstrated, in the relation between the vibrating sound sources timbre (instrument+musician voice and body gestures) and the non measurable+measurable time dimensions of the expressive gestures act connected to the social group and Nature... No instituted religion is needed in the beginings why ? Because the Nature soul as the soul of the group and of each individual is one mimesis phenomenon, where hunting, praying, dancing, speaking-singing, eating or dreaming are one activity...Meanings is not mere information but a cosmic event cascading in the Group which perceive the synchronicities as meaningful events... We can see it nowadays degraded in crowd hysteria and lynching festival... We are "civilized" : we begin to loose our individualities in the mass control experiment call A.I. technology and other "progress" sponsored by mad uneducated oligarchs... But it is like the "soul" alleged non existence for programmed mind another matter for another forum...
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Before caves or Callas or Nick Cave we lived in trees. Two important principles about sleeping in trees....don't fall and be quiet. So late arriving member of the troop arrives at the tree house and makes a low sound of some sort not to alarm his fellow limb dwellers. One or two respond in a rhythm or cadence unintended and music is born! Next day on a long slog to a better tree the previous night's melodic episode is picked up by the ordered march and repeated by the group to the great effect of mitigating drudgery. Then that night around the fire a stick is introduced to a log, the music repeated, and someone sways, dances, and gets laid. No stopping this train now. Well Prog Rock is trying.
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