It was always about the Magic

Bags of flesh and bones moving to the sound of music that makes them feel, that makes them yearn, that takes them home.

Music is a universal language that is able to communicate and translate feeling through sound and by doing so, allows people to connect those sounds with certain occasions.

That's the power of music - it is has the magical ability of being able to incite feeling.

Perhaps, that is why I write this Halloween Party Playlist, while listening to Eleanor Rigby by Cody Fry [score video] and consequently why I make it the first recommendation.

ELEANOR RIGBY BY CODY FRY

Halloween has never really been about the gore or malice that its commercialization has come to associate it with.

This time has always been about magic, the otherworldly and the fantastical. So, as the first recommendation for the playlist begins with the sound of cellos and trumpets that scream intrigue, the listener is transported to a world of bubbling cauldrons, the curious and all things magical.

The beauty of Cody Fry's rendition and its association with Halloween is in how it momentarily transports people to a world where magic is possible, where adventures are had and where home is found. People find their home because music transports the listener to the beloved magical world that the music originates from. It's this quality that leads to the next song on the playlist, which is Double Trouble by John Williams for the Harry Potter film.

DOUBLE TROUBLE BY JOHN WILLIAMS

As the choir sings Double Double Toil and Trouble referencing Shakespeare's Macbeth, a listener takes flight on brooms or Buckbeak to Hogwarts. As the listener hears the music, they enter the great hall as it is lined with floating candles, night skies and ghosts that float around Hogwarts castle.

Halloween is magic and the magic imbued in these songs light up a space. Through these songs, people are given the opportunity to imagine their world beyond the boarders of the everyday and into worlds of magic.

So, as someone walks towards the cauldron at a Halloween Party with Double Trouble playing, for a moment, they will exist in the magical world of Harry Potter brewing potions in potions class.

Halloween is about the fantasy, worlds beyond the one we are in.

This is especially why Halloween is not a gory time but a time that explores and gives people the opportunity to enter the fantasy worlds they love. By entering these fantasy worlds, people are also given the opportunity to grapple with their lives and pains so that they can find a semblance of peace and hope. That is why this playlist selection come from worlds of fantasy, because that is also what Halloween is all about - a time of fantasy and magic.

People decorate their spaces, dress up as their favourite character and feel like they can exist in the magical worlds they always think about. Whether it is through the costumes they wear to the themed Halloween Parties they attend, they enter the magical worlds they long to go to.

It's all about feeling.

This takes us to the next song in the playlist, which is, Alice's Theme from Alice in Wonderland.

ALICE'S THEME FROM ALICE IN WONDERLAND

The chimes, the choir, the magic - certainly the line between fantasy and halloween become undeniably blurred in this sound. What shines through is the emotive nature of the sound and how it transports the listener to a world of possibility. That is what Halloween is about too, possibility, because for magic to exist there must be the possibility that it exists. This aspect of possibility creates the spaces that allows one to get closer to who one is and that is truly magical.

It is the element of magic that leads to the final song in this playlist but not the final song in this playlist altogether - The Harry Potter Spooky Hogwarts Halloween Playlist, which is a combination of Spiders, The Chamber of Secrets, Lumos, Secrets of the Castle and Finale by John Williams.

HARRY POTTER SPOOKY HALLOWEEN PLAYLIST

This is the perfect combination to end the playlist on because it brings together the qualities of every song on the playlist thus far - magic, intrigue and adventure to the listener. The song connects with listeners as every song has in the playlist by transporting the listeners to another world.

Perhaps, that is one of the reasons we want the perfect playlists for certain occasions, because it is a way to connect the ideas we have surrounding the occasion so as to enter the worlds we wish to be in. It gives the listener an opportunity to engage with magical worlds through the language of music. Music, then, has a way of touching our souls in ways words cannot on their own.

That is why Alphonse de Lamartine said,

"Music is the literature of the heart; it commences where speech ends."

or why, Albus Dumbledore said,

“Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here!”

Halloween is about people coming together to experience what they love: magic and truly one of the most beautiful things about magic is in how it provides hope - a hope to experience and be where one wants to be.

It's always been about the magic.