Wednesday 15 June 2016

And Time Goes by So Slowly

'Unchained Melody' by the Righteous Brothers is a beautiful song. I don't really know enough about music to talk about time signatures, but I love songs like that, where each chord is a lilting arpeggio of 6 notes. 'For Your Precious Love' by Otis Redding, 'Last Kiss' by Taylor Swift, 'Hallelujah' by Jeff Buckley, 'Sanctus' from Fauré's Requiem, and, of course, possibly the most beautiful song ever written, Schubert's 'Ave Maria'. If you can collect enough of them, put on some headphones with a playlist of them and close your eyes. That class of song, they are irrefutably utterly beautiful. There must be something very specific about that rhythm for so many disparate songs to achieve the same effect.

So in amongst its kin, 'Unchained Melody' is probably third after 'Ave Maria' and 'For Your Precious Love'. What brings it to my mind to highlight is a section which, musically, just blows my mind every time. It's that bit near the beginning which goes '... such a long lonely time / and time goes by / so slowly / and time can do so much'. The emotion in those dulcet tones as the first stanza glides into the second really does one on the heart-strings.

However.