Hector Berlioz - Symphonie fantastique - Fifth movement: “Songe d’une nuit de sabbat” (Dreams of a Witches’ Sabbath)
From Berlioz’s program notes:
He sees himself at a witches’ sabbath, in the midst of a hideous gathering of shades, sorcerers and monsters of every kind who have come together for his funeral. Strange sounds, groans, outbursts of laughter; distant shouts which seem to be answered by more shouts. The beloved melody appears once more, but has now lost its noble and shy character; it is now no more than a vulgar dance tune, trivial and grotesque: it is she who is coming to the sabbath… Roar of delight at her arrival… She joins the diabolical orgy… The funeral knell tolls, burlesque parody of the Dies irae, the dance of the witches. The dance of the witches combined with the Dies irae.
Leonard Bernstein described the symphony as the first musical expedition into psychedelia because of its hallucinatory and dream-like nature, and because history suggests Berlioz composed at least a portion of it under the influence of opium. According to Bernstein, “Berlioz tells it like it is. You take a trip, you wind up screaming at your own funeral.”
Tokyo NHK Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Pinchas Steinberg
Rodgers’ biographer William G Hyland states:
“That Richard Rodgers would recall, at the very beginning of his memoirs, his great-grandmother’s death and its religious significance for his family suggests his need to justify his own religious alienation. Richard became an atheist, and as a parent he resisted religious instruction for his children. According to his wife, Dorothy, he felt that religion was based on “fear” and contributed to “feelings of guilt.”
When asked if he believed in god by his daughter, he responded that he believed in people.
-Richard Rogers (composer for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television, songwriter, playwright best known for co-writing musicals The Sound of Music, The King and I, and Oklahoma!)
As much as I loved it, here’s to hoping we don’t need to have many more rallies. It boggles the mind that here in the 21st century, when we are peering at planets orbiting distant stars, when we’re thinking of going to Mars, we still have to stand up for, defend, and celebrate science, reason, rationality, equality, and secularism in the face of superstitions from thousand-year-old books.
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| — | Faisal Syed, former Muslim, on the Reason Rally (via cat-loaf) |
I do understand what love is, and that is one of the reasons I can never again be a Christian. Love is not self denial. Love is not blood and suffering. Love is not murdering your son to appease your own vanity. Love is not hatred or wrath, consigning billions of people to eternal torture because they have offended your ego or disobeyed your rules. Love is not obedience, conformity, or submission. It is a counterfeit love that iscontingent upon authority, punishment, or reward. True love is respect and admiration, compassion and kindness, freely given by a healthy, unafraid human being
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Dan Barker (Dan Barker (1949) was a Christian preacher for 19 years. After leaving Christianity Barker became an atheist and is the author of the books Godless and Losing Faith in Faith: From Preacher to Atheist. Dan is the co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation.) |
Interesting blog choice, but I'd like to call into contention the inclusion something like the Virginia Woolf quote. Despite being an excellent writer, Woolf was also an anti-Semite (despite the fact that she married a practicing Jew. Let's just say things were complicated). I would argue that Woolf is the example of exactly what you don't want to promote with atheism- she became something of a tortured soul and angrily rejected religion in all its forms.
AnonymousThere is something infantile in the presumption that somebody else has a responsibility to give your life meaning and point… The truly adult view, by contrast, is that our life is as meaningful, as full and as wonderful as we choose to make it.
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| — | Richard Dawkins (via storageofstuff) |
I’ve made this blog because I’m super sick and tired of atheists being wrongly assumed to be horrible people void of all morals. The atheists I know are loving, compassionate, creative, genuinely AMAZING people who are out to make positive changes in this world.
Basically, what I want this…
This blog is absolutely wonderful! :)
Believing there is no God gives me more room for belief in family, people, love, truth, beauty, sex, Jell-O and all the other things I can prove and that make this life the best life I will ever have.
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| — | Penn Jillette (via eudaimonist) |
