Works by Mozart and Strauss, along with a powerful piano performance by Conrad Tao, impressed the local symphony audience last night at our city’s performing arts center. A new conductor took the podium over the summer and this was the first performance I’d heard since his hiring.
Music enchants me. I love to listen to the different sections of the orchestra blend their instruments with the voices of the accompanying section—violins and cellos, trumpets and trombones, flutes and clarinets— playing different musical lines next to each other, creating a balanced and harmonious blend of sound that soothes the ears. The end result is like reading a good book with layers of scenery, dialogue, character thoughts, and interactions all coming together to create the whole.
God must love music. The Psalms are filled with references to making joyful noises before the Lord our creator.
In Ps. 98:4-6, David, who is known for his praise passages to God, writes, “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth: make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise. Sing unto the Lord with the harp; and the voice of a psalm. With trumpets and sound of cornet make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King.”
God must know how music lifts our spirits, turns our hearts to happier thinking, and elevates our souls to higher planes.
The last psalm, Psalm 150, make s it clear that music is a way to reach God in His heavens as it says,
Psalm 150:3-6
Praise Him with trumpet sound;
Praise Him with harp and lyre.
Praise Him with timbrel and dancing;
Praise Him with stringed instruments and pipe.
Praise Him with loud cymbals;
Praise Him with resounding cymbals.
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD.
Praise the LORD!
Does music light your heart?