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That is a Good Thing in my view. Unbelievers need religious literacy to fully grasp the story arc of their culture.
I'm glad you said this. Too often I get the feeling from unbelievers that there is nothing from the past that can speak to them today, and as far as they are concerned all of ancient philosophy and religion may as well be tied up in a bundle and put out on the curb as trash. But i feel the more we can engage with and understand the thoughts/beliefs of the past, the more enriched our lives will be in the present. It is all part of our cultural inheritance and DNA. Part of practicing the faith for me is exactly engaging with this inheritance in a personal way which to me is important, and to others, rubbish.
I have a theory that the problem there is that Music has reached the end of its evolution. It has stretched tonality to the very limits, explored quarter - tones, extremes of dissonance and clashes of unrelated polyphony. Shoenberg worked out logically a way to escape all those restrictions - metre, tonality and even what we'd call normal playing of instruments.
For me the result has been a body off music of which Stravinsky said "Who needs it?" Though he was persuaded to have a bash himself. We have become saddled with a body of modern music that is right up against it in touching us on any level other than magnificent orchestration. Unless some genius invents a music that is saying something new, we are saddled with stuff that at best makes us think a bit, and may come up with a few beautiful noises and interesting chords, but has no lasting value.
That's my feeling anyway. How can I blame an almost total adherence to rock, when Classical music has only Old stuff or incomprehensible stuff to offer?
The composers today are not incapable of composing anything; but they have nothing left to compose.
Well many would agree with your theory. Music composition has become an intellectual exercise that people engage in within the bounds of academia, always trying to find something new to say, to appeal to others of the same background, but escaping the appreciation of the average listener. I find my own tastes gravitating back to the baroque and Renaissance, while much of later music just seems "schmaltzy."
Some living composers do a good job I think of mixing ancient and modern music. For example Steven Sametz, a Jew, who has been the music director of Episcopal churches, and has brought in elements of Gregorian chant, Buddhist, Hindu and other musical traditions to produce "new" music that I think is appealing.
This rendition of Sametz's "in time of daffodils" from a secular poem by e.e. cummings may provide some with a religious experience (it works for me):
in time of daffodils (who know
the goal of living is to grow)
forgetting why, remember how
in time of lilacs who proclaim
the aim of waking is to dream,
remember so (forgetting seem)
in time of roses (who amaze
our now and here with paradise)
forgetting if, remember yes
in time of all sweet things beyond
whatever mind may comprehend,
remember seek (forgetting find)
and in a mystery to be
(when time from time shall set us free)
forgetting me, remember me
I'm glad you said this. Too often I get the feeling from unbelievers that there is nothing from the past that can speak to them today, and as far as they are concerned all of ancient philosophy and religion may as well be tied up in a bundle and put out on the curb as trash. But i feel the more we can engage with and understand the thoughts/beliefs of the past, the more enriched our lives will be in the present. It is all part of our cultural inheritance and DNA. Part of practicing the faith for me is exactly engaging with this inheritance in a personal way which to me is important, and to others, rubbish.
I don't have to be enamored of religious ideation to acknowledge its massive influence on culture, or to recognize that you can't even really understand much of culture without understanding the evolution of religious thought within it.
As a former believer, I have that understanding baked in, at least with regards to Christianity. I would suppose that if I had been raised indifferent to these things it would be a little harder for me to recognize the role of religion, and I'd have to make a real effort to learn the history of religion if all the religious history I had ever been exposed to is the often dry and boring narratives of high school history courses.
Part of the evolution of religious thought, in my view, is that society is evolving away from it. I don't deny that either. But that doesn't make beautiful music that happens to be sacred, any less beautiful.
Well many would agree with your theory. Music composition has become an intellectual exercise that people engage in within the bounds of academia, always trying to find something new to say, to appeal to others of the same background, but escaping the appreciation of the average listener. I find my own tastes gravitating back to the baroque and Renaissance, while much of later music just seems "schmaltzy."
Some living composers do a good job I think of mixing ancient and modern music. For example Steven Sametz, a Jew, who has been the music director of Episcopal churches, and has brought in elements of Gregorian chant, Buddhist, Hindu and other musical traditions to produce "new" music that I think is appealing.
This rendition of Sametz's "in time of daffodils" from a secular poem by e.e. cummings may provide some with a religious experience (it works for me):
in time of daffodils (who know
the goal of living is to grow)
forgetting why, remember how
in time of lilacs who proclaim
the aim of waking is to dream,
remember so (forgetting seem)
in time of roses (who amaze
our now and here with paradise)
forgetting if, remember yes
in time of all sweet things beyond
whatever mind may comprehend,
remember seek (forgetting find)
and in a mystery to be
(when time from time shall set us free)
forgetting me, remember me
Nice. Don't want to turn this into a music thread, but I get the 'religious experience'. Like the end of Mendelshohnn's 'Oh for the wings of a dove' and much like Holsts' rare funeral chant from the Rig Veda (one of my favourites). i was longing for a modulation into a related key by the way. But I guess that would have spoilt the hypnotic effect. .
I don't have to be enamored of religious ideation to acknowledge its massive influence on culture, or to recognize that you can't even really understand much of culture without understanding the evolution of religious thought within it.
As a former believer, I have that understanding baked in, at least with regards to Christianity. I would suppose that if I had been raised indifferent to these things it would be a little harder for me to recognize the role of religion, and I'd have to make a real effort to learn the history of religion if all the religious history I had ever been exposed to is the often dry and boring narratives of high school history courses.
Part of the evolution of religious thought, in my view, is that society is evolving away from it. I don't deny that either. But that doesn't make beautiful music that happens to be sacred, any less beautiful.
I must admit, when I was a believer I had little interest for either the church history or the classical art, religious or not. The former was sort of useful to know, but not as useful as extensive knowledge of the scriptures. After all, it was the believer's own relationship with God that mattered, not the history of other people's relationships. And the latter, while certainly of high quality, was perceived by my religious surroundings as too "high church", ceremonial, stilted, lacking a sincere emotion or expression of one's heart towards God. It was associated rather with the "false" Catholic or Eastern Orthodox church. What I was into back then, was rather art like this:
I have a theory that the problem there is that Music has reached the end of its evolution. It has stretched tonality to the very limits, explored quarter - tones, extremes of dissonance and clashes of unrelated polyphony. Shoenberg worked out logically a way to escape all those restrictions - metre, tonality and even what we'd call normal playing of instruments.
For me the result has been a body off music of which Stravinsky said "Who needs it?" Though he was persuaded to have a bash himself. We have become saddled with a body of modern music that is right up against it in touching us on any level other than magnificent orchestration. Unless some genius invents a music that is saying something new, we are saddled with stuff that at best makes us think a bit, and may come up with a few beautiful noises and interesting chords, but has no lasting value.
That's my feeling anyway. How can I blame an almost total adherence to rock, when Classical music has only Old stuff or incomprehensible stuff to offer?
The composers today are not incapable of composing anything; but they have nothing left to compose.
I know plenty of classical connoisseurs who would vehemently disagree with that post or even say that we have barely scratched the surface of endless possibilities for musical creation - but I do agree with you.
And what does it matter if a piece of music is old, as long as it is beautiful and inspiring? For me there is nothing more beautiful and inspiring than the musical creations of a bunch of long dead Germans and Austrians from the 1700s, 1800s and early 1900s. If humanity has ever made anything that approaches absolute perfection, it is some of that music.
I was about to say I like your lack of diffidence about telling me I'm talking nonsense. I gave Atonal 15 years of opportunity to Speak to me. Now I'm "out". I still do hear some, and I can follow the development of the material, but I do groan at the sight of an orchestra playing a New Work with a huge kitchen suppliers' department.
One thing (amongts many) I got from atheism was understanding what you rationally had to justify by evidence and what, rationally, you absolutely don't have to; and artistic taste is one that you don't. If someone really is blown away even on an intellectual level by canvases of coloured squares called "Meal Ticket" or half an hour of "Plink, plonk", good for them. Jut leave me El Greco and Handel, even if he is setting passages about a Messiah taken way out of context.
I'm glad you said this. Too often I get the feeling from unbelievers that there is nothing from the past that can speak to them today, and as far as they are concerned all of ancient philosophy and religion may as well be tied up in a bundle and put out on the curb as trash. But i feel the more we can engage with and understand the thoughts/beliefs of the past, the more enriched our lives will be in the present. It is all part of our cultural inheritance and DNA. Part of practicing the faith for me is exactly engaging with this inheritance in a personal way which to me is important, and to others, rubbish.
Ah.... Yes, yes, but we must be sensible about it. If we accept on an artistic level, Egyptian temples, or Greek hymns... (I'll try to find one...that'll teach you ) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fggmNwe-xHE
or Byzantime mosaics (I've never understood what they have to do with Moses) it is a suspension of disbelief, or at least partially and we do the same watching Sci Fi or fantasy, and we can buy in to doing dress up conventions. Just so we don't go too far and think it is real.
When it comes to what is real, then we'll keep the bathwater and leave the baby with the trash. Because it isn't a real one, anyway.
(gosh, there's even been deciphered a 2nd mill BC Hurrian musical piece from Ugarit.)
I was about to say I like your lack of diffidence about telling me I'm talking nonsense. I gave Atonal 15 years of opportunity to Speak to me. Now I'm "out". I still do hear some, and I can follow the development of the material, but I do groan at the sight of an orchestra playing a New Work with a huge kitchen suppliers' department.
One thing (amongts many) I got from atheism was understanding what you rationally had to justify by evidence and what, rationally, you absolutely don't have to; and artistic taste is one that you don't. If someone really is blown away even on an intellectual level by canvases of coloured squares called "Meal Ticket" or half an hour of "Plink, plonk", good for them. Jut leave me El Greco and Handel, even if he is setting passages about a Messiah taken way out of context.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Norne
I must admit, when I was a believer I had little interest for either the church history or the classical art, religious or not. The former was sort of useful to know, but not as useful as extensive knowledge of the scriptures. After all, it was the believer's own relationship with God that mattered, not the history of other people's relationships. And the latter, while certainly of high quality, was perceived by my religious surroundings as too "high church", ceremonial, stilted, lacking a sincere emotion or expression of one's heart towards God. It was associated rather with the "false" Catholic or Eastern Orthodox church. What I was into back then, was rather art like this:
Mediocre repetitive pop-music pretty much - but plenty emotionsl and good to "fire youself up for the Lord"
It's..ok, for what it is. A sort of Ballad he could sing about his Partner. He is just here singing about..something else. In an odd way it is like Bach would could use the same music to write about Pilate telling Jesus he can execute him and a father telling his daughter he's going to ban coffee.
Anway ...miles off topic, ....I found a vid on the 1200 BC bronze age collapse - the one that led to the end of the Canaanite states and the Hittites and allowed the Hebrews to come down from the hills where they herded their goats and the Edomites to move in from the Desert and the Amonnites to come from wherever they came frrom and of course start fighting over land. That (not the Exodus) was the 'Conquest'. What was it? I thought Thera, but that is too early. It ended the Cretan sea -empire but is the wrong date for the start of Israel. What did it? Nobody knows.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 08-14-2016 at 06:38 AM..
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that the problem there is that Music has reached the end of its evolution. It has stretched tonality to the very limits, explored quarter - tones, extremes of dissonance and clashes of unrelated polyphony. Shoenberg worked out logically a way to escape all those restrictions - metre, tonality and even what we'd call normal playing of instruments. 
I was about to say I like your lack of diffidence about telling me I'm talking nonsense. I gave Atonal 15 years of opportunity to Speak to me. Now I'm "out". I still do hear some, and I can follow the development of the material, but I do groan at the sight of an orchestra playing a New Work with a huge kitchen suppliers' department. 
Yes, yes, but we must be sensible about it. If we accept on an artistic level, Egyptian temples, or Greek hymns... (I'll try to find one...that'll teach you 
) 
