Michael: You recent articles on the importance of music brings to mind my long-held recognition of the correlation between the study of law and a background in music. The connection, I believe, lies in the right-brain’s appreciation for the language of music. Sadly, the study of law is now dominated by such left-brain attributes as logic, reason, and linear thinking – all worthwhile qualities, except when standing alone without the emotional, spiritual, and intuitive voices being heard. Various composers and students of music – including the renowned symphonic conductor, Fritz Reiner – had the study of law as part of their intellectual development. One of my professors in law school was fond of bringing to our attention that the Chicago Symphony would be performing a particular work on the upcoming weekend, and asking if any would care to join him in attendance.

In this age of careerism and other tunnel-vision expressions of what learning should be about, students and schools alike are content to keep their minds focused on only those questions that might appear on a bar-exam. Students may graduate with knowledge of legal principles and concepts, but too often without an understanding of them. The model of helping students learn how to think – rather than teaching them what to think – was at the core of the film Dead Poets Society. This approach, which was still very much alive in my student days in law school, was reflected in the 19th century work of Paul Bonnefon, for whom the study of law was “a sort of search for truth, carried on by teacher and student in common, and which they feverishly undertook, opening up an endless field for philosophic speculation.” What meaning can be discovered in a mind that insists on anesthetizing its right-brain?

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