Inside of Music- A visual explanation of Sufjan Stevens

I have an idea for a body of artwork that I need to create.

It came to me after a few experiences:


Experience #1:
A Sufjan Stevens song came on as Laura and I were talking in the living room. It was one of my absolute favorites, and I was certain that she would like it. But much to my surprise, as soon as she started listening her face dropped and and she smirked like there was a bad smell in the air. She said, "This is... the stupidest music... I have ever heard." I rushed upstairs and turned off the music, terribly confused and embarrassed.

Experience #2:
I went to the Sufjan Stevens concert. The music that I heard there was the weirdest, most indescribable sound I have ever heard. My mind struggled to process it, and listening to it was one of the most brain intensive activities of my life. I had to work so hard to understand it, I came out a little different. My brain had been stretched in new ways, and the way I thought about music was altered. I struggled to enjoy that music the first time I listened to it. But then something changed. The way I perceived the music changed. And now, even though my brain is receiving the exact same information, I process it so differently that I actually hear something else. It's sounds beautiful to me.

Experience #3:
Laura began to make fun of the way Sufjan makes music. "You can't actually like it, Julia. It sounds like Mr. Rogers. It sounds like Sesame Street. The stupid horns! The clarinets and oboes! It sounds so stupid!"
"You can't tell me I don't like it, Laura."
"It's just that sometimes I think you're only saying you like it to seem cool, or to please Brian. I mean, come on. The way it sounds, the actual sonic quality is not good. It's not enjoyable."
"Laura, when I listen to it, that's not what I hear. I hear something different than you. I've let go of all prejudices about certain instruments. I don't associate the sounds with anything predetermined, I just listen to the sound. There is this one song in particular, that if I were to show to you, you would hear it as the ugliest, stupidest, cheesiest sound you have ever heard, but that's not what I hear."
"Ok. Well then, what are you hearing? What does it sound like to you?"
"I can't describe it in words. It brings out specific, subtle emotions that no other music expresses, that there aren't words for. It actually sounds beautiful to me."

When Laura responded to one of my favorite songs the way she did, it was very jarring-- I realized I couldn't possibly comprehend how other people were hearing my music. I never would have considered the possibility that that song would be, "the stupidest music" she's ever heard. I assumed she would love it. But listening to music is a mental process, and can be done in very different ways. Laura and I were receiving the exact same sound waves, but what our brains did with those sound waves was completely different.

The way I listen to music has changed. I used to hear the top layer, the shell of a song. This shell is our automatic judgment. It is each sound's perceived connotation. It is expectation of what we think music is and should be. It is the association of certain sounds with predetermined emotions. It is assumption, and impatience, and ego, an unconscious refusal to appreciate something others may label as silly, annoying, or strange.

This hollow shell is the only thing I use to hear while listening to music. It meant that while some music reached me deeply, far fewer pieces were able to reach me at all. But I was slowly exposed to artists who drove me to new levels, and different thought processes. They challenged, one at a time, all assumptions, expectations, connotations, and judgments that I made about music. And now, when I hear a piece, I listen to it from the inside-out, not the outside-in. That's the only way I can describe it. I'm in the song, I'm inside the world that it creates while it's playing. And it sounds completely different from the inside. It begins to display emotions that you didn't know you had, ones that are not simply "angry" or "sad" or "joyful." With all assumptions set aside, a specific song will communicate things that nothing else can communicate. You might think that stripping music down this way would eliminate all meaning, that if all pre-decided associations were dissolved then music would be nothing more than purposeless noises, like the unorganized sounds you hear walking down the street, or how a word loses meaning when you say it over and over. But this is not the case. Listening to music in this elemental way opens the way for more direct communication. It doesn't dismantle meaning, it uncovers it. Because that is what music is-- It's a form of communication. It's a language. It has meaning. It can communicate obscure ideas and emotions that words cannot even begin to approach. It's worth it to give a song a chance. It's worth it to be patient, and suppress your automatic aversion to the noise, because it may just communicate something precious.

And when you begin thinking about music in this new way, the way your mind thinks in general will open up. The patience and questioning and lack of ego will translate into all of your thought processes. Your brain will become accustomed to being accepting and free. It will get used to questioning an initial judgment. You won't get locked into one mindset, or one way of thinking.

Not all music will speak to you, even after you give it the opportunity to do so. I suspect that Sufjan Steven's music affects me personally because of who I am, and Laura would not find the same meaning in it, even if she were to look for it. But I want to answer that question, "What are you hearing? What does it sound like to you?" And I can't do it in words. I can however, attempt to express it visually. I will describe my individual perception of it through color. I will make pairs of paintings for several songs, one representing the outer shell, and next to it a representation of what it sounds like to me.

This is gonna be fun. :)