Musics again and again…

Paul Verlaine used to say: "De la musique avant toute chose…"
Somebody else said: "After the end of the world there will always be MUSIC left…"
Duke Ellington: "There is only two kinds of musci: the good one and the bad one."

Breathing musics…

- >More important than words or melody is the sound and the tempo… which produce impacts on us, unconsciously I guess… Take Erik SATIE or Thelonious MONK there is so much in their music of the "art of silence", a way to breathe INSIDE the music.
Miles DAVIS has got the idea too (may be from Thelonious…?). Let's take a ballad like "Drag dog" (on the "My Prince will come" album (1961)): the way Miles plays the first part is typical of "breathing music". Same thing for "In a silent way" (1968)…
- Listening to Erik Satie's "Vexations" - a cyclical phrase repeated 840 times - brings back the same impression of "breathing": it looks extreme or unlistenable but when played it is not: the piece puts the listener in a kind of transe where one composes is ownd music by "playing" and "adjusting"different parts together, not as expected from the beginning. Satie meant it that way, probably… In brief: looks boring, on paper, but when listened carefully, one of the most exciting music on Earth. John Cage got into it too… but I never listened to his own version.
- Back to Monk: his solo works - and compositions >> Monk is a prolific composer! - show evidences how he is dealing with space and silent intervals… Worth listening are "Ruby my dear", "Crepuscule with Nellie" (Nellie was Monk's wife) plus the dramatic pauses on "Coming on the Hudson"… Anywayn, nothing is more dramatic than the Monk'silence(s) on the famous 1954 sessions with Miles: "Bag's groove".