The Power of Music
The Reith Lectures
BBC
4.2 • 770 Ratings
🗓️ 5 May 2006
⏱️ 42 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This year's lecturer is Daniel Barenboim, who has become known as one of the most versatile pianists of his generation. His skill as a conductor and a musician has led him to world recognition and the appointment as Chief Conductor for Life by the Staatskapelle Berlin. He has also won a Grammy for his recording of Wagner's Tannhäuser and received the Wilhelm Furtwängler Prize for his work with the Staatskapelle Berlin.
In his final lecture, delivered in Jerusalem's International YMCA, Daniel Barenboim discusses the power music has beyond words. Music is more than just a physical power it is also has an emotional strength. He explores the hold music has over us and the association that music can evoke. He distinguishes between the substance of music and our perceptions of it.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is a podcast from the archives of the BBC Ruth Lectures. This lecture in the series, |
| 0:06.2 | In the Beginning was sound, given by Daniel Barrenboim, was originally broadcast in 2006. |
| 0:12.7 | Hello and welcome. Over the past five weeks, we've been to London, Chicago, Berlin and now Jerusalem, |
| 0:19.1 | in the company of our lecturer Daniel Barrenboyne. |
| 0:22.1 | All these places are central to both his music making and his philosophy, that music has the |
| 0:28.3 | power to transform and improve the world. |
| 0:31.7 | Last week, before a mainly Palestinian audience, he described music as a great equalizer. |
| 0:39.4 | An orchestra can't bring peace, |
| 0:45.4 | he said, but it can bring the understanding, patience and courage for people to listen to one another. Today we're in the Jerusalem International YMCA, but this is no ordinary YMCA. It was designed, |
| 0:53.3 | in fact, by the architects of the Empire State Building, |
| 0:56.3 | and described by Field Marshal Lord Allenby when he opened it in 1933 as a place where, and I quote, |
| 1:03.2 | jarring sectarians may cease from wrangling and men's minds be drawn to loftier ideals. |
| 1:10.9 | A noble note, then, on which to introduce our last lecture. |
| 1:14.7 | Please welcome the man who argues that music should be seen as a metaphor for life, |
| 1:20.1 | capable of demonstrating the great qualities of leadership. |
| 1:23.9 | Ladies and gentlemen, Daniel Barrenboyne. |
| 1:40.3 | Thank you very much. Today I would like to concentrate on the fact that music has a power beyond mere words. |
| 1:54.0 | It has the power to move us, and it has the sheer physical power of sound, as we know. |
| 2:00.0 | Throughout the series of RIS lectures, I have been focused on the content of music |
| 2:04.5 | and its relationship to life. |
| 2:07.9 | Here, today, in this final lecture, I would like to explore the power that music has over |
| 2:12.7 | us, the power of the association that music evokes, that is to say, |
... |
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