Mysticism in Music

Trade your cleverness for bewilderment.
- Rumi

WHAT IS MUSIC?

According to the Webster's dictionary music is “the science or art of ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination, and in temporal relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity”.

According to my personal life experience music is an invisible force that sonically presents itself as an offer to take me deeper into my awareness of who I am not only as a human being but also as a spirit in a body.

WHAT IS YOUR DEFINITION?

Music has no real definition because its definition is entirely in relation to your experience of it. Thats why music is music. This lack of real concrete definition is why music has its roots in mystery, in mysticism. According to the Webster’s dictionary the definition of mystery, it is “something not understood or beyond understanding.” It is important to view music as something beyond us. There is a humility and openness to this view that keeps your relationship to music always fresh and always growing, all the while serving to evolve your intelligence. In fact I would say it takes more intelligence to understand the concept of something being “beyond yourself” and letting go into that than to understand a harmonic structure and its relative mathematics of any given piece.

I’m one of those mystery seekers because my own journey of music has brought me here. Is there a fear of the mystery in music today? Hendrix didn’t fear the mystery. Perhaps thats why he sounded original. Same goes for Coltrane. Well, now its 2011. The Coltrane and Hendrix eras are gone. Who’s up for creating new ways? When you can walk into the great mystery of music and life, then new ways come into bloom. New music. New vistas. New mysteries.

John Shannon teaches Acoustic Guitar, Electric Guitar and Songwriting with BML.

CATCH JOHN SHANNON LIVE THIS MONTH:

John Shannon and Wings of Sound
Pete's Candy Store
11/28/10 @ 10:30pm