Showing posts with label contrast. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contrast. Show all posts

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Walk in Beauty

Mage Music 61  Walk in Beauty  jimmypagemusic.blogspot.com
With beauty, may I walk.
With beauty before me, may I walk.
With beauty behind me, may I walk.
With beauty above me, may I walk.
With beauty all around me, may I walk
.
~ Excerpt from the Navajo Night Way Ceremony


Mage Music 61  

While beauty truly is in the eye (and ear) of the beholder, one thing that most people would agree to is that too much sameness is pretty darned boring, and that rule applies to what can be found in nature or in human-created works of art.  It is contrast that makes the difference – but not in just any which way.

Balance is beautiful
Contrast is the difference in surroundings that makes the contrasting thing stand out and be noticed.

Humans are quick to notice differences in patterns of everything around them.  Things that have changed leap out and attract our attention, because evolutionary survival has taught us that changed circumstances are often immediately followed by things that leap out and make us dinner.  This ability to take note of changes in pattern is so important to survival that it is an involuntary response of the brain.  Our response to sudden change is hardwired into us.

No one could survive, however, if they spent all their time reacting to every change.  There would be no time for anything else in life. We tolerate lots of change in our daily lives just fine.  Our brains don’t automatically shove us into involuntary survival mode every time there’s a difference in what we perceive.  We need to take time to differentiate between bad things and good - after all, just because something changes doesn't mean we won't like it.    

Being able to appreciate the contrasts in our environment, not just involuntarily run from them, is a good thing, too, because artists rely on contrast to give life to their work.  

Light and shade
Normal humans are most comfortable in a middle-ground of contrast, but we seek entertainment outside of the comfort zone.  We look for the maximum difference that doesn't tip us over into the danger zone. We all flirt with discomfort and risk for fun and enjoyment to one degree or another.

Contrast is interesting. We are attracted to it.  Beauty happens when there is just the right amount of contrast, which means balance. Sameness may be pretty on the first go-round, but artfully balanced contrast will stand the test of time.

Jimmy Page refers to contrast as light and shade. These are terms for visual arts, but the terms obviously apply to music, too. The important thing for music and any form of art is to find the delicate point of balance between too much and too little, and when you are dealing with things that are not necessarily alike, it becomes a juggling act.


Balance is beautiful
We humans have an innate understanding of music. We know instinctively when various components satisfy intuitive benchmarks. We seek out pattern and completion, and we know when the contrasts are beautiful or boring.

It’s not so easy to satisfy us though. The light and shade – contrast – that provides interest doesn't come from simple juxtaposition of opposites, which would be too predictable and therefore boring. Musical contrast doesn't come from just going from loud to soft, from fast to slow, from plain vanilla to heavy effects – it comes from mixing all possible combinations of musical values in contrasting patterns. Juggling, if you will.

Balance in art is a tricky thing. Great beauty comes from balancing on the edge of chaos – after all, juggling one tennis ball is not nearly as interesting as juggling a couple of raw eggs along with a sharp dagger or two.

When it comes to Magick, it’s even trickier.


Beauty in the heart of contrast
Consider how a downhill skier handles the many changing conditions there are on a run: Speed, slope, snow quality, obstacles, wind, and more. The skier finds an internal place of balance in the heart of the onslaught of new and constantly changing conditions, letting her body move around that center, rather than trying to move her center in reaction to the conditions. Knees flex, skis bounce, poles poke and drag, the body sways – a flurry of movement centered on a core of balance.  
 
A Mage steps from what is now to what will be by dwelling in the quiet point of balance between the inner world of his own desire and will, and external reality. Walking in beauty is dwelling in the quiet heart of contrast.  

I believe if you listen to the music of Jimmy Page, you will hear exactly what I'm talking about.






Sunday, June 3, 2012

Mage Music: Imagine This


Mage Music: Imagine This

Aubrey Beardsley
Frontispiece to The Wonderful History of
Vergilius the Sorcerer
1893 
What exactly makes a mage powerful?  Unlike what is portrayed in fiction, a mage doesn’t have to be a person in black robes, and isn’t a person who has a lot of magic stored up in amulets or who is born with magical power.  A mage doesn’t “have” magic any more than a computer “has” the internet.  Magic is like Yoda’s Force – it is the energy source of life.  Like a Jedi who masters the Force, a true mage is one who has the skill, talent and will to open to that energy and to use it to make changes in the world. 

Think of the relationship of a mage to magic the same way you do of the device you use to access the internet to the internet itself.  The internet is gigantic, so big it is for all practical purposes infinite – there’s no way your device can access it all.  Still, the more powerful the device the better it can access the internet and the more data it can process, providing it isn’t hampered by malware, poor programming or by just not having sufficient capacity.

It’s the same with a mage.  All of us access the energy of the universe without even thinking about it – it’s called being alive.  A mage, however, accesses that energy on purpose, using clarity of mind to visualize the desired outcome, and then ritual of some sort to focus the mind on the desired outcome.

The clarity both comes from and results in enlightenment – literally aligning with the energy of the universe.  The most proficient use of the energy comes through focus.  The actual process is not truly important – alignment with the energy of the universe can be equally achieved through magick, meditation, the sciences, art or, in the case of Jimmy Page, through music.  The product of true enlightenment is readily apparent to anyone who sees experiences it. 

It can be easily seen why Jimmy Page is considered a mage:  He engages purposeful clarity of vision, and focuses through the ritual of the music on a desired outcome.  Music is the ritual of his magic.

Jimmy Page is well known for his attention to detail and his control of all aspects of his vision.  Thus when comparing the John Lennon/Yoko Ono 1972 film, Imagine,  to the Jimmy Page acoustic segment deleted from the 2008 video It Might Get Loud, we must wonder what Mr. Page’s choices meant in the context of the music he was playing.

It would be very hard to believe that Jimmy Page had never seen the Lennon/Ono film, if not when it first came out then sometime over the next thirty-something years, when Mr. Page makes a video of himself playing an unnamed acoustic guitar piece in a room so identical to the one in the Lennon/Ono film that one might only tell the difference by checking out the scenery through the windows and details of the rooms.

A white empty room; a white chair for Jimmy Page, a white piano for John Lennon:  We must believe Jimmy Page didn’t just “happen” to choose that room to be filmed in or that his chair placement, in basically the same location as John Lennon’s piano, was accidental.  We must believe that the video starts and ends with visual focus on a reflection in the floor rather than the guitarist for a reason.  We must believe that there is purpose for everything in this video because control of detail has always been in Jimmy Page’s nature.  He is, after all, a master mage – he is performing ritual - but it is for his own purposes and it is up to us to take meaning from it.

The music
John Lennon’s song is very different from Jimmy Page’s.  Lennon’s is finished and polished.  It has lyrics that carry the meaning; the music is support for the lyrics.  Jimmy Page’s song sounds raw and unfinished.  It doesn’t even seem like it was meant for an acoustic guitar; it sounds very much like he was hearing an electric guitar in his head along with support instruments.  It has no need for lyrics because the music itself carries the meaning.

The visuals
While each song is being played, the music is the focus.  But before and after each song, the visuals are the focus. 

At the beginning of Imagine, Yoko Ono and John Lennon walk together to the room where the music will take place.  At the end they look at each other, then kiss – excluding the viewer and, in making the video be about the two of them, leaving the message of the song behind.  The song is over.

At the beginning of the Jimmy Page acoustic video the camera focuses on the reflective floor before panning to the musician.  At the end, Jimmy Page sits back and looks out the window, redirecting focus out to the world before turning to look at the camera, which then pans to the reflective floor.  The music has been given to the world, and then to the viewer, and then… the reflection.  Has the song, or more importantly the message, actually ended?

This brings us to the message, the intent of the work of the ritual.

The message
No one can read the mind of the artist or the mage, or presume to know what the meaning of a work is.  The inner vision is the artist’s alone and each person brings to a work his or her own life experience, which acts as a filter and framework for interpretation.

Nevertheless, we can make some statements about the message of Jimmy Page’s video.  The setting is meant to evoke another setting.  The beginning and end focus on a reflective surface:  This video is meant to reflect something else.  There are no lyrics, so the music and the video itself convey the message.  Jimmy Page’s song and video have no name, but reflects the Lennon/Ono film and song:  Imagine.  To me the message is just that:  Imagine what this song of Jimmy Page’s - still in process, still more in his head than in the world – will be.  Imagine, because there is so much more than what is seen and heard there.


Of course there is no way to know if any of this interpretation was meant by Jimmy Page. Sometimes, perhaps often, the creator doesn't actually know what the work means - he or she only knows that it must be created.  Still... keep in mind what Albert Einstein said:  “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”  Technology can come in many forms, can't it?  Science or art, video or music - whatever it is, advanced enough and it is indistinguishable from magic.  

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Light and Shade: Domino

Painters and other visual artists will, in the process of creation, discover something – a technique, an image detail, color combinations, shapes – that intrigue them and lead them into exploration in their next works. All creative artists look at other artists’ work, at life around them or deep inside themselves and discover something that intrigues them. They will absorb it, play with it and reinterpret it, make it their own and let it come out in their subsequent work. Thus the artistic products evolve. It has ever been so with all artwork, and students of the various artistic mediums can follow the evolution of the inspiration from artist to artist, and within one artist’s work.

Once Led Zeppelin was formed and Jimmy Page was able to become fully creative with his own music we can more clearly hear his exploration of themes and pushing of the musical envelope that is so characteristic of his musical genius. Expression of “light and shade” has always been a fundamental part of Mr. Page’s music. He may have picked up the term during his time at art school, although the use of light and shade to provide contrast is a concept used in all forms of art. Unlike in life when things may be much the same for long periods of time, an artist has control over the use of contrast to bring focus to and highlight certain areas of the work.

Painting:  Skull of a Skeleton with Burning Cigarette, 1885–1886, oil on canvas, Van Gogh Museum
Skull of a Skeleton with Burning Cigarette,1885–1886, oil on canvas, Van Gogh Museum
In music, the technique of light and shade may be brought about through changes in volume, tone, rhythm and speed, the use of different instruments, of melody versus chorus, and various other techniques. Jimmy Page uses every means in his considerable arsenal to achieve contrast with just one musical instrument - his guitar - intensifying the depth of his music to an incredible degree. Part of the magic of his music is in his use of light and shade, which draws us in and delivers us to the heights and depths of Mr. Page’s inner vision.

One of the light and shade areas that Jimmy Page appears to be drawn to is that of allowing his music to rise from a version of drone. In music, drone is a note or chord that is continuously sounded throughout most or all of a piece. We know that Middle Eastern tuning is one of the techniques Page uses (Kashmir, discussed last week, being a great example); drone originated in instrumental music of southwestern Asia and spread to Europe, India and Africa.  It can be used to evoke an emotional atmosphere, which we see Mr. Page do to great effect, such as can be heard in in Domino (1999), where sometimes the extended low growl of the guitar’s chords is used as a drone and other places it is the memory of the drone and the return to it that gives the impression of drone.

Domino YouTube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-W-G5txkbw

Page’s melodies rise out of the drone effect throughout Domino, and using light/shade, he returns to the drone again and again to give the mind rest before the contrast of the notes that rise like a fiery phoenix from the dark.