I grew up in the Episcopal church, and while I'm no longer religious I do still really love a lot of the music. I enjoy a lot of sacred music of other faiths too. I love hearing how different people connect to what they feel is Divine. Sometimes a hymn contains beautiful poetry, but it's not necessarily all about the words for me, but about the mood, melody, structure, and forms of the music. emotion_bigheart
To be honest, I guess if I were to have to define what I think qualifies as Divine, music would probably be it. A really well-constructed moment in a piece of music can trigger immediate swells of emotion and an absolute flood coming out of my eyes. I guess "the four right chords can make me cry," as Third Eye Blind put it. razz
I thought about this because I was playing my music library on shuffle in the background at work and a song came on that I grew up hearing our church choir sing. (Eye Has Not Seen (Marty Haugen)) I've always felt extremely moved by the melody. I don't even care what the words to this particular melody are, as long as they're pleasant words. whee (I'll spare the technical music theory details, but I think there's something really magical about the notes chosen for the phrase "come give us the mind of Jesus") and the way the entire melody intertwines with the flute ornamentation. I haven't looked at the chord progression, but it's probably really interesting too.
I guess... when I just focus on the way this song sounds and think about what the sheet music would look like if I had it in front of me and the fact that someone could write something that sounds so simple, but is musically full of tiny complex details, I kinda start to picture a really beautiful and delicate lace doily. whee
One I grew up listening to with my grandfather was "Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb?" by the Statler Brothers. There's only one arrangement of that song that my heart will accept (lol), and again it's because of this one particular chord choice (the crunchy part and then resolution on the word "Lamb," in the phrase that starts at 0:16 in the video) that just totally makes a moment for me. I actually could do without the gratuitous key change at the end, but that one chord is so important to the feeling, to me, that I can let it slide. rofl
I also like Hare Krishna music. My favorite is this random old vinyl record that I found in a thrift store by a group called Murari, who are basically part of this farm/commune of Hare Krishnas in Tennessee called Murari Sevaka. This album is really just a delight to me - the whole thing is unapologetically corny, but it's endearing to me that they sound so pure and earnest and idealistic, and the music itself is just pleasant. I find this album calming and inspiring. Murari (Check out 4:00 and 16:49 in the video for my favorites.)
I admit, I'm more familiar with the sort of Hare Krishna music made by Western hippies types like Murari and George Harrison, but I'd like to hear some more traditional music of this type also.
Sometimes I also listen to Qawwali (Sufi devotional music). It has a lot of repetitive elements that are good for helping to clear the mind. Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's group performing Dam Mast Qalandar Mast Mast is one I really like (skip to somewhere around 0:40 to 0:45; they're pretty slow at actually starting the song in this video sweatdrop ). This one is similar to the idea of the Hare Krishna chant and is basically a song about achieving a state of ecstasy via chanting or singing the name of god.
Please share some of your favorite sacred music with me. I'm interested in hearing it all, not necessarily just Christian hymns. 3nodding Actually, sometimes I get even more mental stimulation from music sung in a language I don't understand, because then my mind doesn't get stuck on thinking about the words and I can hear the singer's voice as an instrument!
