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Music and Spirituality
Lecture at a WSCF-meeting in Prague, 1993

By Carl Petter Opsahl

Music as language

First I would like to read something Martin Luther wrote in 1538, in the foreword to Georg Rhau's "Symphoniae Iucundeae", wich means "Beautiful Symphonies" translated to norwegian. "Beautiful Symphonies" was one of twelve collections of hymns and other pieces of music to be used in the service, collected by the german typographer and church musician Georg Rhau.

"Be greeted in Christ! I would so much give praise from the heart and recomend to everybody Music as the divine and absolutely excellent gift it is! But I am so overwhelmed of the greatness and variety of it's good and fine qualities that I cannot find a beginning or and end or any way to sort out the material. Even as much as I am destined to praise it, the praise will be poor and helpless. Who can cover everything? If you want to cover everything, the end of the song will be that you didn't get anything. If we look at the case itself, the first thing we will see is that music from the beginning of the world has been within or built in every creatures, both in each one of them and in all of them together. Because nothing is without tone. Even the air, wich are invisible and impossible to grab or sense with any of the senses, yes, it's the least musical of everything, since it's mute as a fish, even that gets a voice and is possible to grab when it's put into motion. It's wonderful possibilities the Holy Spirit points to here, but this is not the place to talk about it. But more wonderful are the music in the living creatures, especially in the birds. The most musical of all kings, the blessed hymnist King David was astonished and in an exalted mood when he in Psalm 103 praised the birds skills in the art of singing: Above them are the heavenly birds, and between the branches are they singing.

Music is the mother of all languages. Music is the organizing principle of language in that language are structured by rythm, sound and pitch. Music is the language of Nature. Many philosophers say that language distinguish the human being from the animals, but music is a language we share with the Creation as a whole. Listen to the birds, but also to the songs of wolves, whales and grasshoppers. Listen to the wind blowing through the trees, listen to the polyphonic sounds of the rainforest that changes through the day and the year. Listen to the water, to the rain, to the waterfall. Listen to the thunder and the fire. The nature got it's own rythm. If we want to communicate with the nature, we must learn the natures own language: music. Actually, it's more a matter of relearning, since this language is deeply rooted in our souls, it has been with us since the beginning of time. Music is our first language.

Before words were developed, people communicated through music. Before telephone and TV, mankind used various forms of horns and drums to send messages long distance. We learn this musical language before we are born, when we are in our mother's womb. As it is written in the gospel of Luke, chapter one:

And when Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby stirred in her womb. Then Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed in a loud voice: "God's blessing is on you above all women, and his blessing is on the fruit of your womb. Who am I, that the mother of my Lord should visit me? I tell you, when your greeting sounded in my ears, the baby in my womb leapt for joy."

Here, in the womb, we are united with our mother through sound, through pitch and rythm. Here we listen to our parents' voices and learn the structures of the language we later will speak. Our first communication to the new world when we are born are not a speech, but a scream that all our later creative utterings are related to. As a baby we converse with our surroundings in musical ways, the first years of learning the adults language.

A lot of people says: "I'm not musical" or "I cannot sing". Every human being is musical, the whole nature is musical. It's not a matter of singing operatic arias or pretty songs. We are all born with a voice, our own voice. Music is our most basic way of communication, although most people tend to forget that as they grow older. But if we listen carefully, we are all able to hear our own voice.

Music as Identity
Music is a very important part of our identity, in many ways. First of all: music is a way of expressing this identity, a way of expressing our selves. But we have to think of music in a broad sense. I think for instance of both crying and laughing musical utterance. Through music we can carry out the most remote part of our souls. Music gets through were words comes to short. That's why there is so many songs about love. That's why there is so many songs of despair.

Music is strongly connected to memories. That's why there is so many record collections out with "Hits of the fifties", "Hits of the sixties" and so on.. We connect certain songs to certain events and people in our lives. If you were in love one summer, and you hear a song that was popular at that time, you will remember all these sweet things when you hear that particular song played on radio. Or maybe you only have bitter memories and turn off the radio. Since different styles of music are popular at different times, music also identify what generation you belongs to. Heavy Metal means something to the youths of today, but our parents think it's just a lot of noise. On the other hand we think of theirs music as boring.

When we are small kids, we learn a lot of children songs and nursery rhymes. Although most of us stop to sing these songs when we grow older, we still carry these songs with us. When we later hear these songs, they bring back memories of childhood. I hope everybody knows "Frere Jacob", and I think we should try to sing it, everybody in their own language.

Music makes us a part of a cultural identity.on many levels. Music creates a feeling of togetherness. Children songs makes us belong to a childhood culture wich make children able to identify themselves with other children. In youth rock and popular music is an extremely important element in forming a social and cultural identity, at least in the western countries. In the fifties Bill Haley, Elvis Presley and Chu Berry was instrumental in forming a youth culture. Rock & roll became a powerful force with the Rolling Stones in the youth revolt throughout the sixties. Today we can see that what kind of music you listen to tells what kind of social group you belong to. Certain groups listen to heavy metal, others listen to pop and disco.

National anthems and folk music helps people to unite on a national or ethnic level. During the ninetheenth and well into the twentieth century there was a nationalist movement in western art, where painters, authors and composers tried to establish a national art. This led to a flourishing of national culture, based on folk art wich was discovered and collected in this period. Especially oppressed and newly established nationalities saw a rich growth in nationalist culture. Music and other art forms helped these new nations to create a national identity. Countries like Norway, Hungary, Russia and Checkoslovakia saw composers like, Grieg, Liszt, Bartok, Glinka, Mussorgsky, Dvorak and Smetana.

Related to national identity are political identity. Music is the creative mind's answer to oppression an injustice. It's not strange that we find so much music and songs in political movements. If we look to the United States, we can see how jazz, blues and later soul music had a great share of the "black consciousness". Black music was a revolt against white surpression. Up until the end of the fifties, american popular music were dominated by a white music industry, and few black musicians made it ond the pop charts. With Chuck Berry, James Brown and Jimi Hendrix this changed. The sivil right movement draw heavily on this black music in their campaigns. In countries like Chile and the Soviet Union gave Victor Jara and Vladimir Vysotski voice to the opposition. Now I would like us to sing a song that are used in many political contexts: "We shall overcome"

Through music we respond to the world that surround us. I would like to make a personal political statement throgh music. The song I'm going to play was written after a visit to Palestine. One day I was in an palestinian refugee camp. I saw how israeli soldiers were shooting at small kids with rubber bullets. I saw fear in those kids eyes. That same evening I heard a jewish professor talking about "the palestinian problem". This professor was an expert on hebrew archeology. I had heard some of his lessons, and had a lot of respect for his knowledge. But when he talked about the palestinians as a no-good and lazy people, as someone with no rights to that land, I saw how a very intelligent man turned to be a simple propagandist. I saw how words could be turned around and twisted until they lost their meaning. That was an shocking experience, that lived inside me for a long time. Finally me feelings transformed into this song, witch is called "Palestina". This melody draws on both palestinian, jewish and armenian influences.

(playing)

But music transcend social, cultural and national borders. Music is universal. It's possible to enjoy music originated in a different cultural setting than our own. Since the turn of the century many western composers have been influenced by other musical traditions, especially indian ragas and balinesian gamelan music. And the last ten-fifteen years so-called "ethnic music" has revitalized western popular music.

Music as the language of the Holy Spirit
What I have tried to explain so far, is that in music we are able to communicate on deeper levels than when we only use words. That is why it has such an important role in spiritual life. In the following I want to tell you what role music plays in my own spiritual life. In my youth I was a bit inspired by the Pentecostal movement, and I went to some of their mass meetings. I remember that I very much wanted to speak in tongues, since this was a sign of spiritual baptism. I prayed and prayed for this gift, but nothing happened. Finally I gave up. I began to study theology at the University and was concerned with other things. Then, after being a professional musician for some years, I realized that I've been looking in a wrong direction. Music is the language of the Holy Spirit. Playing music is nothing but speaking in tongues. Here is a song I've dedicated to the Holy Spirit: When The Saints Returns".

In church and theology one of our major concerns is the Word of God. In the lutheran church this means "word" in a very limited way. That's why the ministers talk so much in the lutheran churches, and that's why lutheran theologians write such big books. God's word is a word of creation, when God speaks it's just not a lot of talking. Music is creative, and in music we are as close to the Creation as it's possible for human beings. Having practised as both minister and musician I see that it's much easier to tuch people with music than with words. So, as a parallel to "narrative theology", I want to practice a "musical theology". In narrative theology the theologian wants to retell the biblical text, to interpret it through a story. In musical theology I want to interpret the text with a melody or other kinds of musical statements.It's not a theology were everything has to be logical and put in an analytical system. As narrative theology it's a remaking of the text were the theologian has to be open to were the creative prosess leads him. Musical theology is strongly related to meditation, but it's not meditation only with the mind. It's a kind of meditation that involves both mind and body. Music used in meditation is mostly slow and soft music. I also want to employ strong rythms and music you can dance to.

I practice "musical theology" in liturgical settings, through playing and composing, and this music has to be heard in it's context. I feel that if I explain to much of what this means, I miss the point. When Louis Armstrong was asked what swing was, he replied: "Man, if I have to explain to you what swing is, then you probably never get it". But I will give you an example of musical interpretation of a biblical text.

The reading is from the first chapter of John:

In the beginning was the Scream, and the Scream was with God, and the Scream was God. All things were made through the Scream, and without it was not anything made that was made. In the Scream was life, and the life was the light of men.

(playing)

Not all of us are musicians, and there is other uses of music in a spiritual life than I have given an example of here. My point is that music is such a basic way of communication that it should not be overlooked. Music opens up our harts and it leads us to places we never would have been without it. As a human being, as a christian, as a leader we have to use all our creative resources to reach out and communicate with other people.

© carl petter opsahl 2002