Psychedelic Music and Synesthesia

Good evening, O readers. Recently I have learned some things about LSD, some of which I shall reiterate to you. LSD can temporarily allow the eyes to taste or the ears to see. That is, it has been known to induce for a time synesthesia, a blurring of the senses. This is the origin of the user's tendency to find fascination in apparently disinteresting things, as this individual is perceiving illusions that exist only in the mind, sort of echoes of a particular sensory experience in the other senses. I will not go into the biochemistry of this, for I do not know what it is.

Now, synesthesia very much interests me, particularly because I think that perceiving, in particular, color with sound is fascinating, though I am not at all interested in tasting with my eyes, I must admit. Of course there are some born with synesthetic abilities or disabilities; call them what you will, and this is where the matter becomes interesting.

In the long-ago days of the 1960s, our artists created what we call "psychedelic art." Included, of course was "psychedelic music." Supposedly, this is intended to convey the sensations that follow the use of LSD. Syd Barrett, the founder of Pink Floyd, is said to have written much of his music immediately following the return of his mental functions after his daily dosage of the substance. For those of you who are aware of the history of Pink Floyd, you also should be aware that Barrett's behavior became exceeding erratic and even psychotic to the point that he was removed from the band in 1968. For the full story of Syd Barrett, listen to the album Wish You Were Here.

Thus psychedelic music is inspired by synesthetic experiences, but what of those who experience synesthesia without the use of LSD or any such substance? Furthermore, what of composers whose music was influenced by their synesthetic associations, such as Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov or Franz Liszt? Rimsky-Korsakov associated colors with musical key signatures and Liszt appears to have associated colors with particular notes. Furthermore, Rimsky-Korsakov writes a great deal on the analogy between orchestration and coloring in his Principles of Orchestration. At any rate, these men along with many others were not thinking only in terms of music when they wrote. The color was a factor, and without doubt a considerable one. Who wants to write a trumpet fanfare and see it in a dull color? This is not terribly different from expressing artificially and, of course, dangerously induced sensations of the same variety.

I conclude that psychedelic art has been around for much longer that it has been called such and long before anyone with a few chemicals wreaking havoc on the brain could produce it.