Music and Religion

"Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands" Psalm 100:1

I'm a Lutheran. That means that my church services are very "by the book," or rather "by the Bible, no more or no less." If there is anyother church that we can be compared to in terms of tradition, it would be a Catholic mass, but there are differences for those of you that know your history of Martin Luther and the 95 theses. I'm actually a WELS Lutheran, which stands for Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Church. Basically, our Lutheran synod originated in Wisconsin.

At WELS Lutheran church services, all music is predominantly accompained by the piano or organ. Occasionally, during the offertory or for special church season occasions, like Chistmas Eve or Easter, other performances are allowed. Any and all music that is performed in church is to be sung or played for the glory of the Lord; the objective is to praise His holy name and thank Him through music. We also have a choir and/or a bell choir that sings/plays every so often. After every musical performance, no one is permitted to clap. It sounds harsh for those that are playing/singing, but typically, clapping is viewed as a way of praising the musician. The whole point of being musical in our church services is to glorify God, therefore, Lutherans normally feel that clapping is unneccessary.

All songs and pieces that are played in my church are straight from the hymnal. J.S. Bach was a Lutheran, so many of his familiar tunes are based off of hymn melodies as well. Within the hymnal, each song is organized by church seasons/events. We have the Christmas and Easter hymns, but there are also hymns for Communion and Baptism.

Growing up as a Lutheran, my musical experience has been based solely off of classical and religious music. My very first solo in church was "Silent Night" at the children's Christmas program. Other people in the choir would sing solos, it didn't matter how good or bad you were, the point was just to make a "joyful noise." Through the years, the church has started to become a little more conventional. Most Lutheran churches now have sound systems and different types of instrumentalists are performing. In fact, my very first church formed a group of instrumentalists, consisting of roughly one clarinet, one trumpet, one trombone, and an euphonium. (Secretly, my family liked to call them the Umpa band, their musical abilities had quite the range).

I'm very much drawn to classical music and religious songs because of my background in it. I grew up in the church singing "On Eagle's Wings" and "Be Still My Soul," so understandably, that genre of music has had its influences on me. I love music that has a theme of something bigger than ourselves, it gives a deeper meaning to the music, and I'm sure that can be attributed to my faith.

Christian hymns were the very beginning of Western music. Many classical composers stole melodies and ideas from the written hymns. I think that most Christian hymns exemplify the starting point of what all Westerns orginally found aesthetically pleasing. For example, think of the tritone. It was first thought of as some sort of spawn of satan in the form of music. Many songs that were considered too dissonant were band from the church. Music has obviously grown since then, but how it all started is still very much apart of society today.