I've just watched Laura Marling in the Minster Chapter House. The Chapter house was built in 1286. It is an absolutely stunning piece of architecture; a round, finely carved stone room with a domed roof and intricate stained glass (look at it here). A woman one month older than myself stood for 50 minutes and plucked a stringed piece of wood whilst singing down a microphone. And honestly it's one of the most beautiful things I've ever experienced. Hard to explain why though.
There was something deeply spiritual about that experience that I found fascinating. It's incredible how just sounds, just bricks can create something so special. I was just fixated by her performance, by the beauty of her song-writing, by how her voice echoed round the room, the skill of her playing. I was stuck to my chair, almost trance like. And I suddenly thought; the human being is incredible. Music is incredible. And I don't understand it. It makes no sense that mere sounds can make me feel like this.
But people have been doing it for centuries. Every time I hear 'don't think twice it's alright' by Bob Dylan or 'Clare de lune' by Debussy it sends shivers down my spine. I don't know if other people experience this phenomenon, but I can only describe it by saying that it moves my soul. I don't necessarily mean that in a metaphysical way, but what I mean is that there is something totally beyond me in those moments, there is something I cannot reduce down to just electrical impulses and neurons firing (in actual fact, it is likely that this is the cause of the phenomenon, but this is not to say it can be reduced down to this level.)
I re-watched the film American Beauty a couple of weeks ago. There is a guy in that film who is fixated by beauty. There is a scene in the film when he films a carrier bag flying around in the wind for fifteen minutes, he claims it is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. I'm not convinced personally, but he makes a good point when he says:
In a world full of pain and suffering, there is beauty. In a world where death looms round every corner, there is hope. As Paul puts it in Romans 8- creation is under bondage, but it is crying to be released, it will be brought to beauty and glory. In those moments, I understand this, I understand what it means to see beauty in the universe, to see hope. And whilst we live in this broken world, it is so important to get those glimpses of beauty. To stop and see the sunset, to meditate on the beauty of a piece of music, to get lost in a moment.
Call me soppy, pretentious, naive- I don't particularly care. But I believe, in the infamous words of the philosopher Samwise Gamge, 'that there's some good in the world and it's worth fighting for.'
There was something deeply spiritual about that experience that I found fascinating. It's incredible how just sounds, just bricks can create something so special. I was just fixated by her performance, by the beauty of her song-writing, by how her voice echoed round the room, the skill of her playing. I was stuck to my chair, almost trance like. And I suddenly thought; the human being is incredible. Music is incredible. And I don't understand it. It makes no sense that mere sounds can make me feel like this.
But people have been doing it for centuries. Every time I hear 'don't think twice it's alright' by Bob Dylan or 'Clare de lune' by Debussy it sends shivers down my spine. I don't know if other people experience this phenomenon, but I can only describe it by saying that it moves my soul. I don't necessarily mean that in a metaphysical way, but what I mean is that there is something totally beyond me in those moments, there is something I cannot reduce down to just electrical impulses and neurons firing (in actual fact, it is likely that this is the cause of the phenomenon, but this is not to say it can be reduced down to this level.)
I re-watched the film American Beauty a couple of weeks ago. There is a guy in that film who is fixated by beauty. There is a scene in the film when he films a carrier bag flying around in the wind for fifteen minutes, he claims it is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. I'm not convinced personally, but he makes a good point when he says:
"Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world, I feel like I can't take it, and my heart is just going to cave in. "And that's precisely how I felt as I watched Laura Marling sing to 200 people in a small room in an ancient building. It was one of those moments I wanted to capture and revisit. There is something so beautiful about the universe, so beautiful about the human mind, about music, I have to ask why. I have to seek something beautiful, there has to be something creative behind the fabric of the Universe. Not in a way I can ever prove, or in a way that won't seem foolish if you're already sceptical, but in that moment in time, in those snapshots of beauty, I could not doubt that there was a God, I could not doubt his presence.
In a world full of pain and suffering, there is beauty. In a world where death looms round every corner, there is hope. As Paul puts it in Romans 8- creation is under bondage, but it is crying to be released, it will be brought to beauty and glory. In those moments, I understand this, I understand what it means to see beauty in the universe, to see hope. And whilst we live in this broken world, it is so important to get those glimpses of beauty. To stop and see the sunset, to meditate on the beauty of a piece of music, to get lost in a moment.
Call me soppy, pretentious, naive- I don't particularly care. But I believe, in the infamous words of the philosopher Samwise Gamge, 'that there's some good in the world and it's worth fighting for.'
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