THE SACRED AND THE INANE

There was a disastrous musical experience yesterday morning at my church. The first hymn was misprinted in the bulletin, which took all the wind out of the service. And it got me to thinking (ranting, actually) about the quality of worship music floating around these days.

A little background, dear reader: My church is ELCA, the most “progressive” Lutheran denomination in the US. Our primary hymnal, the Lutheran Book of Worship, was published in 1978 at the height of the liturgical renewal movement. A supplemental hymnal, With One Voice, was published in 1997, featuring more contemporary (but still far from “contemporary”) hymns and service music.

I am sensitive to the realities involved in this. The 1978 hymnal draws on seven centuries of music tradition; the 1997 hymnal draws on about 25 years’ worth. You would guess that the quality of hymns is higher in the older book, and you’d be correct. (Don’t fool yourself, though–there’s plenty of duds in the LBW.) And yes, churches are full of people who need to be drug kicking and screaming into the 1950s. But doggone it, if there’s sacred music writers out there, I wish, wish,, wish you would give heed to the following:

1. Enough with the Psalms, already. Yeah, I know they were written to be sung, and they’re actually poetry, and all that. And they’re perfectly lyrical and metrical–in Hebrew. English is another story. I don’t need more lumpy, tortured musical settings of praise songs. I need worship music with decent lyrics that scan. If you can’t write good lyrics, find a wordsmith who can.

2. Turn off NPR once in a while and listen to commercial radio. This is where you’ll learn that most music is built around 8- and 12-bar phrases. Not 6, not 10, and certainly not 9. So knock it off with the trick where you have the people hold the last note of a phrase for an extra bar–I know dang few people who can hold a note on-pitch for 6 or 8 beats, even at a fast tempo. Oh, and this will also teach you that most people out there do not listen to contemporary folk music.

3. “Syncopated” does not equal “contemporary.” You can write a nice, moving, contemporary-sounding melody without resorting to polyrhythms that require a PowerMac to interpret correctly.

4. And watch the melisma, too. Most people can sing the melisma in “Angels We Have Heard On High”–you know, the “Glo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-ria” part. Most people can’t bend a note to 13 different pitches in the span of 0.3 seconds like Whitney Houston can.

5. There’s a market for contemporary music other than “7-11″ songs. You know–songs with 7 words that you sing 11 times? How about hymns that are actually about something? I’d buy a hymnal full of those. In fact, I’d buy 150 of them.

6. We need flexible accompaniment styles. That means it has to sound good with just a keyboard or organ instead of a seven-piece band of semi-professional musicians. And would it kill you to publish some tablature for guitar players?

Wow. Cranky am I. But it’s been chewing away at me for a long time.