“But don’t minimize their importance just because heroic interventions can’t be reduced to dollars and cents.”
Songwriting is a form of alchemy. Even humming a soothing melody to oneself is therapeutic. That’s the real value!! Valuing creativity, curiosity, beauty, and knowledge—all of these gifts music gives us.
I want a physical copy of this, but I am grateful for the digital version. I want to watch this as a musicology lecture—amazing information to synthesize with a deeper understanding of where it comes from. Thank you for the endless inspiration!
I wonder, Ted, if in your research you have found and experienced the type of music used in the Orthodox Monastery (Church) setting. A lot of the music, which we call chanting, is hundreds if not thousands of years old. Consider Mount Athos.... Chanting is incorporated in nearly every part of the services--there are specific kinds of chants for specific "Feasts" (like, the Nativity of Christ or the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, or the Exultation of the Holy Cross, etc.) Every year the same "songs" are used, over and over. If you know the services fairly well, a person could understand upon entering the temple what time of year it is and what Feast is being celebrated simply by the type of music/chants. Kind of like how we are reminded of the Christmas season at the mall when we enter and hear those timeless carols. The Orthodox Monastery is one of those last places where an ancient musical tradition is being perpetuated without any concern for money or fame. The monks are singing what they live, and living what they sing. I hope you and others find an opportunity to experience Byzantine chant, not only on Youtube, but within the walls of the ancient church. There is nothing like it!!
As a song genre, this essay seems to me a lamentation, a song of mourning for a vanished musical past. It holds up as an ideal a Golden Age of music from which our modern, lifestyle and market-driven music has “fallen.” Our redemptive task is to recapture this past, when life and music were integrated.
I am torn. I feel the loss you are pointing to, Ted, and to some extent share in the lamentation, yearning for both the reinvigoration of music you speak of and the return to community it would require. But I am also suspicious, in myself, of Golden Age thinking and Edenic narratives of a Fall. They breed discontent and alienation from the present—at their worst, a sense of sin, guilt, hatred of what is, after all, our moment, our reality, our lives.
Thank you. You always make me think—and always about what matters.
I think it depends on how you look at it. History works in cycles, or that's how the ancients understood it, anyway; not linearly, but in a repeating series of circles that never quite complete to form the shape proper and instead split at the end like the ouroboros symbol. The fall is a reason for optimism: death is required for life, and what has been lost always has the potential to be rediscovered and regained. It's all part of the process of history, and life, the way I see it.
I don’t think that’s the narrative mode that founds Ted’s historical account, Emma, though I’ve only read sections of his book, so I can’t be sure. In any case, cyclical models, for which death is a preparation for new life—one stage in a cycle—it seems to me, are very different from linear narratives, in which death is an a “fall” from a static and eternal paradise.
Northrup Frye, the Canadian literary critic, connects these two models to the linear, male-centered, Judeo-Christian tradition and the cyclical, female-centric earth-based religions of Mesopotamia. For the first death is a problem—a “fall”; the second, it is natural, a stage in the eternal cycle.
Must read this through again - and again to comment intelligently. Not a student of music but grasp what you say of the antecedents of genres. I wonder what you say on the subject of curated music being delivered today? Growing up in the 50s, 60s and 70s I have the soundtrack pretty much embedded in my brain. What I turn to. Recollecting army bases and protests both during Vietnam- the impact of Bob Dylan, the monster guitars that dominated music - and hip hop that my child embraced.. but I wonder at the false wall set up between what is put in the bin of rock and the separate bin of folk and country. The crossovers are there, but sit unseen unless a major figure stands up and belts it out. They are interconnected, country and urban.. why this split? Who are the gatekeepers setting some truly great music and songs aside?
I have been watching/listening to the night 4 recording of Bob Marley Live at the Rainbow 1977 over and over again. I’ve tried to explain it to other people, what that show does to me, what Bob Marley’s music <i>does</i>, but I draw blank stares. I think a lot of people don’t hear it for what it stirs in you, they hear it for what it is per its genre. After reading this piece, I think I have a framework to speak more clearly about it now. Because Bob Marley (particularly that concert) inspires me in a transformative way: to fight on, to conceptualize freedom, to struggle, to love. Seriously - check out “War/No More Trouble” in that concert and if you don’t cry - seek help! It’s real.
But for a lot of people, Bob Marley is a commodified genre-lifestyle that means spliffs, Jamaica, chillin’, and whatever you assume Rastafarianism is about. Anyhow, I’m curious if you think he might be a good case study to flesh out the points you make in this piece!
Most movements and lifestyles I know of generate music. As far as I know, MAGA does not generate music. It expropriates music (YMCA), although its hard to see how movement and music come together. Many musicians refuse to let-their music be expropriated. The one authentic song I remember (about Northern elites exploiting Southerners) did not stick. Can you sustain a movement that cannot generate music?
I've always felt that the pro-life movement would benefit from having a common song to bind them together and to call others to join them. It seems so appropriate for something of such an emotional/moral nature to have a theme song.
Real movements do have their own music, politics is too shallow to create its own. Politics wants to look like a movement, but it's parasitic, on genuine movements. For example, both MAGA and Occupy tapped into real cultural pain and issues. Take "Rich Men North of Richmond" an anthem for some who feel left behind. MAGA tried to co-opt it, but Oliver Anthony was careful to not let them.
In the UK, Nigel Farage hilariously used Eminem's "Without Me" to entertain and draw people in, while Tony Blair’s Labour used D:Ream's "Things Can Only Get Better" to project optimism and Trump used a salsa band's catchy "iiii, I will vote for Donald Trump" to create a positive vibe but also to "program" the crowd as they sing along
""Most movements and lifestyles I know of generate music.""
That's an interesting observation. MAGA is a political movement. I would imagine that Occupy Wall Street would be a left leaning version of that. I'm trying to think of any music that they generated and I'm coming up blank.
Too many genres, I think. But I look at it from the viewpoint of a composer/musician who has to pick one when sending out to streaming services. Unless it's definitely jazz, or rock, or country, or EDM, or hip-hop, there are just too many granular choices. I usually choose Pop, even though I don't consider my music to be what I consider Pop to be. It's frustrating.
I appreciate the historical context, while also getting a feeling of "in the past everything was better." We consume music differently because our lives are different. Yet we still use music for certain purposes. For example, when I was young and suffering a heartbreak I had my own playlist (long before Spotify playlists) of sad songs--Patsy Cline, Mary J. Blige, Kiri Te Kanawa, which had nothing to do with lifestyle posing/genre.
I'm reminded of a bit of stage banter I heard from the Johnson Mountain Boys (legendary bluegrass band from the 80s and early 90's). One of them said (this is a paraphrase), "we keep lists of different kinds of songs so we can vary our set. We have these different categories, and we number them, so we make sure we're playing different kinds of songs for you. #1, those are the sad songs. #2, those are the lonesome songs. #3, those are the mournful songs, and #4, those are the ones that are just plumb pitiful. We like to mix it up!"
Ha! Like Neil Young saying on FOUR WAY STREET: "This is a song guaranteed to bring you right down. It's called 'Don't Let It Bring You Down.' It starts off slow, the fizzles out altogether."
I think about genre often, especially when placing my own music in a larger picture. For me, genre does little to predict my interests as there are certain qualities that resonate no matter the genre. I like music that’s dynamic, catchy, chaotic, unpredictable, narratively driven, etc.
Music, as you mention, does things to us, not just entertain, and that’s why I struggle to keep up when people use genre terms to discuss music. It feels like we’re trying to categorize something that never quite fits. Ambient is a good example, where many things are permitted under its umbrella. I’ve heard it described as music that is supposed to evoke feelings or moods rather than entertain, but I think all music has the potential to do that. Is it background music? I think any music turned down low enough can fit that bill.
Anyways, I find it hard to wrap my head around current genre trends, and so I always default to a larger explanation, like the hero’s journey you mention, for example; that makes sense to me: narrative drive with tension, resolution, and a climax.
“But don’t minimize their importance just because heroic interventions can’t be reduced to dollars and cents.”
Songwriting is a form of alchemy. Even humming a soothing melody to oneself is therapeutic. That’s the real value!! Valuing creativity, curiosity, beauty, and knowledge—all of these gifts music gives us.
I want a physical copy of this, but I am grateful for the digital version. I want to watch this as a musicology lecture—amazing information to synthesize with a deeper understanding of where it comes from. Thank you for the endless inspiration!
I wonder, Ted, if in your research you have found and experienced the type of music used in the Orthodox Monastery (Church) setting. A lot of the music, which we call chanting, is hundreds if not thousands of years old. Consider Mount Athos.... Chanting is incorporated in nearly every part of the services--there are specific kinds of chants for specific "Feasts" (like, the Nativity of Christ or the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, or the Exultation of the Holy Cross, etc.) Every year the same "songs" are used, over and over. If you know the services fairly well, a person could understand upon entering the temple what time of year it is and what Feast is being celebrated simply by the type of music/chants. Kind of like how we are reminded of the Christmas season at the mall when we enter and hear those timeless carols. The Orthodox Monastery is one of those last places where an ancient musical tradition is being perpetuated without any concern for money or fame. The monks are singing what they live, and living what they sing. I hope you and others find an opportunity to experience Byzantine chant, not only on Youtube, but within the walls of the ancient church. There is nothing like it!!
As a song genre, this essay seems to me a lamentation, a song of mourning for a vanished musical past. It holds up as an ideal a Golden Age of music from which our modern, lifestyle and market-driven music has “fallen.” Our redemptive task is to recapture this past, when life and music were integrated.
I am torn. I feel the loss you are pointing to, Ted, and to some extent share in the lamentation, yearning for both the reinvigoration of music you speak of and the return to community it would require. But I am also suspicious, in myself, of Golden Age thinking and Edenic narratives of a Fall. They breed discontent and alienation from the present—at their worst, a sense of sin, guilt, hatred of what is, after all, our moment, our reality, our lives.
Thank you. You always make me think—and always about what matters.
I think it depends on how you look at it. History works in cycles, or that's how the ancients understood it, anyway; not linearly, but in a repeating series of circles that never quite complete to form the shape proper and instead split at the end like the ouroboros symbol. The fall is a reason for optimism: death is required for life, and what has been lost always has the potential to be rediscovered and regained. It's all part of the process of history, and life, the way I see it.
I don’t think that’s the narrative mode that founds Ted’s historical account, Emma, though I’ve only read sections of his book, so I can’t be sure. In any case, cyclical models, for which death is a preparation for new life—one stage in a cycle—it seems to me, are very different from linear narratives, in which death is an a “fall” from a static and eternal paradise.
Northrup Frye, the Canadian literary critic, connects these two models to the linear, male-centered, Judeo-Christian tradition and the cyclical, female-centric earth-based religions of Mesopotamia. For the first death is a problem—a “fall”; the second, it is natural, a stage in the eternal cycle.
John Barleycorn.
Must read this through again - and again to comment intelligently. Not a student of music but grasp what you say of the antecedents of genres. I wonder what you say on the subject of curated music being delivered today? Growing up in the 50s, 60s and 70s I have the soundtrack pretty much embedded in my brain. What I turn to. Recollecting army bases and protests both during Vietnam- the impact of Bob Dylan, the monster guitars that dominated music - and hip hop that my child embraced.. but I wonder at the false wall set up between what is put in the bin of rock and the separate bin of folk and country. The crossovers are there, but sit unseen unless a major figure stands up and belts it out. They are interconnected, country and urban.. why this split? Who are the gatekeepers setting some truly great music and songs aside?
I have been watching/listening to the night 4 recording of Bob Marley Live at the Rainbow 1977 over and over again. I’ve tried to explain it to other people, what that show does to me, what Bob Marley’s music <i>does</i>, but I draw blank stares. I think a lot of people don’t hear it for what it stirs in you, they hear it for what it is per its genre. After reading this piece, I think I have a framework to speak more clearly about it now. Because Bob Marley (particularly that concert) inspires me in a transformative way: to fight on, to conceptualize freedom, to struggle, to love. Seriously - check out “War/No More Trouble” in that concert and if you don’t cry - seek help! It’s real.
But for a lot of people, Bob Marley is a commodified genre-lifestyle that means spliffs, Jamaica, chillin’, and whatever you assume Rastafarianism is about. Anyhow, I’m curious if you think he might be a good case study to flesh out the points you make in this piece!
"And, for heaven’s sake, why are marriage songs kept out of the other ‘love’ categories?"
Have you ever been married? There's your answer!
But I'm not bitter...
Most movements and lifestyles I know of generate music. As far as I know, MAGA does not generate music. It expropriates music (YMCA), although its hard to see how movement and music come together. Many musicians refuse to let-their music be expropriated. The one authentic song I remember (about Northern elites exploiting Southerners) did not stick. Can you sustain a movement that cannot generate music?
I've always felt that the pro-life movement would benefit from having a common song to bind them together and to call others to join them. It seems so appropriate for something of such an emotional/moral nature to have a theme song.
Real movements do have their own music, politics is too shallow to create its own. Politics wants to look like a movement, but it's parasitic, on genuine movements. For example, both MAGA and Occupy tapped into real cultural pain and issues. Take "Rich Men North of Richmond" an anthem for some who feel left behind. MAGA tried to co-opt it, but Oliver Anthony was careful to not let them.
In the UK, Nigel Farage hilariously used Eminem's "Without Me" to entertain and draw people in, while Tony Blair’s Labour used D:Ream's "Things Can Only Get Better" to project optimism and Trump used a salsa band's catchy "iiii, I will vote for Donald Trump" to create a positive vibe but also to "program" the crowd as they sing along
I don’t think Occupy lasted that. Some of the far left went with hard core punk. A tia adopted Green Day… “No Trump, No KKK, No Fascist USA!
""Most movements and lifestyles I know of generate music.""
That's an interesting observation. MAGA is a political movement. I would imagine that Occupy Wall Street would be a left leaning version of that. I'm trying to think of any music that they generated and I'm coming up blank.
Too many genres, I think. But I look at it from the viewpoint of a composer/musician who has to pick one when sending out to streaming services. Unless it's definitely jazz, or rock, or country, or EDM, or hip-hop, there are just too many granular choices. I usually choose Pop, even though I don't consider my music to be what I consider Pop to be. It's frustrating.
This explains a lot. Thank you.
How do you foresee music reclaiming its place as it was historically used?
I appreciate the historical context, while also getting a feeling of "in the past everything was better." We consume music differently because our lives are different. Yet we still use music for certain purposes. For example, when I was young and suffering a heartbreak I had my own playlist (long before Spotify playlists) of sad songs--Patsy Cline, Mary J. Blige, Kiri Te Kanawa, which had nothing to do with lifestyle posing/genre.
I have to admit, I am now tempted to go and create playlists on Spotify in Pepys' categories 😂
I would be interested to know how much you think copyright laws influenced this.
I'm reminded of a bit of stage banter I heard from the Johnson Mountain Boys (legendary bluegrass band from the 80s and early 90's). One of them said (this is a paraphrase), "we keep lists of different kinds of songs so we can vary our set. We have these different categories, and we number them, so we make sure we're playing different kinds of songs for you. #1, those are the sad songs. #2, those are the lonesome songs. #3, those are the mournful songs, and #4, those are the ones that are just plumb pitiful. We like to mix it up!"
Ha! Like Neil Young saying on FOUR WAY STREET: "This is a song guaranteed to bring you right down. It's called 'Don't Let It Bring You Down.' It starts off slow, the fizzles out altogether."
This is so friggin good. Can't wait for the next chapter. I'm sick right now. Gonna look for songs to heal sickness.
Are there plans to make this book available all in one piece either paper or file?
I think about genre often, especially when placing my own music in a larger picture. For me, genre does little to predict my interests as there are certain qualities that resonate no matter the genre. I like music that’s dynamic, catchy, chaotic, unpredictable, narratively driven, etc.
Music, as you mention, does things to us, not just entertain, and that’s why I struggle to keep up when people use genre terms to discuss music. It feels like we’re trying to categorize something that never quite fits. Ambient is a good example, where many things are permitted under its umbrella. I’ve heard it described as music that is supposed to evoke feelings or moods rather than entertain, but I think all music has the potential to do that. Is it background music? I think any music turned down low enough can fit that bill.
Anyways, I find it hard to wrap my head around current genre trends, and so I always default to a larger explanation, like the hero’s journey you mention, for example; that makes sense to me: narrative drive with tension, resolution, and a climax.