Uncool Greg

Here are some photos from good times last Sunday afternoon.

I know good food comes from the kitchen. Where does good music come from?

People once credited the godlike Muses for inspiration. King Pieride had nine daughters whose musical, speaking and artistic skills were so good that he challenged the Muses to a match, resulting in his daughters being turned into crows. Parents, be careful of pushing your kids to play the violin or piano!

Christians sometimes say, “God gave me the song.” But then they explain that God gave a blessing that stimulated thanks, remorse, or hope.  I haven’t yet heard anyone claim that a voice from heaven directed,  “B minor chord over a dotted quarter note D”.  No.

I think that a good song grows like a rose.  The song grows out of the dark smelly soil of the music you liked when you were 17.  It is watered by the sweat of practice, and blooms in the sunshine of God’s love.

What makes music good? Overlooking lyrics for a moment,  I think much good music involves a mixup.  A consistent mixup that has pleasant results.

A few people plausibly claim to not just hear sounds, but to see sounds as well. One woman says that to her, sneezes are turquoise.  A man complained that his chicken did not have enough points. This mental mixup has a medical name, “synesthesia“. I think synesthesia influences both making and enjoying music. I confess a slight sense of texture for pitches and intervals. D above middle C is clearly brass with a little oil on it. The E above that is a piece of rope. F is kind of chalky, G is tree bark. Yeah, I’m wierd.  To me, music is itchy, though usually in a nice way.  The reverse is also true for me in a weak way.  A breeze or water or bare feet in grass has a rightness to it that makes me think of certain chords and arpeggios and intervals.  How would you explain to a blind person the difference between green and blue?  I’m struggling the same way to explain my mental mixup.

Here’s a concrete example. Around a quarter of the population reacts to sudden bright light with a sneeze. Is it much more a stretch to hear song in sunlight flickering through the leaves of a tree, or harmony in a river under a blue sky on a quiet afternoon?

We use synesthetic language.  You might sing the blues while wearing a loud shirt in a hot joint.

So my “mental mixup music” is kind of a genetic gift, though it might be developed. We also may learn to associate music with states of mind. I like to quiz pre-school piano students about musical and abstract associations.  The younger kids just like to create a noise.  Five-year-olds consistently call minor chords “scary” or “sad”. Major scales and chords are “happy”.  Is this inate, or are kid’s TV shows forming associations?  Vietnamese parents have patiently explained to me that minor modes are romantic, meditative and wholesome, while major modes are crazy Western clanging. In the Republic, Plato suggested that soldiers listen to what we now call minor keys. He felt that music in major keys created, well, sissies.

In the 1400′s the premier sacred instrument was the trombone.  You couldn’t have the best worship time without a trombone. Many believers regarded the pipe organ as more fit for circuses. Thanks to several gifted composers and technicians, the sound of a pipe organ became the sound of  high church.  But what about today? An organ sound cues Phantasmic horror or a stuffy funeral. A leader in one church told me that a newcomer on hearing a pipe organ would turn on their heels and leave.  A century ago the guitar was for cowboys.  Now guitars are the mark of authentic worship and evangelism.

Shut off the music for a few seconds and look at the picture.  The solitary organist embodies individual dedication. No limb is unused! However, a band or a chorus demonstrates that people can work together.  Speaking as a sometimes organ player, of the two, group participation is more needed.  I’m happy that I can participate in a band.

What will we play?  Everything is permissible, but not everything is profitable.

“Contemporary Christian Music” is an interesting flower, growing out of rock, pop, 60′s folk, with touches of  country, Celtic, Appalachian hymns, and other trace elements.  Just as hymnbooks long defined Christian music, CCM is defined by playlists.

• Top 20 CCM This Week with links to snippets of the songs!
• Published radio station “playlists” such as these for WGTS 99.1 FM
• YES collection of radio station playlists
• CCLI Top 25

Recently I resolved to better know Contemporary Christian Music. “Sing to the Lord a new song!” says the Psalms, six times!  But there are so many new songs–where should I start? For example, in seven days the local WGTS radio station had 2,133 music slots.  That’s rather more than any hymnal I’ve seen.  By going online and using my l33t skilz I found that the station played only 216 different recordings.  The top seven recordings repeated around six times each day. See the 216 songs and counts here.  How many songs in the top 20 do you recognize?

Oh uncool man that I am! All of the top 20 contemporary songs were unfamiliar to me!  And I only recognized a few in the top 50!

But thankfully, every CCM song I checked had a YouTube presence–unlicensed as far as I can tell, hmm.  Also every CCM song that I checked could be downloaded from Amazon, iTunes, etc. for around 99 cents.  A little Googling leads to interviews with the artists, revealing the troubles and blessings that shaped their lives and specific songs.

I’m overwhelmed by the number of new songs I don’t know.  But CCM doesn’t have anything on Fanny Crosby (1820-1915), who wrote over 8,000 hymns–about two a week. There has always been more music than a person could absorb. That’s a good problem to have.

Regardless of medium, I am cheered by songs that speak to me and speak for me.  I am concerned when either old or new songs don’t line up with scriptural experience and personal experience. This dissonance can come by explicit contradiction in lyrics, or problems with form.

Suppose the sermon has been on Jesus’ words, “Let your yes be yes and your no be no. Anything beyond this comes from the evil one.”

After the sermon, we need an invitation song, where people can say yes to Christ. What would you pick? In the old days we would have sung that hymn that says, “I surrender all, I surrender all, All to Jesus I surrender, I surrender all.”  But that’s shallow commitment compared to the newer tune, Trading My Sorrows, that repeats “Yes Lord” eighteen times in the refrain. I like both songs.  I guess my tolerance for “useless repetition” is somewhere between 4 and 18, and requires genuine passion.

It puzzles me when supposedly hip songs are burdened with “partake” and other language from 1611 I could accept that if there was a need to rhyme with “heartbreak” or “eat cake”.

Oh boy, now I’m really in whine mode.  Lord willing, I will in some later posting be more constructive.

Another puzzlement: Jesus-is-my-boyfriend songs. I heard two of these today, a new one, “Peace Be Still” (2007) and an old one,  “In the Garden” (1912). Yes, I know about the Song of Solomon. Jesus is a friend of this sinner. Come ask me to show you how I endorse hugging!  But these two songs and others go over the line for me. “And the joy we share, as we tarry there, none other has ever known.” None other?  Yeah, goin’ steady with Jesus. By contrast, “As the Deer” (1987) and  “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” (1868) speak for me and speak to me.

Sniping is easy. Instead of judging the kids and the geezers, hey, I guess I’ll have to write better songs.

So, in my humble uncool opinion, CCM repeats many of the defects of the good ol’ hymns and gospel songs.  CCM has a disadvantage. The technology adds sonic sugar to half-baked songs and delivers them instantly to millions.  Fortunately, good music also can spread broadly and quickly by this means.  We need to be discerning. Just because it’s in the hymnbook, or on the screen, or on the radio, does not make it blessed. Moreover, in that form, that is someone else’s music. “I will not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing,” said David in 2 Samuel 24.

Jesus said, “Therefore every teacher of the law who has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.”

A cool thing about music is that giving away my treasure only increases my treasure.

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