Paradise Lost by John Milton- A Musical Approach
Among my most unpretentious ambitions, I've came up with the idea of creating a musical approach for books.
The first one of this mostly ingenuous intent was Paradise Lost by John Milton, which proved to be quite challenging, but also very amusing. How to conciliate the journey of one of the most heroic, foul and charming character (Satan) of ocidental mythology with the openly christian ocidental classical music?
Playlist with all the musics mentioned in the article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zet2W-0vO2k
Verdi’s Requiem
For the opening, I’ve chosen Verdi’s Requiem. Most specifically Liber Scriptus. The same fate that Satan and his legions ambitions had: a glorious, arrogant and magnificent intent that never reached it’s objective.
Here Satan sorrow for the state of his legions, assuming not all the responsibility but a big part of it.
For the constitution of Satan as a moral being, i would like to resort to Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822), most specifically his book “A Defense of Poetry” (1840). Here, among other themes, the author point fundamental similarities and differences between Milton’s Devil and Prometheus. Despite the irreversible consequences of their acts ; Eternal doom and torture in hell (Satan) and to have his liver eaten daily by a enormous eagle (Prometheus); Both of them have a superior morality in comparison with their God(s). They resist with bravery for those who suffer in their name. In the other hand, their God(s), ruthless, punish those who trespassed the limits of their will .
In Paradise Lost, God permitted the fall of Men even knowing that it would lead to suffering, but also to grace.
“That with reiterated crimes he might
Heap on himself damnation, while he sought
Evil to others, and enrag’d might see
How all his malice serv’d but to bring forth
Infinite goodness, grace and mercy shown
On Man by him seduc’t, but on himself
Treble confusion, wrath and vengeance pour’d. “
Milton John, Paradise Lost- I v 214–220
Without further reflection in the motivations for those actions, we should guide our focus to the reasons for them (Prometheus and Satan) to endure suffering.
According to Shelley, Prometheus would be the highest example of moral perfection. His only sin was to aid human’s ignorance and powerless with a portion of Atena’s wisdom and the knowledge of fire. He had no other intent than promote the greater good, despite the consequences of his acts. Differently, Satan’s moral example comes not from the reasons of his actions, mostly rebellious and envious, but from his persistence even after the fall. That lead us to our next piece, Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto №2.
Rachmaninoff — Piano Concerto №2, Op. 18- I. Mov
When listening to this wonderful piece, grave and soft, pendular in the most elegant way, no one can imagine what it brings forth. Rachmaninoff was a rising star in Russian romantic classical music, sadly, his first symphonic work was a disaster. Regarding it Composer and critic Cesar Cui wrote: “If there were a conservatory in hell, Rachmaninoff would gain the first prize for his Symphony, so devilish are the discords he has dished up for us.” . After those events, the young compositor fell into a depression that lasted several years. His confidence was afflicted by great torment.
This piece ( Piano Concerto №2, Op. 18) represents Rachmaninoff’s retrieval from his decadent moral state. After seeking treatment with Dr. Dahl, a apprentice of Jean-Martin Charcot, former teacher of Freud, our composer concentrated his energies in a mostly dashing work. With one presentation, he should retrieve his honor and respect, and so he did.
The same grieve, the shame of a obscure and mediocre future which struck the composer, had fallen over Satan’s legions and himself:
“Is this region, this the soil, the clime,
Said then the lost Archangel, this the seat,
That we must change for heaven, this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? “
Milton, John. Paradise Lost, p. 53.
With great wrath and ignominy the fallen angel has risen. He was aware that his rebellion was an unforgivable act upon God’s eyes, there was no path to take back. He should face his misery with bravery, his disgrace with arrogance, even if his strength wasn’t enough to match heaven’s. And so he claimed:
“ So as not either to provoke, or dread
New war provoked: our better part remains
To work in close design, by fraud or guile,
What force effected not; that he no less
At length from us may find, who overcomes
By force hath overcome but half his foe.
Space may produce new Worlds; whereof so rife
There went a fame in Heaven that he ere long
Intended to create, and therein plant
A generation whom his choice regard
Should favour equal to the Sons of Heaven.
Thither, if but to pry, shall be perhaps
Our first eruption — thither, or elsewhere;
For this infernal pit shall never hold
Celestial Spirits in bondage, nor th’ Abyss
Long under darkness cover. But these thoughts
Full counsel must mature. Peace is despaired;
For who can think submission? War, then, war
Open or understood, must be resolved.” p.89
From all of this resignation and overcome, the rebellion was reestablished. A new objective was shown in the horizon.
Johannes Brahms- Hungarian Dances- No 5.
The most popular of the Hungarian Dances by Brahms, the №5 inspires great cosmopolitanism and diversity, a true blend of Hungarians and Hungarian-minorities. The multiplicity of voices in this piece remember an discussion, enraged very often, rarely calm, certainly ironical and compounded by fierce argumentation. Well-fitted for the hellish council described by Milton.
After the construction of the “Pandemonium”, the devilish citadel, the devils were assembled in council:
“Their summons called
From every hand and squared regiment
by place or choice the worthiest. (…)
New rubbed with balm, expatiate and confer
Their state affairs.” p.98
The worthiest among the fallen angels are all united, conspiring and discussing which shall be the path to be taken to restore their seat in heaven.
The monarch, exhausted of the discussion, ended it with prudence:
“The present misery, and render Hell
More tolerable; if there be cure or charm
To respite, or deceive, or slack the pain
Of this ill mansion: intermit no watch
Against a wakeful foe, while I abroad
Through all the coasts of dark destruction seek
Deliverance for us all. This enterprise
None shall partake with me.” p.138
And so he left towards the gates of hell, the question remains, in his heart was he dread of the abyss?
Johannes Brahms- Hungarian Dances- No 2–1
Our hero flies thorough the Stige river towards the gates, three layers of metal protect the outer worlds from hell. There he would meet his children, a reward of his rebellion: Sin and Death. This is what places the difference between the fallen angels and man. The rebels have fallen by their own desire, but man were seduced by sin, and punished by death. I’ll speak more about this difference ahead.
With both sin and death delighted as the devils by the possibility of a new world, Satan has a free pass to proceed with his vengeance:
“With head, hands, wings, or feet pursues his way,
And swims or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies” (p.176)
The same chaotic energy reins in Brahms pieces, but in the most tender and delicate way, with some sort of vicious spirit rounding through the verses. A divine creation, corrupted by his own will wanders by the void, this piece it’s what I imagine for the background.
A Bridge between hell and the Earth has been built. Through chaos he rides ruthless, but respectful for the reign that knows no order.
Schubert, Trio №2 op. 100 — Andante con moto- II. Mov
The angels “Canto” occupies 72 verses, precisely being 72 the mystical number of Christ disciples; 72 were also the name of angels. Returning to the moral aspect of Satan already mentioned in “Verdi’s Requiem’, i would like to resort to a central concept in Paradise Lost named as “Felix Culpa”.
This philosophical and theological concept, introduces the paradoxal notion that God has the same objectives as Satan; to obtain a occasion to good from evil, of grace from the fall. Schubert Trio no.2 describes well this transition, this paradoxically connection, i the musical field from classical to romantic period.
The grace mentioned by Milton however is exclusive, some sort of pardon reserved for men, the only creation that can be redeemed by divine mercilessness. Their fatal sin was not a choice, but a consequence of Satan’s persuasion. The false dissembler unperceived, persuaded even Ariel: “the sharpest sighted spirit of all in heaven” and achieved the entrance to Eden.
Arnold Schoenberg: Verklärte Nacht
The astonishment of beholding Eden is completely wiped out by the self-piety that overwhelms Satan. This is the first moment in the book that he is completely alone with no company other than his own thoughts. Or so he thought. Actually, he was being observed by an angel (Ariel) that soon warns heaven about an intruder in the garden of Eden. But that is not our focus in the moment, the allowance for the existence of evil by god was discussed with more detail in the last piece. Now our attention is guided by the very first moment where Satan is seen in a fragile state of mind:
“But with no friendly voice, and add thy name,
Sun, to tell thee how I hate thy beams,
That bring to my remembrance from what state
1 fell, how glorious once above thy sphere;
Till pride and worse ambition threw me down,
Warring in Heaven against Heaven’s matchless King.
Ah, wherefore? he deserved no such return
From me, whom he created what I was,
In that bright eminence, and with his good
Upbraided none; nor was his service hard.” p. 254
But lets not be naive to believe that this painful lament lead to so some sort of regret. In fact, Satan’s recognize his failure and the superiority of god, but does not regret his rebellion, as he reinforces his contempt and hate for submission.
This piece, Schoenberg: Verklärte Nacht, Op.4, has it’s own roots in a poem by Richard Dehmel. Both the piece and the poem transmits the painfully consciousnesses of “transfiguration”, change, a certain mixed feeling of nostalgia and disdain for the past, but also a vortex of hate and fear for the future. The same process Satan is facing, his transfiguration from an angel to an fallen spirit. To not proceed with mostly naive and pointless reflection, i let the lament and the piece speak for themselves:
“Me miserable! which way shall I fly
Infinite wrath and infinite dispair?
Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell;
And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep
Still threatening to devour me opens wide,
To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heaven.
Oh, then, at last relent! Is there no place
Left for repentance, none for pardon left? —
None left but by submission; and that word
Disdain forbids me, and my dread of shame
Among the Spirits beneath, whom I seduced
With other promises and other vaunts
Than to submit, boasting I could subdue
The Omnipotent. Ay me! they little know
How dearly I abide that boast so vain,
Under what torments inwardly I groan.
While they adore me on the throne of Hell,
With diadem and sceptre high advanced,
The lower still I fall, only supreme
In misery; such joy ambition finds. —
But say I could repent, and could obtain
By act of grace my former state — how soon
Would highth recall high thoughts! how soon unsay
What feigned submission swore! Ease would recant
Vows made in pain, as violent and void.
For never can true reconcilement grow
Where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep —
Which would but lead me to a worse relapse
And heavier fall; so should I purchase dear
Short intermission bought with double smart.
This knows my Punisher; therefore as far
From granting he, as I from begging, peace.
All hope excluded thus, behold, instead
Of us outcast, exiled, his new delight,
Mankind created, and for him this World!
So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear,
Farewell remorse! all good to me is lost.
Evil, be thou my good; by thee at least
Divided empire with Heaven’s King I hold,
By thee, and more than half perhaps will reign;
As Man ere long, and this new World shall know.” p.(256–260)
Giuseppe Tartini: Devil’s Trill Sonata
As Satan spoke to eve in her dreams with poisonous words, also he did in Tartini’s Dreams playing this devilish sonata. The composer in a letter to a close friend, Jérôme Lalande, relates that in a dream a Devil appeared to him proposing a contract: the devil service for Tartini’s soul. Before accepting the deal, the composer challenged the devil to play a melody in the violin to test his abilities. The melody proved itself so beautiful that Tartini arouse breathless, enchanted by the sonata, in a rush he grabbed his violin and memorized part of what the devil had shown. However, Tartini declares that compared to the sonata played in his dream this piece was mediocre.
Eve suffered the same fate that Tartini, but no music or reward was shown in her dream. She was tempted to eat the forbidden fruit due to Lucifer lies about it’s properties. He falsely claimed that the fruit had properties that would make the person who ate it a god. Not long after this nightmare, an angel is sent to Eden to warn Adam and Eve about a evil soul that wanders the garden. After the proper presentations, the angel begins to describe the war in heaven that preceded the fall and how men should fear rebellion.
Dvorak Symphony No.9 4th Movement
“From the New World”. This is how this symphony got known world broadly. Not only the name, but the inner concept of this piece fits perfecly the changes provoked and unleashed by heaven’s final battle.
Dvorak drinks both from boehmian’s culture, as notably in his Slavonic Dances, and from Native American’s one, as evidenced by the presence of the pentatonic scale in several of his late life works.
In this piece the composer faced a crucial problem: how to go from E minor, t to the distant D-flat major . The seven chords that begin the second movement are key for this passage, despite their fast but central appearance. These transition happens during the whole symphony however, the last movement is what bring it all together.
Initially seen as a common closure movement such as a sonata, there is much more that cannot be easily heard. All the multinational and multicultural foundations of the symphony unite in a glorious finale. From an initially darker, gloomier E Minor symphony, to a bright, powerfull D-flat major symphony. All the themes and nationalities touched in the 1th to the 3th movements are merged in one beautiful closure. From the horror that was stamped in the face of the fallen angels since the first blow that Satan took, the very first time he felt pain:
To the wrath of Jesus that lead himself, surrounded by cherubs, to expel those who have betrayed his father, the omnipotent:
I could write for hours about the beautifully written discussion that precedes the war, but i reserve the privilege to the reader to see with his own eyes.
Enigma Variations- Variation VII (Presto) “Troyte”
This beautiful variation by Elgar was inspired by a thunderstorm he faced with a friend, but that ended in a calm and quiet place, another friend’s house. In my interpretation, Elgar intention was to show that doesn’t matter how hard wrath strikes, the calmness always imposes itself with no rush. Both of those phases have it’s own beauty and place in time and space.
After the rebellion of Satan, the treachery of Adam and Eve and therefore, the birth of sin and death, again calmness was restored. Despite the eternal torment of God’s foes, the worlds coexisted in restless tolerance. And even this disturbed peace, will have an end by final judgement.
My ingenuous intent reaches it’s end here. There are some things that can be said only by gifted, talented authors. I’m not one of them, but Milton is.
