I was given The Romantic Manifesto for my birthday, and I was reading the essay "Art and Cognition." As a musician, the section on the nature of music was especially fascinating to me.

"Music is experienced as if it had the power to reach man's emotions directly (41)."

"Music communicates emotions, which one grasps, but does not actually feel; what one feels is a suggestion, a kind of distant, disassociated, depersonalized emotion- until and unless it unites with one's own sense of life (42)."

One of the ideas I was intrigued by most was her statement here:
"Until a conceptual vocabulary is discovered and defined, no objectively valid criterion of esthetic judgement is possible in the field of music (46, italics original)."

This leads me to a question and informal survey for all of you: what is your favorite piece of music (or musician), and what emotions do they inspire in you? How does this unite with your sense of life?

My favorite piece of classical music that I play routinely as a violinist is Bach's E-Major Concerto. It is triumphant, disciplined, and although it goes through some minor sections, it always returns to its wonderful, glorious theme. It makes me feel so alive.

I am expecting a wide range of answers here, since there is no "objective" criterion. (Feel free to discuss this, too - is there, isn't there, how would we define objective criterion, etc.)