Showing posts with label I'm listening to. Show all posts
Showing posts with label I'm listening to. Show all posts
Sunday, 8 June 2008
Enough said
What's wrong in the Church today? Why do churches shrink, or end up having little to say? Why do people die, face up to their Maker and wonder why their church-going didn't get them right with God? Want to find out my fundamental criticism of too much of even the British, well-founded evangelical ministry I experience? CLICK HERE.
Saturday, 7 June 2008
The Early Music Show
There's something disturbingly middle-class and aging about having post titles that reflect the BBC Radio 3 Saturday lunchtime line up!
Why is the Early Music Show so called? Why was the label Das Alte Werk so called? After all, the history of music-playing culture stretches back as far as our knowledge of civilisation, and that must be thousands of years! Most people have held in their hands books that contain songs thousands of years old, whether the Psalms of the Bible or songs in Hindu or Buddhist works; and if the Guru Granth Sahib contains Hindu hymns, which it does, perhaps there are works thousands of years old there too. Mesopotamia, India, China and South America can look back over thousands of years and so have music that really is early. Yet the Early Music Show is essentially about the Baroque period of European music: Bach, Handel, Vivaldi - yet they were around only 300 years ago. Das Alte Werk produced recordings of these and composers of a similar period. If you get all the way back to Tallis, then you are getting into musical prehistory on that basis, and he was around under Henry VIII, from whom at school we dated the Early Modern Period!
I am not so worried by the Eurocentricism of that, not because Eurocentricism isn't wrong, but because there are plenty of other people bothered about that online, and they no doubt have commented interestingly. My problem is the underlying assumption in terms of history. Everything pre-Bach, pre-1750, can be called early and covered in that context. Only the most recent deserves any more careful differentiation. We assume the superiority of the contemporary, that everything else is just old, even early, but have you listened to Bach and compared him to Britney? Exactly, no, you haven't. It would be an insult to Bach's quality even to consider making the comparison. And I apologise.
But this one goes deeper. We assume that what is modern renders the wisdom of the past obsolete. However, what we in fact find is that there is nothing new under the sun, that humanity's big issues have already been faced up to, and, if Romans 1:30 is right, that much of progress is inventing evil. We fail to listen to the past at our peril; we exalt the contemporary to the point of idolatry; and we dismiss those who disagree with the Zeitgeist - shutting them up with laws dressed up in the language of tolerance - at the cost, potentially, if J S Mill, that great Victorian liberal, was right, of progressive thought itself.
Why is the Early Music Show so called? Why was the label Das Alte Werk so called? After all, the history of music-playing culture stretches back as far as our knowledge of civilisation, and that must be thousands of years! Most people have held in their hands books that contain songs thousands of years old, whether the Psalms of the Bible or songs in Hindu or Buddhist works; and if the Guru Granth Sahib contains Hindu hymns, which it does, perhaps there are works thousands of years old there too. Mesopotamia, India, China and South America can look back over thousands of years and so have music that really is early. Yet the Early Music Show is essentially about the Baroque period of European music: Bach, Handel, Vivaldi - yet they were around only 300 years ago. Das Alte Werk produced recordings of these and composers of a similar period. If you get all the way back to Tallis, then you are getting into musical prehistory on that basis, and he was around under Henry VIII, from whom at school we dated the Early Modern Period!
I am not so worried by the Eurocentricism of that, not because Eurocentricism isn't wrong, but because there are plenty of other people bothered about that online, and they no doubt have commented interestingly. My problem is the underlying assumption in terms of history. Everything pre-Bach, pre-1750, can be called early and covered in that context. Only the most recent deserves any more careful differentiation. We assume the superiority of the contemporary, that everything else is just old, even early, but have you listened to Bach and compared him to Britney? Exactly, no, you haven't. It would be an insult to Bach's quality even to consider making the comparison. And I apologise.
But this one goes deeper. We assume that what is modern renders the wisdom of the past obsolete. However, what we in fact find is that there is nothing new under the sun, that humanity's big issues have already been faced up to, and, if Romans 1:30 is right, that much of progress is inventing evil. We fail to listen to the past at our peril; we exalt the contemporary to the point of idolatry; and we dismiss those who disagree with the Zeitgeist - shutting them up with laws dressed up in the language of tolerance - at the cost, potentially, if J S Mill, that great Victorian liberal, was right, of progressive thought itself.
Music matters
Perhaps I should demand payment from Bose, the soundsystem manufacturers. My parents bought one after hearing mine, and now I'm going to write a very positive blog.
In fact, the very fact we now have a competent - even excellent - sound system means I listen to less music. Having a proper system leaves little room for lazy listening, such as whilst marking (I teach, remember) or other activities. Suddenly music is a completely multi-layered experience, full of depth, genuine bass and subtle structure.
My favourite moment in music is in Bach's Matthäuspassion. You can find the order of the movements at http://www.bach.de/werk/bwv/244b.html, and the full lyric rather awkwardly laid out at http://www.musikaltnikolai.de/dmat2-20.html. I'm looking at 47-51 here. You have Pilate's question, "what evil has he done", and the soprano recit of all his good, followed by "Aus Liebe will mein Heiland sterben" - an explanation of Christ' fundamental driving motivation - out of love to die for his people, that "eternal destruction and the punishment of the judgement may not remain on my soul". Then the crowd returns with violence to sing: crucify him. The juxtaposition in both lyrical and musical terms is gut-wrenching.
In fact, the very fact we now have a competent - even excellent - sound system means I listen to less music. Having a proper system leaves little room for lazy listening, such as whilst marking (I teach, remember) or other activities. Suddenly music is a completely multi-layered experience, full of depth, genuine bass and subtle structure.
My favourite moment in music is in Bach's Matthäuspassion. You can find the order of the movements at http://www.bach.de/werk/bwv/244b.html, and the full lyric rather awkwardly laid out at http://www.musikaltnikolai.de/dmat2-20.html. I'm looking at 47-51 here. You have Pilate's question, "what evil has he done", and the soprano recit of all his good, followed by "Aus Liebe will mein Heiland sterben" - an explanation of Christ' fundamental driving motivation - out of love to die for his people, that "eternal destruction and the punishment of the judgement may not remain on my soul". Then the crowd returns with violence to sing: crucify him. The juxtaposition in both lyrical and musical terms is gut-wrenching.
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