Sound, in its many forms, is part of our life. It is not only about music. It is a broader notion, denoting the many invisible waves that stream through the air and reach our ear. What enters us through the ear changes us, transforms us, penetrates deep within us.

Noise of every kind: screeching, creaking, whispering, shouting, ticking, whirring, groaning, weeping, and so on. The sheer variety of words coined to define sound points to just how many kinds and intensities of it there can be. If we were only to stop for a moment to work out how many kinds of sound we hear in a single day, we would not come close to being able to count them.

And then there is the music that surrounds us far more than we think. Our lives are steeped in a sonic dimension.  And yet we often pay too little attention to that fact. Our approach to the world around us seems, above all, to be a "visual" one, made up of images and colours. Our eyes are clearly visible on our face. They come in different shades, and as such are the mirror of the soul; they are the beauty of man and woman.

Ears are more discreet. They sit on the sides of the head, often hidden beneath our hair, and are certainly not the first thing we notice when we notice a person. And yet ears, and their ability to capture the outside world, are something special, perhaps unique. They truly hold something wondrous. They are the gateway into that world of vibrations which enters us and is turned into messages, sensations and a whole range of emotions.

This separate universe, which finds its summit in music, and man's ability to bring sounds into harmony, has always fascinated every people. It is as though something far deeper lies hidden behind the seemingly banal act of listening. Something most fundamental. As though, behind the ability to govern a sequence of sounds, there lies hidden, in some way, an immense, almost invincible power.

The story of Orpheus opens up new horizons for us on this journey. A wondrous story that has inspired poets and musicians of every age. A paradigm of the power of song and music. Orpheus, son of the Muse Calliope, goddess of the beautiful voice, and of Oeagrus, the solitary hunter, receives a lyre as a gift from Apollo. Apollo himself trains him in music, and he begins to wander, playing and singing. And the effect of his music on those who hear it has something quite astonishing about it.

In the words of Seneca, "At Orpheus's sweet music the roar of the swift torrent stops, and the passing water, powerless to continue on its way, loses its momentum ... the motionless forest swayed, bearing the birds upon its trees; or if one of them was in flight, touched on hearing the sweet song, it lost its strength and fell ... the Dryads (immortal nymphs of the wood), coming out from their oaks, rushed towards the singer, and even the wild beasts came out of their dens, drawn by the melodious singing".

When Orpheus plays, everything grows calm, cares cease, fears vanish, and peace quickly comes. The power of his music is immense. Whoever hears it is left enchanted, unable to resist it: that harmony transforms his soul at its very depths.

All of us have, at least once, felt within us that reconciling power of music.

A few years ago I happened to step into the basilica of Sainte Marie-Madeleine at Vézelay in Burgundy. A masterpiece of Romanesque architecture, later converted to Gothic in the twelfth century, it presents itself to the eye with its magnificent façade — the very same one, though refashioned in later centuries, before which medieval pilgrims once stood, having crossed the "eternal hills" to reach it.

When I entered, the high naves of the cathedral opened up before me in a full and dense silence, heightened by the fact that my eyes needed some time to grow accustomed to the sudden darkness and to the soft light slanting in through the tall windows. However, what deeply changed my mood was hearing the chant of Benedictine monks coming from the choir at the far end of the nave. They were singing the psalms of the Divine Office, in slow and perfect Gregorian melodies. It was as though something entered into me, and my restlessness gradually faded away. As though the beat, the rhythm of life, suddenly slowed, opening onto some distant experience, far from everyday life.

Those who listened to Orpheus's music lived through a similar experience. Their hearts found peace, and they could not resist that stilling of the heart.

One of the chief characteristics of music, describing its full power, is precisely this: that its beauty cannot be resisted. One becomes, as it were, enchanted by it, caught up in a kind of spell (incantesimo), a word which, as it happens, still carries within it that "singing" (cantare) which Orpheus himself once taught.

The great German poet Rainer Maria Rilke, in his Sonnets to Orpheus, best describes what it means to be overtaken by music: "There rose a tree. Oh, pure rising! / Orpheus sings! Oh, the tall tree in the ear! / And all fell silent. Yet even in that silence / a new beginning came about, / a sign and a change. / (...) you built them a temple deep inside their hearing".

All fell silent. Silence is a necessary condition for all listening, but it is also an effect of the enchanting beauty of music. As a condition, it represents waiting, the silence before a concert begins, an act of trust that we extend to those before us, who will soon begin to play. As an effect, it is perhaps still deeper and more concentrated. It is the silence that spreads as the music begins, and which slowly becomes more complete as the music penetrates us. This is not an absolute silence, but rather the quiet disposition of those who, caught up in the sonic harmony surrounding them, let it penetrate them, forgetting everything around them.

All fell silent. Even now everything is quiet, in this strange time of distanced relationships. A time of enforced silence which can become fruitful, if it becomes a silence full of expectation, or a silence that contributes to the beauty that is revealed before us.

Translated from Ossevatore Romano