The international photographer (Jan-Dec 1930)

Fourteen The INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER April, 1930 ff^hen £ound ^Builds Form -BY BISHOP CHARLES W. LEADBEATER, in "The Hidden Side of Things' There are many people who realize that sound always generates color — that ever}' note which is played or sung has overtones which produces the effect of light when seen by an eye even slightly clairvoyant. Not every one, however, knows that sound also builds form just as thoughts do. Yet this is nevertheless the case. It was long ago shown that sound gives rise to form in the physical world by singing a certain note into a tube across the end of which was stretched a membrane upon which fine sand or lycopodium powder had been cast. In this way it was proved that each sound threw the sand into a certain definite shape, and that the same note always produced the same shape. It is not, however, with forms caused in this way that we are dealing just now, but with those built up in etheric, astral and mental matter, which persist and continue in vigorous action long after the sound itself has died away, so far as physical ears are concerned. Let us take, for example, the hidden side of the performance of a piece of music — say the playing of a voluntary upon a church organ. This has its effect in the physical world upon those of the worshipers who have an ear for music — who have educated themselves to understand and to appreciate it. But many people who do not understand it and have no technical knowledge of the subject are yet conscious of a very decided effect which it produces upon them. The clairvoyant student is in no way surprised at this, for he sees that each piece of music as it is performed upon the organ builds up gradually an enormous edifice in etheric, astral and mental matter extending away above the organ and far through the roof of the church like a kind of castellated mountain-range, all composed of glorious flashing colors coruscating and blazing in a most marvelous manner, like the aurora borealis in the arctic regions. The nature of this differs very much in the case of different composers. An overture by Wagner makes always a magnificent whole with splendid splashes of vivid color as though he built with mountains of flame for stones; one of Bach's fugues builds up a mighty ordered form, bold yet precise, rugged but symmetrical, with parallel rivulets of silver or gold or ruby running through it, marking the successive appearances of the motif; one of Mendelssohn's Lieder ohne Worte makes a lovely airy erection — a sort of castle of filigree work in frosted silver. In the book called "Thought-Forms," will be found three illustrations in color, in which we have endeavored to depict the forms built by pieces of music by Mendelssohn, Gounod and Wagner respectively, and I would refer the reader to these for this is one of the cases in which it is quite impossible to imagine the appearance of the form without actually seeing it or some representation of it. It may some day be possible to issue a book containing studies of a number of such forms, for the purpose of careful examination and comparison. It is evident that the study of such sound-forms would be a science in itself and one of surpassing interest. These forms, created by the performers of the music, must not be confounded with the magnificent thought-form which the composer himself made as the expression of his own music in the higher worlds. This is a production worthy of the great mind from which it emanated, and often persists for many years — sometimes even over centuries if the composer is so far understood and appreciated that his original conception is strengthened by the thoughts of his admirers. In the same manner, though with wide difference of type, magnificent erections are constructed in higher worlds by a great poet's idea of his epic, or a great writer's idea of the subject which he means to put before his readers such for example, as Wagner's immortal trilogy of The Ring. Dante's grand representation of purgatory and paradise, and Ruskin's conception of what art ought to be and of what he desired to make it. The forms made by the performance of the music persist for a considerable space of time, varying from one hour to three or four, and all the time they are sending out radiations which assuredly influence for good every soul within a radius of half a mile or more. Not that the soul necessarily knows it, nor that the influence is at all equal in all cases. The sensitive person is greatly uplifted, while the dull and preoccupied man is but little affected. Still, however, unconsciously, each person must be a little the better for coming under such an influence. Naturally the undulations extend much faster than the distance named but beyond that they grow rapidly weaker, and in a great city they are soon drowned in the rush of swirling currents which fill the astral world in such places. * * * In the quiet country amidst the fields and the trees the edifice lasts proportionately much longer and its influence has a wider area. It is surely a beautiful thought that every organist who does his work well, and throws his whole soul into what he plays, is thus doing far more good than he knows, and helping many whom perhaps he never saw and never will know in this life. Another point which is interesting in this connection is the difference between the edifices built by the same music when rendered upon different instruments — as, for example, the difference in appearance of the form built by a certain opus when played upon a church organ and the same piece executed by an orchestra or by a violin quartette, or played on a piano. In these cases the form is identical if the music be equally well rendered, but the whole texture is different, and naturally, in the case of the violin quartete, the size of the form is far less, because the volume of sound is so much less. The form built by the piano is often somewhat larger than that of the violins, but is not so accurate in detail, and its proportions are less perfect. Again, a decided difference in texture is visible between the effect of a violin solo and the same solo played upon the flute. Surrounding and blending with these forms, although perfectly distinct from them, are the forms of thought and feeling produced by human beings under the influence of music. The size and vividness of these depend upon the appreciativeness of the audience and the extent to which they are affected. Sometimes the form built by the sublime conception of a master of harmony stands alone in this beauty, unattended and unnoticed, because of such mental facilities as the congregation may possess are entirely absorbed in millinery or in the calculations of the money-market, while on the other hand the chain of simple forms built by the force of some well-known hymn may in some cases be almost hidden by great blue clouds of devotional feeling evoked from the hearts of the singers. Another factor which determines the appearance of the edifice constructed by a piece of music is the quality of the performance. The thought-form hanging over a church after a performance of the Hallelujah chorus infallibly and distinctly shows for example, if the bass solo has been flat, or if any of the parts have been noticeably weaker than the others, as in either case there is an obvious failure in the symmetry and clearness of the form. Naturally there are types of music whose forms are anything but lovely, though even these have their interest as objects of study. The curious broken shapes which surround an academy for young ladies at the pupil's practising hour are at least remarkable and instructive, if not beautiful; and the chains thrown out in lasso-like loops and curves by the child who is industriously playing scales or arpeggios are by no means without their charm when there are no broken or missing links. Singing A song with a chorus constructs a form in which a number of beads are strung at equal distances upon a silver thread of melody, the size of the beads of course, depending upon the voice and expression of the solo singer, while the (Concluded on Page 27)