Passage J: October 2012

Re: Japanese onomatopoeia [link]:

Here's the legendary musician's take on the richness of Japanese onomatopoeia, which, as he so rightly says, has the power to not only describe literal sounds, but states of mind as well.

"Can you imagine? States of mind have sounds?! Concepts have sounds!? Who’d ‘a thunk it? Is this a kind of synesthesia? So therefore a musical composition (musique concrete, most likely) COULD be a real map or analogy or model of a progression of concepts——a sonic map of a progression of thoughts…sometimes proceeding one after another, in traditional logical fashion, and sometimes overlapping, rushing onward, and sometimes happening simultaneously——as sounds certainly do, and maybe thoughts too? Each sound corresponds to an idea or concept, and then logically (or not) leads on to the next…eventually arriving as some sonic/psychic conclusion. Or merely an ending."

Uki Uki

My state of mind after reading Mr. Byrne's bang-on take on the sonic scope and possbilities of the Japanese language was jiin—the sound of stillness that envelopes you when you're moved beyond words. And when that happens, it's time to let yourself go and stop making sense, right?

Here are two great destinations you can check out if you'd like to dive deeper into the surreal musicality of the Japanese language.