2006年NPR美国国家公共电台十一月-Music Makes Me Come Alive

Mondays we bring you our series-"This I Believe". Today we hear from Joan Tower, a composer who began writing music in 1956 at the age of 18. Her works have been played by orchestras around the world and she teaches at Bard¹ College in New York. Here's our series curator, independent producer Jay Allison.

Joan Tower has called musical composition a very specific blueprint² of your soul. Not so very different from what we request from essayists in our series. Tower said she found it more challenging to write and render her feelings in words, but she was game because she wanted to honor her belief in music which she calls the deepest channel of communication. Here is Joan Tower with her essay for "This I Believe".

After 60 plus years of composing and performing, I believe more than ever in extraordinary power of music. In this day, a fast information and communication, music nourishes our inner souls. As tensions between nations continue, music reaches beyond borders. At weddings, funerals, inaugurations³ and prays, music gives us public permission to feel and share things. In fact, music has always been a shared thing between the creator, the performer and the audience. Music connects me to people I don't even know. Strong music put you in a space where you forget about yourself, it's like a good movie, it's an escape. You lose yourself; it's a license⁴ to feel, sing, shout and to dance.

Do you remember when you first fell in love, was there a song associated with that love?

When you hear that song now, do you think of that person actually, remember what you felt. Maybe you even cry. When I was growing up, my life largely centered around boys and sex. I was into music, but music didn't always give me the nourishment⁵ that boys did. It takes time and patience to be nourished by music. But now I can say, without music, I would be lost. A conductor once told me that music had kept him off the streets and even out of jail. Music became a kind of survival phenomena⁶ for him and for me, too. It is our drug of choice because it has given us the extraordinary lasting⁷ inner experience that is even replaced real drugs, vacations, money, fame and all the things we associate with pleasure and excitement.

A friend of mine who happens to be an extraordinary pianist and still practices up to five hours a day, once said to me, the piano is my best friend. I can't think of anyone better to spend my time with. I feel the same way about composing. I am in the studio from 1:00 to 5:30 religiously every day. I used to run from the studio, I tell myself, I had to clean, you know make a telephone call, anything to get out of there. Now I look forward to these hours. Music is not just my most trusted friend; it makes me come alive to show strength and passion and to feel useful. Music makes me feel like I'm doing something terribly important.

I believe that with music, I can help to change the world around me if just a little bit.

Joan Tower with her essay for This I Believe. We invite you too to send us your words about the core belief that guides your life. To do so, visit npr.org, or you can also see what over 19,000 others have written.
This music, by the way, comes from Joan Tower's composition "Fanfares⁸ for the uncommon⁹ woman". For This I Believe, I'm Jay Allison.
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render
To give what is due or owed:
表示：给予到期或拖欠的东西：
render thanks; rendered homage¹⁰.
表示感谢；致以敬意
drug of choice
选用药
fanfare
（引导某人进场或宣布节目开始时） 嘹亮的喇叭声

1 bard   

n.吟游诗人

参考例句：

• I'll use my bard song to help you concentrate!我会用我的吟游诗人歌曲帮你集中精神！
• I find him,the wandering grey bard.我发现了正在徘徊的衰老游唱诗人。

2 blueprint   

n.蓝图，设计图，计划；vt.制成蓝图，计划

参考例句：

• All the machine parts on a blueprint must answer each other.设计图上所有的机器部件都应互相配合。
• The documents contain a blueprint for a nuclear device.文件内附有一张核装置的设计蓝图。

3 inaugurations   

n.就职( inauguration的名词复数 )；就职典礼；开始；开创

参考例句：

4 license   

n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许

参考例句：

• The foreign guest has a license on the person.这个外国客人随身携带执照。
• The driver was arrested for having false license plates on his car.司机由于使用假车牌而被捕。

5 nourishment   

n.食物，营养品；营养情况

参考例句：

• Lack of proper nourishment reduces their power to resist disease.营养不良降低了他们抵抗疾病的能力。
• He ventured that plants draw part of their nourishment from the air.他大胆提出植物从空气中吸收部分养分的观点。

6 phenomena   

n.现象

参考例句：

• Ade couldn't relate the phenomena with any theory he knew.艾德无法用他所知道的任何理论来解释这种现象。
• The object of these experiments was to find the connection,if any,between the two phenomena.这些实验的目的就是探索这两种现象之间的联系，如果存在着任何联系的话。

7 lasting   

adj.永久的，永恒的；vbl.持续，维持

参考例句：

• The lasting war debased the value of the dollar.持久的战争使美元贬值。
• We hope for a lasting settlement of all these troubles.我们希望这些纠纷能获得永久的解决。

8 fanfares   

n.仪式上用的短曲( fanfare的名词复数 )

参考例句：

9 uncommon   

adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的

参考例句：

• Such attitudes were not at all uncommon thirty years ago.这些看法在30年前很常见。
• Phil has uncommon intelligence.菲尔智力超群。

10 homage   

n.尊敬，敬意，崇敬

参考例句：

• We pay homage to the genius of Shakespeare.我们对莎士比亚的天才表示敬仰。
• The soldiers swore to pay their homage to the Queen.士兵们宣誓效忠于女王陛下。