The Great Song

Told by Aule to the Noldor

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Nerdanel asks, “My lord Aule, do you know any stories that will strengthen our hearts?”

AULE shifts the drum pattern again... a twinkle in his eye and a quirky smile on his face and he laughs out loud, “oh, heavens.......there was a part of the Great Song.... near the beginning. Wait, you know what I am talking about? The Great Song? Ainulinalë, in Quenya?

Ah.... then I shan't pay attention to the teaching, but the stor. As I said, then, there was a part near the beginning of the Great Song where it seemed that the music simply became a driving rhythm and that all of us, Valar and Maiar, and even the heart of The One, seemed to hold the great theme in suspension... like the glow of a distant light that is still beneath the horizon... pregnant with anticipation. And while this one note hung in space... the rhythm....

AULE plays a simple pattern on the drums... ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

And the melody had paused, but the song became... simply .... how to say this... "a will to become"? The rhythm, however, didn't stay the same. We built it by pieces from the root up..... ♪ ♪ ♫ ♪ making each line more complex than the last... ♫♪r♫♫♪r and... while is was exciting as it built... my people... the Maia who I loved... each began to riff, improvise and whirl wildly with the unfolding tattoo....♫....♪♫å♪♫...

They were not always in time. Sometimes it was a battle, I think, which meter would be the one that prevailed. But that battle was only a variation against a variation of the driving pulse that under grid the Great Song.... .♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♫ ♪

Then the song, of course, went far beyond that...in time... but that one moment, we understood something - that each different drummer -- whether he played a tabor or a kettle or pattered with light feet or clapped their hands -- truly was playing both what was in their own hearts AND what The One had given them to play.

AULE pauses speaking as the drum he plays talks.... ♪ ♪ ♫ ♪ ♪...

Your feet... your hands.... you heart.... your lips..... have their own song to proclaim. And that song may not harmonize with every other song around you... but, in a short time.... the songs and beats unite creating, in variation against variation, deeper harmony. And back then, when the Great Song was the wild whirling of the unformed world... we each simply played what we had and let our ears guide us to harmony... .♫ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♫....

AULE laughs.

I suppose that is the end of that story.....but I have to remind myself.... whenever I see to Elves or two Fae at odds....they are only singing the songs they have... and that harmony will result when they hear each other.