The Musical Ascent of Herman Being

The story, The Musical Ascent of Herman Being, was very educational for me. The purpose of reading the story was to prove to us that individuals don’t have to like music but everyone should learn it. The art of music is something to be appreciated. Humans have used music as a way to communicate as well as a way to express ideas and feelings. In the story Lyall Pratt was Herman’s boss, who had gotten the position over Herman. Herman felt that he had deserved the position more and also that he had more experience for the position. In the story Lyall shot Herman in the leg because Herman was about to beat up Lyall for telling him that Jean had came over and that Lyall had showed her what a real man was. Making Herman upset he began to fight Lyall resulting in Lyall shooting Herman.

The story showed different viewpoints of looking at music and how individuals may listen to music. Irene’s role in the story was to show that people could just listen to music just to listen. She would listen because she loved to music and everything that was involved with it. Irene appreciated the musical instruments and understood the true meaning of the music. On the other hand Duncan was an example of how people listen to music just to analyze it. Duncan never was able to understand the true meaning of classical or any other kind of music because he was busy trying to analyze every musical instrument and every note that was being played. During the story I believe the problem with Ben’s decision for turning down Herman’s invitation to go to a live concert was because he was the main person helping to learn about music. He felt that he wasn’t ready for the live concert. Herman was ready for live concert but Ben was too stubborn to realize that causing Herman to miss a very special event.

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