Musical Treasures and Treasury Treasures
The Stack of the Week, and our featured grad student post
Dear reader,
First, a programming note: starting this week, I will no longer publish on Fridays. I will continue to publish on Wednesdays and Sundays, which means that I will be consolidating the material from the Friday and Sunday posts into one, super-sized Sunday edition of Bird-Bolts and Cannon-Bullets.
This simply makes more sense as a publishing schedule. I recently came to realize that once my Lord of the Rings Challenge begins in March, unless I changed something, my paid subscribers would be getting four email messages a week from me, including the challenge bonus post. And that’s at least one too many. (I don’t get four email messages a week from anybody who isn’t trying to sell me socks.) This change will also make my work week more manageable.
I hope that this makes sense to you. Feel free to comment if you have thoughts or suggestions.
The Stack of the Week
Speaking of reasonable publishing schedules, if you have been enjoying my musical offerings, then you should absolutely check out the Stack of the Week: Shades of Blue by
. Once a fortnight, Michael’s newsletter explores the melancholy in classical music with inspired musical recommendations and insightful commentary.Why melancholy music? Michael explains in his descriptively titled post, “Why I’m devoting this newsletter to melancholy classical music.”:
There's something unique about the effect bittersweet music has on our physical and emotional worlds. The way hearing Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings at times of mourning can help uplift us, rather than allowing us to sink deeper into our sadness. Or how the "love" theme of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture releases a kaleidoscope of butterflies through our circulatory system, despite knowing the tragedy that befalls Verona's most famous couple.
Research from a 2016 study by the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music found that emotional responses to sad songs fall into three categories. Unsurprisingly, some respondents said this music induces negative feelings like grief, anger, and despair. But the majority shared how sad music produces feelings of melancholia — a gentle sadness or sense of longing — as well as a sweet sorrow that helps them tap into ideas of consolation, appreciation, and hope.
Michael’s posts provide us with a chance to slow down, to reflect, and to discover some music that might help us to heal. For a sample, take a look at his most recent post, which includes some of my own favorite music:
Mjölnir's Musings
Our featured post this week is by
, a second-year MA student in literature, who is currently writing her thesis on Chaucer with me. Emma is also a talented pianist, so we spend a lot of time talking music. She has some interesting things to say this week about treasure and ecology in relation to Beowulf:
That’s all for today. I’ll be back on Wednesday for week four of the Beowulf Challenge.
Thanks for reading, from my fancy internet typewriter to yours.
This is delightful, John — thank you so much for sharing Shades of Blue with your readers. I love all the common ground our newslettes share in approaching art with curiosity and close consideration. 🙏