A Meditation on Melancholy Music
Do you get sad? If you do, then that’s ok. If you didn’t, I’d be worried that your weren’t paying enough attention.
This is a horribly emo thing to say, but I feel like sadness is ingrained into the fabric of the life we are currently living. Don’t get me wrong, that doesn’t mean we have no control over our emotions. I think it is a delicate balance between overcoming the emotions we can control, whilst accepting those that are inevitable.
How does that saying go… What is mine to change, and what is mine to bear?
This was basically confirmed to me when, a while back, I came across a site called The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows.
On face value, such an enterprise might seem slightly morose, self-indulgent, downright emo and bordering on nihilistic — and some particular entries support this. There is, for example, a word — Lachesism — for internally egging on catastrophic events for the disruption and resulting clarity they might bring about into otherwise mundane everyday life.
But, if you have not yet had the privilege of coming across this site, and have a spare hour or so (ideally more — many words also have accompanying videos, with thoroughly life affirming and almost YouTube-redeeming comments sections), I highly recommend taking a deep dive, as there is much to be taken in.
Firstly, some of the words are so on point it is hard to argue against this Dictionary as an entirely necessary endeavour in describing the human condition.
Morii — the desire to capture a fleeting moment — provides a coherent underlying rationale for a significant amount of content on social media.
Keta — a memory that leaps back into your mind from the distant past — is (for me anyway) such a fundamental and defining emotional experience that it is a wonder it took this long to be named.
Opia — the ambiguous intensity of eye contact — well, you don’t need my help explaining that one.
The site — taken as a whole with its words, videos and comments sections — can be understood as an exploration of the nature of human emotion, and in particular, a meditation on the nature of sorrow itself. Despite the gentle, even polite morbidness that permeates the site, there are reasons for hope.
Midding — perhaps my favourite, because of its close proximity both to my last name and my desired contribution to most social situations — describes the tranquil pleasure of being near but not quite within a gathering: “feeling blissfully invisible yet still fully included, safe in the knowledge that everyone is together and everyone is okay, with all the thrill of being there without the burden of having to be”.
Reading this definition now still fills me with emotion. Back in my heyday, I remember this as describing exactly the experience of early morning comedowns with friends after a day long summer festival or a big night out (or both) — still the most vividly happy experiences of my life, even if they were artificially created and ultimately unsustainable. It is the necessary absence of this feeling that brings about the sorrow I associate with the word; my life since this time can be largely defined as a journey to try, without the shortcuts this time, to re-unite with the divinity that was found there (yep, there’s a word and video for that feeling as well).
This leaves me convinced that the most fundamental and undefinable human experiences are wrapped in a sense of unavoidable but not overwhelming sadness —a sadness that drives us on rather than pulls us down.
And then there is the Dictionary’s most widely known word Sonder — the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own. That is a serious word. An incredibly humbling, ego-combating reminder of our place in the world, that is likely to induce some degree of melancholy.
But why? To define such a realisation as inherently sadness-evoking seems somewhat subjective; is Sonder really a feeling that should bring on sorrow? That it does likely reflects the relentless inflation of the station of the individual within our society; that we are conditioned to believe in our own importance and uniqueness to such an extent that to consider that the person walking by you in the street is probably going through the same highs and lows becomes a profound challenge to our sense of self.
But once you get over your ego, once you appreciate the life-affirming breezes of understanding the extent of human complexity, Sonder transforms into a word that can bring about great and profound contentment, perhaps even joy.
So sadness, to some extent perhaps, is optional: a consequence of transitioning from a state of being controlled by our ego to a state of humility; perhaps an inability to be sufficiently grateful and call upon the emotional salve that embracing that state of being brings; or perhaps a reflection of an individual spiritual failing to not choose to be cheerful when the choice is available.
This last one is a bit controversial, because some people do believe that if we absolute choice in our lives, we also have absolute choice in how we feel.
If you have complete faith in the divine, complete faith that everyone will eventually be free of the shackles of this earthly existence and be reunited with our higher spiritual identities, you might ration a way to be eternally happy, regardless of what earthly things we see in front of us, regardless of whether bad things are happening to us or someone else.
But let’s not go too far. We do live in a somewhat-to-very broken world, and to completely detach ourselves from the effects of this world seems somewhat spiritually aloof and not a little snobby.
Surely it is the role of those who reach this place of loftiness to apply it in the hope of alleviating the suffering of others. This requires an inevitable degree of sacrifice of our own emotional condition. And I don’t think we are sacrificing correctly if it doesn’t result in some degree of suffering on our part. And what is suffering if it doesn’t necessitate sadness: the final link in the Melancholic Trinity of S Words.
When we reach a place of melancholy — however it is that we arrived there — we need something to turn to, a strategy to help us through. There is one type of response, which is to push through the sadness. This is necessary to keep moving, to keep progressing. On a good day, we can even turn the sadness into something productive and meaningful — a song, a poem, or a blog post for example. But there are also responses that accept when enough is enough — not in an existential sense, but in an acceptance of the fundamental hindrance that this state has on our physical capacities.
At this point, what is required is something that acknowledges and validates — is essentially a companion for — this experience. Like many people, I find that only music is able to provide this role.
If sad music is what you are looking for, there is no shortage of material to choose from. In fact, you might argue that sadness is one of the main underlying themes (whether overt or subtle) of popular music. What that in itself says about the world we live in.
But not all sad music is created equal. I used to listen to lots of different types of melancholic melodies; but increasingly, only a certain kind can play this comforting role.
Because I don’t know much about the science or art of music, it is hard for me to coherently put into words how this music is more authentically sad than the music I used to listen to. Most obviously there is a trend towards instrumentation over lyrics; the replacement of guitars and percussion with piano, strings and hazy ambient electronics.
But there is also more to it than the mechanics of the music. For whatever reason, there is music that is able to honour and respect rather than manipulate and profit from the feeling of sadness. Rather than dragging us into sadness, or glorifying sadness, or converting sadness into other emotions, it is music that captures sadness.
Crucially, I think, this music doesn’t try to lure you in: you know what you are getting yourself in to. This is plainly evident when I look at the names of some of my favourite sad songs, which remind me very much of entries to my favourite Dictionary.
First a song about farewells — A Farewell Sonata by Slow Meadow — one of the most indisputable sources of sadness we all must face.
A song called Family by an Australian artist called Luke Howard. Where to start with the emotions the are associated with our family?
A song called The First to Forgive by From the Mouth of the Sun. If forgiveness was easy, then wouldn’t everyone do it? How much more difficult to be the first one to do so.
A song called I Remember by Jon Hopkins, a name that could be replaced with the word ‘Keta’ in how it relays a simple and instantly recognisable piano melody through a hint of distortion that might just signify the effect of the passing of time.
Finally, a song by Ólafur Arnalds — Undan Hulu, or the Cello Song — which could have been interchanged with pretty much any other song from his album “… and they have escaped the weight of darkness”. The whole album walks a tightrope between sadness and optimism, generally landing on the side of the latter but never far from the former. Even when escaping darkness, how should we feel when you know others are still left there?
What a gift, then, these artists have provided: to channel their suffering, sadness, melancholy — to linger there longer then they have to, to surround themselves in it, create within it, to provide the world with an artefact that accurately reflects this experience.
But this music is still beautiful, and never despairing. Sadness I think can become beautiful if you have knowledge that things will get better, that there is a promised land, and that it will one day be reached. And so, if I could isolate the underlying sentiment of this music, it would be longing. A longing that accompanies this type of sadness, knowing its temporary nature, knowing what lies beyond it, but also still knowing that it is not yet within reach.
I hear this clearly in a song by Hammock called Numinous, meaning something that evokes the spirit, emotion or mystery of the divine. Not the most humble aim for a piece of music to aspire to, but the song does its best to create that beauty: as the music fades away to a lone choir voice, there lingers a longing that arises from receiving a glimpse of a destination that we know we are not yet ready to arrive at.
Interestingly, two of the most emotional songs I have in my iTunes library are also two of the simplest. The first is ‘Horizon Variations’ by Max Richter, whose name and music I can best associate with staring out of a moving vehicle into the distance, watching the world pass by and change before your eyes.
The second song is by Eluvium called ‘Entendre’, a french word we often use in English in a particular way but which turns out to have a considerable depth of profundity. I could get super deep here and say that simply the act of turning your attention and intention to something, to listen to and understand it in its entirety (the simplest translation I could find of the word) is an act of inherent sadness. But ultimately this song is here for its musical simplicity.
Again, I don’t know enough about the notes or chords or progressions that are used to play this song to pretend that I do, but I’m fairly sure that, with the tabs in front of me and a few dedicated hours at a piano, I could come somewhat close to playing it. And it is this simplicity, the distinct impression that the artist is a competent but not overly adept piano player but has instead sat in front of a piano and offered up his soul — not to mention the fact that the song comes to a logical end before deciding to continue for 30 more seconds — which gives it its emotion.
That two straightforward piano pieces, stripped of all production, free from technical virtuosity, can contain such a level of emotion proves, to me, the divine origin of music… and of melancholy.