Kirchenmusik

You may have noticed that there are awfully many different kinds of "church" "music", nowadays. That is to say, there are awfully many kinds of noise produced and listened to in churches. (I could've written "sacred music", but that's not quite a broad enough term to cover it all.) I'm almost certain that you could find all of the following within a fifty-mile radius in the lower 48:

1. The "average" Protestant, if there is such a thing, is accustomed to a hymnal, and to singing hymns out of it. There is, doubtless, a particularly American corpus of hymns that just about every Protestant knows, irredisregardless of denomination. Many Roman Catholics know some of these, too.
2. Taizé services, which tend to be ecumenical in nature, are characterized by simple, repetitive songs designed for a sort of meditative effect.
3. Post-Vatican II Catholics have their own body of hymns: some of these are borrowed from Protestants, but a good many were written in the last forty years. Marty Haugen and David Haas are the primary movers and shakers, here. Recently, Protestants have begun to use some of this stuff as well.
4. A few R.C.s have opted to stick to pre-conciliar music, namely, Gregorian chant. I suspect this has been gaining in popularity.
   
5. Then there are Eastern Orthodox forms of chant, which are something else entirely.
6. On the other end of the spectrum is happy-clappy Christian rock, which is a staple of evangelicals. It has also found some use among mainstream Protestants, and even some R.C.s. Its symptoms include guitars and drum sets.
7. Like unto this are Christian country, Christian rap, what have you.
8. A Methodist church in South Bend has weekly Celtic music services. Any hymn can be made "Celtic" if you put it in Mixolydian mode and add recorders...
   

Often, all of these forms can be found in the same church, with the exception of the Orthodox. But people tend not to enjoy all sorts, so churches will have different services featuring different genres. We're thus free, as largely passive consumers, to choose whichever kind most appeals to us. Of course, when I put it that way, it's clear that this isn't a particularly good thing.

In the great American marketplace of religions, music has become another commodity, along with theology and social values. As a sacred-musician-in-training, this concerns me (in both senses of the word). We can't dictate by fiat What Sort of Music Will Be Played in Church, now can we? If non-musicians can't appreciate what is genuinely good music, if they have no emotional or theological attachment to it, then we're not really serving the congregation. But at the same time, life's too short for bad music.

If congregations were real communities, each would have an established body of music that everyone learned from their grandparents; we'd at least have some sort of attachment to it, then. (This would also rule out, conveniently, the happy-clappy stuff.) In this increasingly-fallen world this is largely not an option. What, then, are we to do? Give people what they want? I'd be especially interested to hear what ordinary parishioners think.

A Gracious Sabbath, Wendell Berry

A gracious Sabbath stood here while they stood
Who gave our rest a haven.
Now fallen, they are given
To labor and distress.
These times we know much evil, little good
To steady us in faith
And comfort when our losses press
Hard on us, and we choose,
In panic or despair or both,
To keep what we will lose.

For we are fallen like the trees, our peace
Broken, and so we must
Love where we cannot trust,
Trust where we cannot know,
And must await the wayward-coming grace
That joins living and dead,
Taking us where we would not go–
Into the boundless dark.
When what was made has been unmade
The Maker comes to His work.

from A Timbered Choir: The Sabbath Poems, 1979-1997

Ave, Patria

This past week I've been back home in the Quad Cities. After waiting months to get back, keeping this return in mind as my goal throughout all the busi-ness of graduate study, I must say it's a bit disappointing in some ways. Places change, even in a few months' time. Trees are cut down; concrete is poured. Even the potato soup at the Belgian Village was rather sub-par yesterday (though I remain hopeful that the clam chowder will be good this weekend). We nostalgize places, and they disappoint. People, it is true, can also disappoint; but so far they haven't. It has been reuniting with friends that has been most rewarding about this homecoming.

I'm still not entirely certain what one's relationship to a place should be. One can admire a place. But should one claim to love a place? I know that this particular corner of Illinois/Iowa is not the greatest place in the world, except by virtue of it being mine, and of me being its. "We admire things with reasons, but love them without reasons", Chesterton reminds us. I sometimes wonder whether love ought be reserved for people: only the heartless choose their friends with reason, and families are of course beyond one's choice. But then, our homeland (patria, a fine Latin word: the land of one's fathers) is also given us. Only those few born in a place like Vienna, or Madison, or Moab, can love their place for reasons. The rest of us, born in a world of places that are indeed quite mediocre when judged by their objective merit, must love our place without reasons.

In any case, it's good to be home.

Remembrance of Websites Past

I should probably remind you that my ol' website will be no more this coming Monday. So if you'd like to visit it, I'd suggest you do so sooner than later. It was a fine website, if I do say so myself. (Five years! That's a fourth of the total age of the internet!) Memento mori, dear readers.

Dispatch from South Bend

Here in South Bend all the nicest-colored autumn trees are turning, which is pleasant. Now it's long-underwear weather, a development in which I rejoice.

I've made a habit of dining at Dagwood's Sandwich(e) Shop(pe), not too far from campus. It's overpriced, and I'm not entirely comfortable with its association with a mediocre comic, but the food isn't bad. I always order a chicken caesar wrap, which neatly removes the one thing I dislike about eating salads (viz., using a fork. I have always found eating lettuce with a fork to be a needlessly inefficient enterprise). A few more weeks of this, and I'll be able to walk in and order "the usual" and the sandwich artisans will know what to make. The fountain drink dispenser at this particular restaurant, in case you were wondering, emits a drone at the pitch of the G above middle C.

That's the news from South Bend, where all the women are strong, all the men are unemployed, and most of the children are considerably below average.

Even the French Like 'Em

Do you have a half-hour to spare? Why not spend it listening to this jam session with Mr Bird and another one of my favorites, St. Vincent?