The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Reads tagged with “music”

Beethoven’s Lifestyle Regimen and the Secret to His Superhuman Vitality
Beethoven’s Lifestyle Regimen and the Secret to His Superhuman Vitality

In praise of “vigorous ablutions with cold water, a scrupulous regard for personal cleanliness, and daily walks immediately after the midday meal.”

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Love Beyond Label: The Tender Letters of Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms
Love Beyond Label: The Tender Letters of Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms

“I would gladly write to you only by means of music, but I have things to say to you to-day which music could not express.”

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The Joy of Suffering Overcome: Young Beethoven’s Stirring Letter to His Brothers About the Loneliness of Living with Deafness and How Music Saved His Life
The Joy of Suffering Overcome: Young Beethoven’s Stirring Letter to His Brothers About the Loneliness of Living with Deafness and How Music Saved His Life

“Ah! how could I possibly quit the world before bringing forth all that I felt it was my vocation to produce?”

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Democracy: Neil Gaiman’s Transcendent Animated Tribute to Leonard Cohen, with Piano by Amanda Palmer
Democracy: Neil Gaiman’s Transcendent Animated Tribute to Leonard Cohen, with Piano by Amanda Palmer

“…the heart has got to open in a fundamental way.”

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Leonard Cohen on Moonlight, the Mystique of Creativity, His Influences, and Why He Loves It When People Cover His Songs
Leonard Cohen on Moonlight, the Mystique of Creativity, His Influences, and Why He Loves It When People Cover His Songs

“It’s also very difficult to untangle influences because you represent the sum of everything you’ve seen or heard or experienced.”

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How a Synesthete Experiences Bach: An Empathic Journey into Sound Through Minimalist Motion, Shape, and Color
How a Synesthete Experiences Bach: An Empathic Journey into Sound Through Minimalist Motion, Shape, and Color

An animated invitation to inhabit a rare neurological crossing of the senses.

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Nina Simone on Time
Nina Simone on Time

A meditation on the one dimension of human existence that “goes past all racial conflict and all kinds of conflicts.”

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An Anthem Against Silence: Amanda Palmer Reads Ella Wheeler Wilcox’s Piercing and Prescient 1914 Protest Poem
An Anthem Against Silence: Amanda Palmer Reads Ella Wheeler Wilcox’s Piercing and Prescient 1914 Protest Poem

“To sin by silence, when we should protest, makes cowards out of men.”

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Patti Smith on Listening to the Creative Impulse and the Crucial Difference Between Writing Poetry and Songwriting
Patti Smith on Listening to the Creative Impulse and the Crucial Difference Between Writing Poetry and Songwriting

“In times of strife, we have our imagination, we have our creative impulse, which are things that are more important than material things. They are the things that we should magnify.”

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There Is a Crack in Everything, That’s How the Light Gets In: Leonard Cohen on Democracy and Its Redemptions
There Is a Crack in Everything, That’s How the Light Gets In: Leonard Cohen on Democracy and Its Redemptions

A generous reminder that we must aim for “a revelation in the heart rather than a confrontation or a call-to-arms or a defense.”

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