"The sweet power of music"

In a famous passage in E. M. Forster's Howards End, the Schlegel sisters attend a concert that includes Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. Forster describes Helen's reaction to its third movement as a vision of goblins marching across the world. Thus Forster proves that it is almost impossible to write about music in words or images that can bridge the gap between the spirits hearing the same piece.

In Merchant of Venice, Jessica tells Lorenzo, "I am never merry when I hear sweet music," and he answers, "The reason is your spirits are attentive." Much of this interchange was set to music by Ralph Vaughan Williams, itself a gorgeous work. All this is prelude to a piece I found wandering through the slim pickings of classical fare available on You Tube. I normally would not draw anyone's attention to a recording that is played over a static picture, but the music is so beautiful, and the voices so unforgettable, that I had to. It's Jussi Bjorling, the immortal Swedish tenor, and Robert Merrill, baritone, singing the duet from Bizet's The Pearl Fishers.



I have no idea what they are singing about, nor do I want to know. I want to bask in Bjorling's effortless purity of tone and Merrill's perfect blending with and support of Bjorling. I just want that stream of melody, that "concord of sweet sounds," as Lorenzo calls it, to reach inside me and touch that within me that is immortal. One response to this video on YouTube was, "It's because of stuff like this that I bother trying to stay alive."

Lorenzo says of the music of the spheres:

Such harmony is in immortal souls,
But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.

When listening to this recording, I think I, at least, come pretty close.

P.S. I came across this comment to another video of Bjorling: "The beauty of Jussi Bjorling's voice is the clarity and his annunciation." Well, the word should be "enunciation," but in this case, it's a felix lapsis, a happy slip. The word becomes fleshed by the artist's voice.