The Popular and the Sacred in Music

Antti-Ville Kärjä

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000509496
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Music

Music, as the form of art whose name derives from ancient myths, is often thought of as pure symbolic expression and associated with transcendence. Music is also a universal phenomenon and thus a profound marker of humanity. These features make music a sphere of activity where sacred and popular qualities intersect and amalgamate. In an era characterised by postsecular and postcolonial processes of religious change, re-enchantment and alternative spiritualities, the intersections of the popular and the sacred in music have become increasingly multifarious. In the book, the cultural dynamics at stake are approached by stressing the extended and multiple dimensions of the sacred and the popular, hence challenging conventional, taken-for-granted and rigid conceptualisations of both popular music and sacred music. At issue are the cultural politics of labelling music as either popular or sacred, and the disciplinary and theoretical implications of such labelling. Instead of focussing on specific genres of popular music or types of religious music, consideration centres on interrogating musical situations where a distinction between the popular and the sacred is misleading, futile and even impossible. The topic is discussed in relation to a diversity of belief systems and different repertoires of music, including classical, folk and jazz, by considering such themes as origin myths, autonomy, ingenuity and stardom, authenticity, moral ambiguity, subcultural sensibilities and political ideologies.

1 Introduction

DOI: 10.4324/9781003183648-1

“Gee-whiz, Auntie Harriet, what is so important about Chopin?” asked Dick Grayson, the young ward of multimillionaire Bruce Wayne, as he was getting frustrated over his piano lessons. “All music is important, Dick,” responded Mr Wayne from his couch, and explained: “It’s the universal language. One of our best hopes for the eventual realisation of the brotherhood of man” (Batman 1966a).

Whether or not one agrees with Mr Wayne’s statement, it foregrounds several common assumptions about music. First, there is an egalitarian recognition of the importance of all kinds of music, implying not only that music can be found in myriad forms but also that it carries significance regardless of its formal qualities. This is reinforced further with the second postulation that concerns the universality of non-verbal sounds and particularly their usefulness in cross-cultural communication, as a form of language. Third, the emphasis on hope conveys assumptions about the potential and role of music as a conduit, if not an autonomous agent even, for social change. Fourth, this change is conceived as a positive one, leading to convivial coexistence of humankind. Finally, there are implications about the gendered qualities of music; is it merely a coincidence that it is a male composer’s work that incites contemplation over achieving “the brotherhood of man”?

As at issue is a work of fiction for television, some might dismiss these remarks as inconsequential; yet I beg to disagree with such dismissals, particularly on the basis of the (historical) popularity and authority of the medium in question. Regardless of the accuracy or veracity of Mr Wayne’s assertion, the fact remains that Batman has reached an enormous audience during its half-a-century-long existence, boosted by the contemporary cult status of the series itself. To be sure, this brings to the fore various ways of interpreting and relating to it; thus, it is entirely possible to treat the passage as funny or ridiculous as Batman’s much-appraised utility belt, or the characters portrayed in the series in general. Yet, to use the title given to the passage on YouTube (2015), “Batman and Robin’s Cultural Policy Debate” may be considered also as part of “a powerful social commentary that wholeheartedly supports the Great Society initiatives of President Lyndon Johnson,” exhibiting “a very liberal line on public spending, the value of human life, penal reform, and racial integration” (Gould 2011).

Thus, it may not be surprising at all to encounter a statement celebrating the equality and importance of all music, as all this coincides, broadly speaking, with the emergence of ethnomusicology in the USA as an academic discipline based on anthropological ideals of cultural sensitivity and relativism. This notwithstanding, to consider Chopin, or any other decomposing composer canonised within the Euro-American classical tradition for that matter, as equal to, say, the “Batusi” dance invented for the series (Batman 1966b), would have been courageous in the academic circles of those days, and it would be so also today. Despite the emphasis on cultural contextualisation and the relativity of musical value within ethnomusicology, the discipline was for long preoccupied with more “authentic” musical traditions such as European and North American folk and Indigenous musics, as well as the musics of the so-called old high cultures of Asia.

The association of Chopin with the immense wealth of Mr Wayne and his manor – as opposed to the speakeasies, greasy spoons and other delinquent lairs with their seductive sounds, frequented by the crime-fighting caped crusaders – is not by any means insignificant either, as it conforms to the principles of cultural and particularly musical distinction based on social class divisions. Considered this way, both immaterial and material value is ascribed to music; Chopin is worthy of being taught by Aunt Harriet in the great halls of Wayne Manor, while Batusi takes its practitioners over spontaneously, if not uncontrollably, in places of low moral fibre and nefarious affluence. Distinctions over musical value spill over to the criteria and definitions of music to begin with, and thus Mr Wayne’s embrace of “all music” raises suspicions about the boundaries of the aesthetic practice in question. This has also theological implications, since, for instance, in certain religious contexts these boundaries may be literally a matter of life and death, as in the case of atrocities committed against musicians by Taliban extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Other theologically intriguing aspects in Mr Wayne’s postulation are the insistence on the universality of music and the way in which this is combined with an eschatological “hope” that there will be an “eventual” social and societal equilibrium in the world.

With this musing over of some twenty seconds from a rather eccentric television series, it is my intention to point to the multiple ways of conceptualising music within a variety of ideological domains, whether mainly cultural, economic, political or religious in quality. Furthermore, I use the Batman example to emphasise the tendency to rely on taken-for-granted assumptions about music being somehow transcendent, as both universally comprehensible and with powers of its own. Indeed, alongside – and crucially because of – its alleged ability to transcend linguistic and cultural boundaries, it is often conceived as an autonomous force that is capable of changing the future (usually for the best) and affecting human behaviour and attitudes. The fallacies inherent in universalist and autonomist schools of thought have been noted by ethnomusicologists and popular music scholars from early on (e.g., Merriam 1964: 10, 274; Blacking 1973: 68–72; Middleton 1990: 172–176), and in significant ways they manifest themselves in the paradox between the universality of musical practices that renders “music” popular by definition, and the vehement moral objections often caused by the self-evident effects of “popular music.” Put differently, the phenomena signalled by the Eurocentric label “music” are constitutive of humanity as a whole, and because of their fundamental qualities subject to equally profound moral concerns. From this, it follows that music is, always already, both popular and sacred; it is appreciated in one form or another by virtually everybody, and one’s “own” music defended and protected, with the occasional result that the appreciation and protection transmogrifies into prohibitive and destructive negations of certain types of music.

This is in fact the line of reasoning behind Taliban extremists’ violence against music and musicians; in its converse form, it has been influential also in the construction of Lutheran Christian musical practices, for instance – and in the later canonisation of Johann Sebastian Bach and his output. Yet it is imperative to recognise that the assumed transcendental or sacred qualities of music, as it were, need not be religious or spiritual. To the extent to which the notion of transcendence is set “vertically” against immanence by referring to “other-worldly” phenomena in the heights or the depths (see Schwartz 2004: x–xi) and, as its etymology suggests, climbing (Lat. scendere) over or beyond (Lat. trans) the boundaries between this and that other world, it may be conceived as pertaining to purely mundane shifts in the human conditions – as in the case of any socialist utopia. In investigations about music in totalitarian societies one quickly encounters references to state-sanctioned types of ideologically orthodox music and to the revolutionary potential of allegedly dissident and decadent sounds of jazz, blues and rock in particular (e.g., Ryback 1990; Rauhut 2017). Philosophers may be interested in re-conceiving transcendence as “the ground of humility,” yet its “unsavory reputation” extends to the present moment as crimes continue to be “committed in the name of transcendent principles – principles held beyond question, beyond critique” (Schwartz 2004: vii). Political leaders may (and will) come and go but as long as the systems that sustain them do not transform – for instance, by abandoning the idolatry of the Nation and Commerce in favour of supporting real-life diversity and equity – it does not matter how many trumps one has to put in; the boundaries remain unsurpassed. As sociologist of religion Gordon Lynch (2014: 147) puts it, “[o]ne of the greatest threats to our ability to live peaceably in pluralist, Western societies is precisely the simplistic narratives that are constructed around moral and cultural conflicts.”

Rescripting the sacred, popping the popular

Different understandings of music and its potential sacred or transcendental qualities accrue a pronounced importance in contemporary times of global migration and religious or spiritual plurality. These two phenomena are in fact inextricably intertwined; while the former yields the latter, the latter – or the lack of it, rather – often contributes to the former. In any case, it is possible to address these global processes through two “posts,” by focusing on the interrelations between postcolonial and postsecular processes. The consequences and “legacy” of European colonialism and imperialism have affected cultural expression profoundly, including conceptualisations and practices of music, and the same can be said of the resurgence and broadening of religious and spiritual forms of life, especially in allegedly secular Western states and countries. For some, this has signalled also “rescripting the sacred” (Santana and Erickson 2016) through an increased confluence of religious or spiritual belief systems and forms of popular culture, occasionally including certain types of music. The ascendancy of studies focussing on the contemporary variety of religiosity and spirituality is indeed notable, particularly from within sociology and anthropology of religion, and often discussed in terms of new religious movements, the postsecular age and re-enchantment. Indeed, it is demonstrable that in the twenty-first century, the study of religious elites has been complemented with investigations into religiosity in everyday contexts and commercial mass media (see Lynch 2005: 22). For instance, in relation to religion and “mediated reality” – spearheaded by social media and reality television – it has been maintained that not only do religious themes such as martyrdom and redemption function in normalising late capitalist ideology, but that the emphasis on ethical issues and fundamental values in the reality media becomes a key component in structuring the daily rituals of lived religion (Einstein et al. 2018: xviii–xx). Relatedly, in theorisation about postsecular societies emphasis is laid on a “new reflexive and inquisitive attitude” or even an obsession towards religiosity, induced by processes of globalisation, European integration and increasing religious pluralism related to (im)migration (Casanova 2012: 42–44). Moreover, instead of treating the sacred as a religious domain exclusively, critical discussion of its multiple forms, fluidity and complex moral commitments has emerged; Lynch (2014: 131, 133), for instance, calls for “careful analysis of the moral architecture that we inherit in particular social and cultural contexts” and of how various “inviolable symbols and objects play a fundamental role in defining the moral meaning and boundaries of society” (see also Lynch 2012).

A common underlying understanding in the attempts to “rescript the sacred” has been to treat popular culture primarily as a secular, non-religious sphere of activity and to conceive the sacred predominantly in terms of (Western) religiosity. Such assumptions inform also relevant music-related research; for example, in a recent collection on “the relations of religion to popular music,” editor Andreas Häger (2018a: 1, 3; emphasis added) considers the contemporary connections between the fields as “examples of how religion is changing” and equates popular music implicitly with secularisation, without any cogitation about how the ideas of what counts as popular music may transform in the process as well. This indicates a distinctively ahistorical, or a presentist, approach to popular music, whereby relevant shifts in the interrelations between religion and popular music in the years, decades and centuries before the 1950s are axiomatically ignored (Johnson 2018: 15; see also Morgan 2007: 29). An intriguing juxtaposition in this respect can be made with the fourth-century distinction between sensuous, “luxurious” music (musica luxuriantis) and “wise” music (musica sapientis), as well as wit...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgements and a note on ortography
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Origins and effects
• 3 Ingenuity and authenticity
• 4 Religion and moral ambiguities
• 5 Subcultures and generations
• 6 Politics and resistance
• 7 Conclusion
• References
• Index