Stretched Soul

I previously mentioned the importance of tensions to composition and promised to come back to the topic. For now, I want to share this wonderful quote:

It is the stretched soul that makes music, and souls are stretched by the pull of opposites-opposite bents, tastes, yearnings, loyalties. Where there is no polarity-where energies flow smoothly in one direction-there will be much doing but no music.

-Eric Hoffer (1902-83), U.S. philosopher.