Music of the spheres; music in the genes
The subject matter of Richard Powers tellingly titled ‘Orfeo’ is immense – immortality and transcendence, the desire to make sense and purpose of it all, and what remains always outside our ability to grasp its intangibility, but is always on the edge of our yearning reach.
Orpheus in classical mythology is a poet and musician of such power that all of the natural world is charmed by his music. In one version, he is the son of Apollo. He descends to the world of the dead to bring back his wife Eurydice, a task which ultimately fails as he disobeys the instruction to not look back.
Corot – Orpheus leading Eurydice from the Underworld Wiki Commons
The central character of Powers’ book, Peter Els, though initially trained as a chemist, with a particular interest in its metaphysics, the secret at the heart of matter, falls as passionately for the metaphysics of music, becoming a composer. The book charts not only the history of music, the intense experience, the yearning, the transcendence, the way, which, if we pay attention to it, it can be felt almost at a cellular level, but also, through the central character in space and time (America, 1960’s onwards) the life of that country.
And there is more. At the start of the book, Els is 70. He has begun, in his search for a music which is present and meaningful, to return to his earlier training, and look at the building blocks of living matter, the alphabet of DNA, and how parallels can be found with the alphabet of music. He is exploring the music of biology, at cellular level
Unfortunately, in a world fearing chemical and biological terrorism, the discovery of a home lab where genetic engineering is taking place, makes Els a fugitive, on the run from the security forces.
Els’s ‘run’ also takes him into a spiralling run backwards and forwards into his own personal history, through first and last loves, the start and ending of relationships, with women, with his closest friend, and with his child.
This is a weighty, difficult, challenging read in many ways, exploring music and specific pieces in immediate depth, diving into the heart of them, and Powers uses language most potently, but demands work from the reader. His clear craft of language, the sense that every sentence is constructed with care, like notes perfectly placed, holding their hidden harmonics, meant it was important to understand precisely the meaning of often complex words. I was using the dictionary frequently. I was also highlighting, almost on every page, observations about art, about music, about biology, chemistry, philosophy, metaphysics, which were telling, weighted and beautiful
And most of all, the wonderful, illuminating journeys through musical works, both real, and imagined (some of Els’ compositions) sent me back to listen, or to listen for the first time.
Proverb Music by Steve Reich, Text Wittgenstein. One of the pieces of music explored in Orfeo
In this, Powers’ reminds me a little of another American author, Siri Hustvedt, another fierce intellect, who in ‘What I Loved’ with a central character who is a visual artist, creates invented pieces of art through words so real that I could see them, and went vainly searching for them via Google, convinced that Hustvedt must have seen or made them. I had exactly the same response to Els’s compositions. Powers writes so impeccably and presently within the heart of specific ‘real’ pieces, that, surely he must have heard the pieces his central character composes.
This will no doubt be a particularly potent novel for those steeped in the Western classical music tradition, as practising musicians, and probably even more so for composers.
The point of music is to wake listeners up. To break all our ready-made habits
It may not be the book if music holds the space of background:
Half the clientele have their own earbuds, the other half use this music, if at all, only as protection from the terrors of silence
Music…………..doesn’t mean things. It is things
Lady Fancifull 
Lovely read! Just wrote a review on Sibelius violin concerto performed by Christian Ferras. You may want to check it out : )
Thank you. And I did. And more thank you!
Ah, a beautifully written, typical LF review to start the New Year! However, I shall do my best to resist… 😉
Heh! I could feel you smiling happily with a clean tbr!
Oh dear…I have this on my TBR, but don’t think it’s for me (though will give it a bash!) Know nothing at all about classical music (I’m such a philistine!) It was just never part of my education, or life experience, and I’ve never been drawn to find out more, as I think of it as not for me…But a beautiful review, as always…
Ah, thanks crimeworm. TBH it saddens me when people think classical music isn’t for them for the reasons you describe. Yes there is classical music that might take more time to come to, as it is more takes more effort – in the way you wouldn’t really expect to start appreciation of reading by giving a child of 7 War and Peace to help them love reading! – but so much of the classical canon is/was also popular in its time. There are lots of good catchy get your feet dancing tunes that are easy to listen to, but I do think this particular book may well speak more if the reader is particularly enamoured of some of that music. There’s a lot more going on in it though, and I’ve obviously focused a lot on the music because that part of it speaks to me most strongly..
BTW I have just found a lovely new blog – the person Good Music Speaks who has ‘liked’ this post. He de-constructs various pieces of music he loves, from all sorts of genres………….
That sounds interesting…I think classical music is something you probably have to grow up with, and learn from parents – and it probably helps if you’re learning an instrument, as that would pique your interest too. I think people are a little afraid to get into it, for example by going to a concert, as they fear it’s music for posh people, and therefore not for them. I know Orfeo made a lot of Best of Year lists in the broadsheets.
Whereas it’s all – naturally – for everyone, and all around, for example, the way a composer might take the music in a bird’s song. Or traditional folk song. It certainly helps to be exposed to a wide range of anything as a child, whether it’s music, food, or people, because you’ll get a taste for some things and not others at an early age before you know whether you should like it or not because of peer pressure or social norms.
All I can really say about what gets called classical music, – which is so varied – is, this will sound strange – my body loves it. I’m not a musician, and don’t really listen to music critically, as in intellectually breaking it down or analysing it, the way I might read. It’s all just a non verbal, felt response for me. And I feel all music is for everyone, because it’s naturally in everyone. We respond naturally to rhythm melody and harmony!
I carried on thinking more about what you said in this post – and want to say – film music. A lot of film music IS newly composed classical music, in terms of its form, in terms of motifs that repeat and are built on and have variations. Except that you may not be CONSCIOUSLY listening to the music because you are attending to narrative, visuals, dialogue. But your emotional response is often formed by the music. And the music in TV. And radio drama and documentary is also, often, classical – because melody and harmony are to the forefront rather than driving rhythm which might make you stop focusing attentively. – except of course in fights and car chases where you want driving rhythm to get your adrenaline going. And even, or perhaps especially, ads, using memorable evocative music threads eg that iconic Hovis ad with Dvorak’s New World Symphony, chosen because that theme is such a swell the heart, comforting melody – even if you don’t know the piece – those qualities are in there . Hence the use of it!
You’re right – it’s a lot more ubiquitous than I’d thought. Your comment on film music made me think of a chap I knew in Glasgow (I wouldn’t go so far as to call him a friend, but I met him and his wife Laura many times as he was playing in my friend’s band.) His career took a huge upturn and he now composes film scores; he is classically trained (Royal Academy.) He’s worked with Baz Luhrmann (R+J, Moulin Rouge, Great Gatsby), he did Ray, and my friend says his next job’s a version of Far from Massing Crowd. Tons of posh awards. His music is mainly classical, and I have listened to some of it, although only because I knew him a bit so was curious about his move from pop, playing keyboard, back to classical (his name’s Craig Armstrong, if you want to check him out.) That’s been my only dip into classical music, but music is SO crucial in films – watch a horror film, and mute it at a tense moment, and all the tension goes…it gives each scene it’s mood, doesn’t it? It would be such an interesting process, learning how you compose music for films – I’d love to look over his shoulder one day (though I’d probably drive him mad with questions!) I must ask my pal Brian if he’s ever seen exactly what he does (he still occasionally works with him, very lucratively, when he wants a guitarist!) I really don’t know why I left Glasgow, when I think about all the people I knew -this town has NO culture. V depressing!
Thanks Crimeworm, I SHALL go check!
Reblogged this on I Write The Music.
Thank you, I moseyed over to your blog and had a wonderful half an hour with Mozart, Pollini and Muti!
I have this book in my TBR pile. It hasn’t made it to the top, yet. But your review made me slip it a little closer to the top. I play the piano and violin, both poorly, but I love making and listening to music.
The Reich piece is stunning and eerie. Depending on my mood, it could leave me with a sense of foreboding. Thank you for the link!
I think in that case you will really love this. Not to mention I suspect really yearn to hear Els’s imagined in the mind of Powers, work.
Yes I love that Reich piece, which I didn’t know at all, till this book