Though John Cage is not in my regular musical diet, I do recommend him for medicinal purposes (in particular, “Music for Trombone” and the piece “Two5”)

John Cage was a pioneer in 20th century Classical music.  He was a minimalist which amazingly drew some pretty extreme reactions.  Most of these reactions were based on the idea of “This is what I expect Classical music to sound like.  This is not what expect any musicto sound like!” He had a very sort Eastern way of looking at music.  If you have ever listened to traditional Japanese music, you might understand.  For a fuller explanation of who John Cage was I suggest looking him up on Wikipedia.

A few days ago I was feeling very stressed out to point of not sleeping.  Like many other people, I sometimes use music to sleep.  It’s a little different for me, I have to use ambient music.  Ambient music is music that can easily be played as background but has enough interesting things going on to draw you in and take notice every so often.  This rules out most of what is referred to as “elevator music.”  But, of course, I digress . . .

On this particular night I listened to John Cage’s “Music for Trombone.”  It has three pieces played by trombone and piano.  I know this isn’t many people’s cup o’ tea but with an open mind it can be helpful.  As I inferred before, it is not what one normally thinks of as music.  It’s like Tibetan chants.  Notes are quite often sustained and far apart.  The piece “Solo For Sliding Trombone” is especially different considering he uses a sound collage that he made in 1958 along with the other instruments.

The medicinal part of it is that by just letting the notes stand for themselves you kind of forget the concept of structure.  You then start forgetting about a linear state of mind which keeps most of us awake or stressed.  By concentrating on one note and waiting for the next you forget everything else.  The train of thought that was stressing you out (someone’s nasty comment, financial worries, you know the rest) is derailed momentarily.  Your mind can rest.  It is a form of meditation without sitting in a lotus position, etc.  Of the three pieces I would suggest “Two5” for the uninitiated.   Just few minutes can do a world of good for you.  Of course, there are many other works by other artists that can help in the same way.  The point is that minimalist music can drive away the dark clouds and lift the stress even if only for for a few moments.  After all, everyone needs a break sometime, don’t we?