‘What God wants to hear’? : Composition and Faith in the 21st Century

A talk delivered at Contemplation by Professor Guy Newbury (Pembroke) on 22nd October 2017

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The voices of two clergymen speak clearly in the memory, unwelcome, to a musician, but impossible to ignore. The first, in one of Oxford’s choral foundations, in the face of a professional (and renowned) choir, tells the congregation that ‘if you are here for the music, you are here for the wrong reason’.

The second clergyman, in response to a genuine enquiry about the desirability to God of the music issuing forth from St Aldates Church, replies ‘you are asking the wrong question’.

The first of these pronouncements invites, initially at least, a near-indignant response. But for the music, why else might we choose to be ‘there’, in a major choral foundation, of all available places of worship in the city? Is it for the joy of the architecture, the spectacle, the incense, the liturgy? It might be for any of these; surely not for the sermon. Perhaps the priest meant to blame those who held as their main point of attraction to the service the desire to hear well-performed music, placing the musical element at the peak of the pyramid, when in his view the music was a mere concomitant. Perhaps he even felt that we (I feel obliged to say ‘we’) were wrong to experience the music as a vessel containing the religious spirit, sealed up inside as it were but able to spill over. It is possible he meant something more puritanical; though one could legitimately ask why a puritanical priest should end up in a musically exalted college chapel.

In the case of the second priest, why did he think it the wrong question? One might say that God ‘wants to hear’ the sounds of creation: the music of the spheres, the sound of wind in the trees, even the grand organ of the sea. But in human terms, it presumably matters to a person of faith to know what God wants of us. There is a well-known story that tells of God, unable to hear the well-rehearsed and resonant younger monks, proceeding to ask for the reinstatement of the cracked voices of the retired team: it was the quality of devotion, and not of the musical delivery that He was able to apprehend. But if sincerity alone counts, and if musical taste and expertise are of no use, why would one trouble to attain excellence in any area of human endeavour?

From the mediaeval period in western European countries, religious music was what composers wrote, and it was natural that it reflected developing techniques and musical trends; the composer placed his art at the service of liturgical need. In the hands of a Renaissance composer such as Ockeghem, the text was expressed through musical richness of invention, rather than direct verbal communication:

Music example: Ockeghem, Missa prolationium, Agnus Dei

The Reformation brought to the fore religious voices that emphasised congregational participation and audibility of words, contrapuntal complexity being shunned. If the complexity of the music, at least for some hearers, served a religious purpose in creating a devotional atmosphere, the Reformation leaders deplored complexity as a vain and sensuous ‘wordly’ element. Music was indeed a channel, but was not invited to obtrude itself.

Traces of this utilitarian approach can be found in churches not immediately touched by the Reformation. Suspicion of music is not confined to Calvinists, any more than it is confined to secular totalitarian leaders. It is said that when Fauré introduced his Requiem at a service in the Madeleine he was quizzed about the nature of the setting and told ‘We have no need of these novelties. The Madeleine’s repertoire is quite rich enough; just content yourself with that’. The curé quoted here may have opposed novelty simply for love of the known ways; or he may have been suspicious of the sensual impact of Fauré’s ‘lullaby of death’.

Are Christians ever right to deplore the sensuous element in music? Osbert Sitwell in his satirical novel Before the Bombardment gives us a description of an Anglican spinster in thrall to the anthem in a cathedral service where the atmosphere, clogged with incense and with the natural colours of objects and people re-tinted by the sunlight striking through the stained glass, is compared to a jungle, the whole experience to some obscurely powerful sub-Saharan rite. There is no doubt that the virginal and somewhat unworldly old lady – portrayed in a generally sympathetic light by Sitwell – is experiencing some kind of sensual fulfilment.

Not all clerics oppose the sensual element in music. Some see it as a way of welcoming little fishes in – a type of bait, sweetening the harsh and difficult message of true religious belief. Among those who disapprove, however, are not only Calvinists but even some musicians with self-imposed standards of musical religiosity. Stravinsky, despite his Russian Orthodox background, wrote a Mass for the Roman Catholic liturgy as an indignant response to the sensuous appeal of Mozart’s masses – ‘sweets of sin’ which made him want to write ‘a Mass of my own, a real one’. The special solemnity of Stravinsky’s religious works is clearly set apart from his dance and theatre music, even if it arguably has its own sensual impact. The musical inference here must be that the sonata-form language of the classical mass settings of Haydn and Mozart, in its consciously beguiling beauty, is indistinguishable from the same composers’ secular concert music and invites non-religious thoughts. That religious music should have an observably different language from secular forms is not an objection felt by some evangelical congregations whose music is of a vernacular type; though Calvin emphasised that liturgical music should be in a different style from secular or popular music, some Protestant churches are happy to fit popular songs and military music with religious words, and even within the Roman Catholic polyphonic tradition, centuries-old examples can be found of secular, even wordly music being used as the basis of the mass, even if it is ultimately subsumed into the polyphonic style (‘Western Wind when wilt though blow/The small rain down can rain/Christ if my love were in my arms and I in my bed again’).

I mentioned the welcoming in of little fishes. Pace Stravinsky, there are priests who encourage the liturgical use of (for example) Schubert’s Masses precisely because of the unleashing of sentiment that they invite; some late 19th –century liturgical music seems positively to flirt with earthy sentimentality – it is even to be found chez such a refined spirit as Fauré, as his Tantum ergo and a number of other motets show.

Music example, Fauré, Maria Mater gratiae

In a more extreme example of the blend of sensuality and faith, Messiaen, compared (by Stravinsky, of course) to a ‘crucifix made of sugar’, communicates a powerful feeling that has been seen as inhuman, expressing blinding theistic certainty despite the confectionery of added-sixth chords.

Context has a part to play in our reception. The greatest religious works often make the transition to the concert hall, and some settle there for good, while music that would never be thought first-rate in a recital or concert can be invaluable for its effectiveness in a religious setting. How many examples of that exist in the Anglican repertory!

A composer today has a special set of problems when writing liturgical music. It cannot be easy to approach with compositional sincerity a text which has been set so many times before, often with clichéd responses to word-painting and expression (one thinks of any number of English-language Magnificat settings). Then there is the difficulty of the musical idiom. Originality so often involves complexity, and even professional or near-professional choirs need extra rehearsal time for anything stretching beyond traditional tonality or modality; the practical constraints are greater than in the instance of writing instrumental music. Even when a composer succeeds brilliantly in reshaping triadic harmonies to form a fresh and resonant language, the result requires considerable adjustment by a choir accustomed to standard repertory. An example might be Jonathan Harvey’s ‘I Love the Lord’, where triads of G major and E flat minor are blended and transfused:

Music example: Harvey, I Love the Lord

the individual lines are eminently singable, but the intended effect calls for interpretative finesse on top of sufficient confidence with the notes. And rehearsal time is at a premium. Even such a fine and essentially approachable piece as ‘I Love the Lord’ remains the preserve of professional groups, and not many of those: it is more likely to be found in a concert programme by the BBC Singers than in a cathedral service.

Recent years have seen a remarkable rise in the popularity of easy-to-sing, easy-to-hear religious music, some of it well-written if derivative, some not very interesting at all. Choirs have seized on it with gratitude, and do not always show discrimination in their choices. One might be glad that composers are fulfilling an immediate need, as was the case from Lassus to J.S. Bach and to an ever-lessening extent since, but one could sometimes question the sincerity of the product. John Rutter stands among the better examples, but watered-down imitations of Rutter must surely pall for congregations – and choirs – with real musical interest.

We find ourselves returning to the question of sincerity, which may apply to the composer as well as the performer. The monks in the anecdote had beautiful voices, but failed to communicate the spirit. Does it matter to God that the choir likes easy-to-sing music if the music itself does not channel a true compositional intention? Of course a derivative composer may begin with sincerity, but once popularity and profit have intervened, it is a question whether it can be sustained for long…

I have touched on the difficulty I see in composing liturgical music today; without wishing to endorse the sceptical curé who questioned the need for Fauré’s Requiem, it can still be said that much of the ground has been well covered. To a composer seeking a truth to express, some individual texts may not find a sincere musical response.

Many years ago I wrote an anthem for Magdalen College choir – that is to say, a devotional rather than a liturgical piece. I have little recollection of my search for a text, only that when I found the poem the piece wrote itself; the language, imagery, and (not least!) the variety of poetic rhythm were all conducive. It was only when reading a monograph on the author of my chosen poem, Henry Vaughan, that I realised the extent the poem expressed a belief in the possibility of religious actuality – not a direct belief in any actuality. The beauty and incipient music of the poem had not been the only draw: the poem had held up a mirror to my unconscious religious feeling at the time.

Music example: Guy Newbury, Midnight

(As for the performability of the work, the then Informator Choristarum at Magdalen approached it judiciously, setting aside a short section of each rehearsal over the period of a term in order to ensure sound progress. Interestingly, the trebles responded to their part without prejudice. Some of the men complained about the intervals.) I remain happy enough with the piece, though it has rarely been revived.

My answer to the first of our quoted clergymen is that it depends what he meant. If he meant to deplore those who mistake a choral service for a concert, he may have a point; even then, can even the individual receptor truly know what he or she is receiving? But to deny the function of music in communicating religious feeling would be wrong, and for some receivers, music is one of the main channels by which it can be felt.

As for what God wants to hear, I suspect that when faced with our own arch-prejudice, we make Him up in our image. Fauré found his period of service at the Madeleine a real penance, according to his biographer Jean-Michel Nectoux: ‘the clergy’s innocently execrable musical taste’ was one of a number of elements that reinforced the composer’s ‘philosophical scepticism’. So it seems that while God can be revealed to the musically receptive through fine music, bad music can make a musician doubt His existence. As musicians, we view God as wanting the best our art can provide.

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