So the deal is, I’m a rather reluctant evangelical, you could say. I believe the stuff but cringe over much of the subculture: the televangelists, the holy-than-thou attitudes, and especially contemporary Christian music!
I was visiting Columbus, Ohio, yesterday and went to a church. I was in the lobby because they had free good coffee, when over the loudspeaker a voice says, “We’ll start the meeting in a few minutes, but first a few jigs.” What?
I thought it was a figure of speech, you know, they were really going to do something from the Barry Manilow School of Liturgy. But there was a bouzuki player, fiddler, and an oboe-ist playing (and playing WELL) some great trad. Then they break into Carolan’s Concerto. It was all I could do to keep my composure and stay in my seat!
Good coffee and beautiful trad in church? What is happening?
You might want to check out Isle of Light. http://www.isle-of-light.com/ You’ll find them a fun mix between Christian and Irish Trad. Their whistle player even plays the Legacy Jig on two whistles at once… AMAZING!
There are many others that use the traditional mode to praise Jesus; I won’t list them all so that others can share their favorites.
I second the vote of confidence for Isle of Light. Another supposedly secular band that really surprised me was Leahy on their latest album “Lakefield”. There are several songs on this one which are obviously Christian, but none of these are overly evangelical (“preachy”). This is a good one if you really like fiddles.
What if the distinctions “secular” and “Christian” have no meaning when applied to music?
Of course, we all know what we mean when we say them, and I say them, too. But it brings up one or two thoughts:
The raw materials of music (pitch, rhythm, and timbre) are, on my reading, all sacred. They are all God’s creations. The only thing that can make music “take sides” is a worldview as expressed in a text. Sometimes when my students talk about “sacred” music I ask them to play a sacred C major scale, and then a secular one and tell me the difference. It’s really fun to mess with college students’ minds.
Besides, I know of no more dreary music than the contemporary stuff I hear in church. I know of no more joyful music than the Chieftans.
Other thought: People are rightly suspicious of us Christians who are always trying to grab a piece of the culture and hijack it for the sack of promoting our worldview. For example, my church has this huge golf outing to which lots of guys are invited in hopes that they will hear a Christian message in the process. And so golf isn’t being played for the sake of golf. It’s being hijacked for the sake of something else, and there is an element of dishonesty about this.
Same goes for music. If we love it, we should play it and hear it and rejoice in it, and not try to use it as bait to convert someone. There really isn’t much difference between this “hijacking-the-arts” approach and political propaganda. In both cases the recipient of the message is being manipulated.
I am not assuming, BrassBlower, that you deserve any of the above tirade. This is just the stuff that’s on my mind, and Chiffers seem like open-minded people who like to have lively and intelligent discussions.
Just to add a bit from the other end: I’ve played a couple of church gigs (and expect I will again), and both at the same location (that I do not necessarily expect ). The first engagement was with myself on flute (natch), a guitarist, and a piper, both of whom I could not have asked for better. The other had me with flute and cittern in tow, and my partner this time was a fine harper (trad wire-strung).
I very much enjoyed the challenge of decision-making re: what to play when, who to play it, and why. Equally important is what not to play, of course, for the solemnity, reverence, grace and joyousness all inherent in such services should be reflected in the music, IMHO. The congregation seemed very appreciative although their general background in this neighborhood was at a good remove from any ITM. A satisfying experience all in all.
The only cloud, if so it could be called, was the pastor himself, who seemed to consider himself a wit equal to all occasions. For some reason, the music director deemed it a good thing that our trio have a “name”. So, “Celtic Praise” it was; nice and ad hoc, just like the three of us. During the first engagement (four services in one Sunday, actually; that church has a huge membership), the pastor kept quipping about “keltic” and “seltic” approaching ad nauseam. But then, he happened to be a Lutheran of Nordic extraction, and nervous around exotica. That’s deepest Minnesota for you. Fortunately, my second engagement saw the pastor on vacation, with a substitute manning (womaning, actually) the pulpit. The musicians and congregation went through far less suffering that time around.
You’re preaching to the choir, so take all the time you want!
I’m sort of going by the record label in this case.
That is true. Apparently, many Christian musicians and their listeners consider originality to be a curse. Bring Iona into most churches, and I bet 90% of the congregation wouldn’t know what to think! (And the other 10% would be playing along on air-guitar!)
Leahy has been criticized for exactly that reason. However, I find the songs in question to be introspective and worshipful, rather than assertive and manipulative. Still, though, I guess my “introspective” may be someone else’s “assertive”, especially when the topic is religion.
Oh, that’s nothing compared to what I’ve been dealt on other forums! And I’m fairly open-minded. I’m just not so open-minded my brains are falling out!
Folks,
Secular music versus Sacred music is about the content and context of the message not the format.
Music is a way we express ourselves. Music allows us to attempt to express those things that we find within that is more than words. Does that apply to our spiritual life, Yes. Does it apply to our political life, Yes. Does it apply to our social life, Yes. … It applies to life.
I agree there is no secular or sacred C scale alone. But the minute you add lyrics to it, then the content and purpose are more revealed. Once revealed we might call it secular, or politcal, or sacred, or romantic, or even academic.
People don’t “high-jack” music, they use common forms of expression to convey the messages they connect with and that they want other folks to connect with.
As I see it for me, With regard to religious music, it appears that all music is religious. If I define religion as an organization of transcendental experience, then music by it’s nature is transcendental and therefor relegious. Transcendense is the attempt to rise above the common realities, to rise above the common experiences and experience things that surpass our understanding. Music does this too. It attempts to communicate that which is beyond our ability to describe in words or in words alone.
Hehehehehe, oh, one of my favorite subjects, oh the niftiness.
Good points all around, so I’m not sure if I really can add anything to this discussion except my own little popurri.
First, a little historical trivia. Back in the … renisannce period (i think, my memories a little vague) composers were taught that certain progressions where “evil”, I cant remember any of them offhand, but they were all progressions that sounded vaguely “spooky”. So thats where, scan forward a couple hundred years, to the modern days, young students in composing classes are still being taught that those progressions are to be avoided, there you have it: an “evil” C Major.
drat, i forgot what else I was going to say… again
ill get back to you if i remember
As organist at my local Episcopal church , I occasionally throw in some whistle during communion- Song of the Books(secular) is a favorite with the folks there- but most any really pretty air fits the bill. The first time I did this, some of the people already at the rail before I started playing remarked later that they thought" I never knew the organ to sound like that" and did not realize it was whistle till they got up and back to the pews The circumstances of when the tune is played certainly changed the “books” tune to sacred. Plus, most of the plainsongs are certainly easily played on whistle.
I think that variety is appreciated and the whistle brings that to our services. If we have a neighboring organist who occasionally shows up, I’ll give her the organ so I can play whistle with her on organ to bring some variety. I always play whistle in lots of our tunes done during our Christmas revelry. And some of these tunes are certainly not slow dirges.
I agree that lots of the “praise music” is not anything to write home about, but, there are some gems that filter through once in a while. Particularly the ones that, like most of the old hymns, are scripturally based.
It’s interesting that there are some
religious tunes that are part of the
secular repertoire, for instance,
Amazing Grace, and I’ll Fly Away,
that really aren’t thought of
as religious. Wouldn’t raise the
hackles on an atheist.
While other songs are viewed
as RELIGIOUS or CHRISTIAN,
and are taken to be propaganda.
What’s the difference?
This is what I love about Chiff: considered opinions offered cordially! I can think of no better place to launch a hot-potato discussion.
For clarification: the topic of texts has crept into this thread, and I should mention that the sacred/secular distinction is irrelevent to me when we are talking about music as music: that is, without text (which is not music but, one hopes, poetry).
Many good thoughts from everyone: thanks for responding. I would like very much to hear what you all have played in your church experiences (without the innane nervous comments from the clergy…)
Hymns (be thou my vision, amazing grace, it is well, holy holy holy)
Contemporary arrangements (i can play as a melody instrument)
Christmas Carols (quite a few)
Ok, inane clergy comments (cuz i wanna) for christmas carols: we just finished up a arrangement of “little drummer boy” when my pastor comes up and says something along the lines of “our little drummer boy has become a little whistle boy” (little background, im the backup drummer) all I could do was stare at him… Celtic praise, that takes the cake, wow, how about you just call em celtic corn? :roll:
I usually play guitar for the congregational singing, and whistle for anything all instrumental.
Here are my church music pet peeves:
Piano players who play “fortissimo” on everything.
Still on piano players - when they find an instrumental hymn in the key of D, and you’re all excited, pulling out the D whistle, then you find out they don’t play sharps, and transpose to Db.
Sorry if I offended, Morgan. Storytelling is a steed that runs away with me regardless of my grip on the reins at times.
I can’t recall all of what we did, but here’s some of it:
At the first service, for the prelude I opened up solo in the yet-empty sanctuary with The Humors of Ballyloughlin at a deliberate pace which worked very well as a call to attend…it had that annunciatory feel to it, and served to draw the congregation into the sanctuary for the service. For the offeratory, I played Sliabh Geal gCua in D with the guitarist backing me up; a sweet, meditative air with poigniant moments. The so-called “Special Music” portion of the service began with the piper soloing on a very fine air (which I forget, sorry), going from there into a series of tunes with all three of us playing. We mixed tune types for that one with the idea of offering up a variety of emotional impressions. I recall that the March of the King of Laois was part of that set. For the postlude, we started with The Eagle’s Whistle (one of the piper’s “party pieces”; he has some really great regulator work on that one), and immediately went into two or three relaxed jigs to complete the set for a positive, uplifting effect that we felt would be a good idea for the end of the service (“Go, and sin no more” was the piper’s wisecrack about it. He’s a wag.)
The second service is hazier; what I do remember is that the offeratory had the harper soloing Lament for the Trees in piobaireachd style. Very nice, I thought.
…Edited to add that on The Humors of Ballyloughlin, the other two made their way in, guitarist first, and joined in in that order so that the tune concluded ensemble.
I was pleased with the overall thing, and I think the others musicians were, too. Especially when we got paid.
I would like to do that again. I don’t go out of my way to find gigs; I’m usually content to play at sessions. Still, again, the challenge of composing a “programme” for the occasion was something I enjoyed.
). The first engagement was with myself on flute (natch), a guitarist, and a piper, both of whom I could not have asked for better. The other had me with flute and cittern in tow, and my partner this time was a fine harper (trad wire-strung).
