I once asked a qawwal at Ajmer Sharif why music was a daily offering at the sufi shrine. He sang there every day with his troupe -- singers and percussionists of all ages, shapes and sizes -- on the marble floor in front of the dargah. The illiterate musician grinned at me and said, “Even when a man is just about to commit murder, if he suddenly hears the chimes of a temple bell, he will automatically stop in his tracks for a few moments. Music is transformational. Is mein kuchh jadoo hai – a kind of earthy magic.”
He talked about this magic of music as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, as intrinsic to us as our beating heart and as powerful as that prayer that automatically moves our lips in a moment of joy or sorrow.
I have often wondered why music has been the medium of expression in temples, mosques, gurdwaras, churches and any place where we forget the small things -- the things that otherwise manipulate our minds and sometimes turn us into beasts, even murderers.
Perhaps because it is so abstract, and such a universal language, music has the power to take one away from the petty self into that universal space where sound and beauty and love meet -- what some people call God. Realising its potency, all spiritual traditions speak of music with reverence.
Research by neurologists have revealed that our nervous systems are naturally and exquisitely tuned for music. And just as we have an instinct for language, we have the same for music – a belief that is behind the Suzuki method of teaching violin to little children, entirely by ear and intuition. It follows the belief that children are naturally inclined to learn music, not to become great performers but, rather, better human beings.
My music teacher’s favourite story about the power of music was that when the musician-saint Haridas Swami used to sing in the forest, tigers would come and and sit quietly, right next to deer and rabbits. Music tames the wildest beasts within us.
Actually, every one has access to this experience – because rhythm and melody guide our inner worlds as well as the universe outside. Our pulse is a formidably regular beat, so is our breath. There is an astonishingly rhythmic rigour in the sunrise, sunset, seasons, tides, or the way, for example, all gulmohar trees blossom at precisely the same time all over, as if they were responding to some silent universal drumroll that whispers, “time to drizzle crimson on the world!”
Sound is everywhere, within and around us – a continuum of energy, a vital force – but only a part of it can be heard. The greater part is within, unmanifest, and beyond the grasp of conscious experience, but gently guiding our lives. The poet Kabir refers to the roar of silence. The mystic Rumi wrote: "Even if the whole world's harp should burn up, there will still be hidden instruments playing."
The Taliban recently shot dead Sufi singer Amjad Sabri in Pakistan. But murdering a musician is like trying to stop a wave in the ocean. Music is far bigger than man. The only way to respond to such horror is to continue to have faith, like the bird that sings in the darkness just before dawn, in anticipation of daybreak.
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