“Musicians as Priests”

“The best composers played vital roles in spiritual evolution; they functioned like psychopomps for the living, leading the way to the regions of soul. These artists, having mounted Jacob’s ladder themselves, re-created its rungs in sound, so that their music’s receptive listeners could likewise ascend. Music possessed this power more than any other art. Music did not involve the thinking mind. One naturally tended to close one’s eyes under its influence, blocking out visual reminders of the material world. Music was the art of sound and sound spoke to human beings from ambient nature, from the enveloping womb, and carried with it echoes of the origins of the universe itself: the gigantic, ultra-deep waves of the Big Bang, the “Logos” of the Bible, the Egyptian creational word “Hu,” and the Vedic “Aum.” The tenuous structure of music allowed it to permeate the thick envelope of the physical body and directly touch the soul. The gift of making music was a holy one, for a sufficiently inspired and skilled artist could immediately remind forgetful humanity of Spirit’s beauty and grace and sometimes inspire individuals to set out to discover and take up residence in this blissful, loving world that was nowhere and everywhere, that was the birthright of everyone and everything, that was called Spirit.”