During the climactic battle scene in Kurosawa's "Ran," the camera gazes on soldiers pierced with arrows or thrust against burning battlements. In the castle tower, a patriarch searches in vain for a sword with which to commit hara-kiri. As our eyes take in the tragedy, we hear neither the cries of me

20th-century music, Contemplative, Ethereal, Moody, Organic, Silence

In the new wave of Japanese contemporary music, Akira Nishimura is the front-runner for the "heterophonic concept." Using droning melodic variations, Nishimura creates a spacious kind of zen spikiness that can either calm the soul or mystify the mind. Nishimura exhibits a particular concern with t

20th-century music, Contemplative, Eclectic, Ethereal, Hypnotic, Layered, Silence, Spiritual

Like the poetry of Wallace Stevens, Henryck Górecki 's music seems cerebral almost to the point of insularity. Stevens wrote: "Here, now, we forget each other and ourselves." Of course, no art exists in a vacuum, carrying as it does an inherent quality of communication. Yet, there are those artist

20th-century music, Contemplative, Dreamy, Ethereal, Melancholy, Mythic, Pathos, Religious