Intermezzo

intermezzo--a usually brief musical interlude or diversion.

coda--the concluding passage of a piece or movement, typically forming an addition to the basic structure.

I enjoy music. I used to enjoy making music as a church and school music director, and as a vocalist. Those days are behind me. So now I enjoy listening to music.  I listen to a wide variety of music including Classical, choral music, Christian music and popular music, especially from the  60s and 70s (my formative  years). At home I use Spotify as my medium.  Besides the many playlists I have created, I make good use of the search box to find any song or composer I care to listen to. I employ the Spotify "radio stations" as well. Spotify is a wellspring of unending musical pleasure. On the road I listen to Sirius/XM radio. The ability to drive across the country (hypothetically) while listening to the same station is quite phenomenal. The only time I lose the signal is while driving slowly under an overpass or through a tunnel. Other than that, XM plays an uninterrupted stream of my favorite music.

Listening to music as often as I do, I have come to notice things about certain types of music and certain songs. Most popular music lasts about three to three and a half minutes. Some songs, however, last much longer. Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven, for example, lasts over eight minutes. The Eagle's Hotel California lasts nearly seven minutes.  The Beatles' Hey Jude lasts over seven minutes. There is something else that Hotel California and Hey Jude share in common. They each have an extended  coda.  Listening to my favorite songs over the years, I've noticed that I tend to tune out the interludes while waiting for the song (the vocals) to start again.  And then it gradually got in my head that the introduction, interludes and codas are just as important as the vocals. But I noticed something else. In Hotel California as soon as Don Henley finishes the line, "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave", the guitar solo starts. To my ear it sounds like an intermezzo, an interlude. Musically, it sounds like the vocals are "to be continued".But then I realized the song ends with that guitar solo. As soon as that solo begins, the vocals are done.  That two minute guitar coda has been named as the best guitar solo in all of music. It's not just tacked on to fill time; it's important music.  And then listening to Hey Jude for the nth time I thought "that 'nah nah nah nah, hey Jude' part goes on a long time". So I timed it.  It goes on nearly four minutes. Four minutes!  Most popular songs don't last four minutes. The Beatles must have thought it was important. And they were right.

In our lives we tend to think that some parts of the day are better than others, are more important than others. During some parts of the day we are marking time until we can get on with the things that really matter. There's nothing wrong with feeling that way. No doubt, most of us treasure the time with family and friends over time we spend on the clock.  On the other hand, unless we're fully retired or independently wealthy, even if we don't particularly enjoy our job,  that time on the clock is, at least, a means to an end. It facilitates that time with those special people, which makes the time at work just as important as the time at home. Another thing, how many more office shootings will it take for us to realize that we don't have any control over when and where we will draw our last breath. That coffee break may end up being that long "coda" of life after death. When we walked away from our desk, we never walked back. It wasn't just a "break" after all;  it was the grand finale!

Maybe you don't listen to as much music intentionally as I do, and maybe you don't want to. But when you find yourself listening at home, at work or in the car, instead of it just being a distraction, tune into the song and you may be surprised what all you find. And if you don't find all you want to know by listening, use Google and Wikipedia like I do. "Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah hey Jude". The end.