There's a meme going around the Facebook. (A SIDE: I've recently been informed that the word 'meme' was coined by one Richard Dawkins, a man with few fans in my social circles. This does not compel me to use a different word.) The basic idea is to list the 15 music albums that 'changed your life.' Now, I like music, but I couldn't come close to listing 15 songs that have truly 'changed my life,' much less 15 whole albums. And it would seem a betrayal of reader interest for me to list 15 albums that I thought were 'pretty sweet.'
That said, I love the idea of admitting that our experience of art and media shapes who we are and how we relate to the world. I'm not just talking music, although that's a big part of it. I'm thinking changing the glasses we use to view the world through books, movies, music, paintings, theatrical performances, culinary experiences, etc. Things that somehow made the world a bigger place afterwards. What moves us and makes us think reveals a lot about who we really are.
Given the power of art in all these forms, I'd like to offer a list of 15 'media experiences' that really did 'change my life.' I'd also like to learn about similar experiences from the readers of this blog, so please feel free to post your own in the comments or link to your own blog entries on the subject. (A SIDE: I'm not a fan of arbitrary rules. Don't feel bound to list exactly 15 unless you find this constraint helpful in some way.)
In no particular order-
1. Putting On Airs (Album): This was the first music I ever spent my own money on, and my first expression of preference for a particular musical style (Irish traditional).
2. The Hunger for Significance by R.C. Sproul (Book): The Image of God actively enters my thoughts regarding every human relationship I have because of this book.
3. Thy Mercy My God (Song): This is the first song to ever truly drive me to tears. I had never really felt truth in my gut until I sang this song with Wade and the RUF team playing.
4. Spaghetti by Andrew Johnson (Culinary Arts): A little balsamic vinegar and rosemary opened my mind to one of my current favorite pasttimes. I love food.
5. The Chicago Tribune building (Architecture): Seeing the Tribune building dissappearing into the fog (or smog, I was never sure which it was) made me care about my physical environment for the first time.
6. Star Trek Deep Space Nine (TV Series): I always suspected that the world was not full of black hats and white hats, but with good and evil within the same people, warring with each other and each having wins and losses. But I believed it when I saw it portrayed in this show.
7. Grace Unknown by R.C. Sproul (Book): The simple sense of this book is the reason I am a reformed Presbyterian. That's pretty worldview shaping.
8. Genesis (Holy Book): I know it's kind of cheating to include a book of the Bible, but everything in my experience brings me back to thinking about what the world was made to be, why aren't the way they're supposed to be, and how God is making all things new again.
9. Prices and Information by W. Robert Reed (Book): This book convinced me that markets are as much a part of human nature as language. The logic of this book changed how I teach, study, and interpret the news.
10. She Must and Shall Go Free (Album): Jesus Christ loves his Church with a deep, burning passion that will not let her destroy herself. This album helped redefine love for me.
11. Josh Groban at the Ford Center (Concert): I had never experienced the mesmerizing power of a live musical performance before this. To be immersed in music is a good thing.
12. The Fellowship of the Ring (Movie): These characters were real to me before the movie, but Peter Jackson made them vivid and alive. This movie (and the others in the trilogy) didn't just capture my imagination, it expanded it.
13. Conspiracy Theory (Movie): As odd as it sounds, I was not interested in seeing this movie until I had a dream informing me it would be great. I pay attention to my dreams in part because this is one of my favorite movies of all time.
14. That Hideous Strength by C.S. Lewis (Book): This book captures my beliefs about logic and human reason. It also captures why I think aliens, monsters, and magiks aren't as far fetched as many 'logical' people believe.
15. The Dark Knight Returns by Miller, Janson, and Varley (Comic Book): I had set aside superheroes since childhood until I picked this up. I realized that comic heroes could be art that tested our values and held a mirror to our humanity.
There you have it. My 15 life changing albums. And by albums I mean artistic experiences. Or something like that.
HOW I FEEL WHEN I’M TWO WEEKS OUT FROM QUALS
9 years ago
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4 comments:
wow, that's fascinating.
Good list. I'm glad Andrew fed you spaghetti.
My list would probably include:
that first Hanson concert that I went to on a whim
the book Ishmael (not a great book, but the first I had ever enjoyed while entirely disagreeing with)
The Ransom of Red Chief, as performed by the Mingo Valley Christian School drama department. Possibly the first time I thoroughly enjoyed doing something that I had absolutely no desire to do again.
Not sure I've ever had a significant experience with the culinary arts. That makes me sad.
Ha! I hereby participate in a facebook meme without actually being on facebook! This enables me to feel subversive, just like a big kid. This is a partial list, numbered at random
Culinary
16. The first time I made a ragu that turned out properly, two years ago in Bologna. (Although to be precise it was a Neapolitan sauce.) The way the flaming cherry of the tomato concentrate gradually subsided and darkened, the texture softening until it looked like crimson velvet, has never left me - every time I make it now I try to recapture that moment. Sometimes I get close.
52. I cannot remember the first time I tried my mom's lasagna, but I do remember quite clearly the first time I really noticed it.
5. Fifth grade, when I won an AWANA cookie contest for my peanut butter balls recipe. It was only afterwards that I began to take a real interest in the sublimnity of food.
8. Jenny's baked manicotti. It was eating that, sometime in February the week after we met, that I started to think she might be the one.
Literature
12. Reading Lewis' "Mere Christianity", far less for its arguments than for its style. The unfolding of the prose entranced me: it's the first time I began to think about the art of words.
13. Lewis' "Allegory of Love", which I have to thank for my introduction to Dante, Spencer, Boccaccio, Chaucer, and the Middle Ages generally. Crazy little thing.
7. La Commedia, which takes the highest dream of every rational being in history, and explains it more beautifully than had ever been done before. I cannot exaggerate the profundity of this poem's effect on my faith and general attitude.
9. The Lord of the Rings. I don't suppose I need say more.
Music
22. Rigoletto. The first grand opera to which I ever listened all the way through. The crashing agony of the prostrate dwarf as his daughter ascends to heaven has always held for me some echo of the sanctifying glory of the gospel. I consider it my first exposure to the throw weight of music.
14. And Trumpets Shall Sound, the bass aria from Messiah. The modulation on the word "changed" that builds into the resolution is splendid, and packs some token of the power and transcendence of the hope of God on earth.
:) I like this post. Good list. Meant to make my own list for a long time. Now, I finally have, here: http://daughter-ofthe-king.blogspot.com/2009/06/fifteen-media.html
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