“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” [Sun Tzu, The Art of War, quoted by John Jantsch in Duct Tape Marketing]. I know a person whose ideas on a particular topic I would like to change. I have realized recently how we all …
Can beauty substitute for truth and goodness?
I use the term “aestheticism” to label a tendency of some arts people and philosophers: they despair of any sturdy results in the realms of truth and goodness, and so they look to beauty as the value out of which to build culture. There are many varieties of aestheticism, some of which …
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This side of Paradise, harmony implies dissonance
C.P.E. Bach and others accompany Frederick the Great "Harmony" is often mentioned as an ideal and sometimes dismissed as outdated and naive. I think Bach understands what makes harmony a mature and worthy aesthetic value for our age. What do you think? The intellectual character of Bach’s music …
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Bach’s balance of religion and humor
Cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and Naina Yeltsin after his performance in an opera There is abundant evidence that Bach’s dominant motivation as a composer was religious. In his Bible he wrote, “With devotional music, God is always present in his grace.” In his religious music, he might write …
Bach: Talent, training and humility
Johann Sebastian Bach (1658-1750) came from an unusually musical family. His grandfather was a town musician, and he had three sons, each of whom was a musician; and each of them, in turn, had three sons, each of whom was a musician. If there was ever a clan which prepared a person …
Getting involved with the arts: the promise, the problem, and the path
The art class of Adelia Armstrong Lutz Artistic living completes the experience of walking in beauty. The universe presents us with an avalanche of inner and outer beauty, and artistic living is our opportunity to give back, to cooperate in bringing forth a more beautiful world. …
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