The sound of silence

"Confessions of a Music User" was linked today at a blog I visit often. I use music as background much less than I once did. From the essay:

.... I seemed to always need background music, something to offset discomfort, or to provide a rush of adrenaline. Some songs I listened to provided that ember of transcendence, yet they lost their flare when I put them on repeat, trying to squeeze the dopamine out of them. .... Music yielded instances of healing, grace, and beauty, but I also used it to manufacture emotions and escape the burden of silence. And I used it a lot. ....

Roger Scruton, the late British philosopher, believed much of modern music had devolved into a vacuum of senseless chatter: “For the most part, the prevailing music is of an astounding banality. It is there in order to not be really there.  .... AI has exacerbated this problem by divorcing music production from human expertise. “Music is no longer something you must make for yourself, nor is it something you sit down to listen to,” Scruton continues. “It follows you wherever you go, and you switch it on as a background. It is not so much listened to as overheard.” ....

...[L]etting music wash over every moment of life without cultivating places for quiet is like reading the classics and never pausing to reflect on their meaning. We become chronic skimmers, afloat in the ocean of noise with our eyes sleeplessly staring into space.

Beautiful music has tended to hit me at unexpected times. As I said earlier, those times can’t be controlled or manufactured. I’ve never been able to wrangle a transcendent experience like a cowboy ropes an elusive bull. Every time I’ve tried, I’ve ended up restless and in an emotional flux – focused on myself instead of on the divine. One thing any of us can do, perhaps, is to choose to listen not only to music but to the silence. .... (more)

Peter Biles, "Confessions of a Music User," Plough, August 7, 2024.