I’m not sure if this blog belongs in the ‘LIFE’ category or the ‘MUSIC’ category…so I have put it in both:
I saw this about 3 years ago.
Alice: what a special lady!
What Alice says, how she says it, what Alice feels and how she expresses what she feels, the look on her face, the depth, her eyes….
I sense that I’m looking into her soul…
Some people are, and I say this in a positive sense, are ‘different’, more in touch with their soul, their essence, they are more ‘spiritually’ connected than the majority of us. Alice equates music with ‘god’, she says it is ‘religion’ – I ‘get’ that.
I don’t believe in a theistic god, one who created the World, ‘man’, flora and fauna, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, a god who forces a way of life on us, a book of rules, a god who punishes and who forgives…..no – I can’t equate that with the world I live in, with the evil, madness and tragedy all around (I won’t ignore all of that and just cherry pick the good stuff). IMHO, faith in a theistic god is incompatible with rationale, with rational thinking (but it is the prerogative of others, as long as it’s not foisted on others, to have that faith).
I often, however, think of music in ‘godly’ terms – I can listen to Mozart or Rachmaninov et al and feel that it wasn’t created by ‘ordinary’ people like me, that the composers, the creators, were ‘touched’ by something not of this world, something, a power, something beyond my comprehension, something ‘godly’ and it is through music that I move beyond myself, that I experience a sense of spirituality.
So, I guess I’m an atheist if we’re talking about a theistic god, the god of the monotheistic religions (I don’t know if the polytheistic religions, e.g. Hinduism, conceive of their gods in theistic terms).
However, ‘god’ in a wider sense, I suppose I’m agnostic. I’m not sure about a deistic god, a ‘god’/supernatural being, who created the world, life etc and then ‘stood aside’ and lets us all get on with it. I can’t rule that out in the way that I rule out the existence of a theistic god. I can almost relate to the idea/concept of a pantheistic god, a ‘god’ which is indivisible from nature and, I guess, music…maybe, for me, ‘god’ is not quite the right word…something beyond my comprehension, a power, a ‘force’, something….immense….
So, back to Alice, she is inspirational (I say “is” even though, at the age of 110, she passed away a couple of years ago), life-affirming, a life force, truly special….I feel a connection to her, forged by a power of love and beauty (Vadenka – I hope I’ve spelt that correctly – and Anita are also incredible ladies!!).
Thank you, Desmond, for bringing Alice back into my life!!
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