Paris taught me a music lesson

It was well past my 30th birthday when I first came to appreciate the immense power of music in its role as a catalyst to man’s praise of God.

Walking across Paris during a busy midweek rush hour, I heard the faint strains of trumpet and strings coming from the closed doors of the church of La Madeleine in the city centre.

I wandered in to be greeted by the sight of a church filled to the brim with people listening enraptured to an orchestra giving vent to Vivaldi.

As I sat and listened to that glorious music I had absolutely no idea whether or not it was religious. It didn’t really matter because it uncovered emotions in me that I had never before experienced in church. It raised my soul and filled my heart fit to bursting in praise of God.

And later, as I wandered off to my appointment through the crowded streets, it made me wonder why on earth the Church did not make more use of this magnificent catalytic medium.

I thought back to my school days where music in church generally meant a slightly out-of-tune organ being played by someone who took mischievous delight in making every tenth note sound slightly off-key, and every twentieth decidedly off-key.

Music in church was, and often still is today, a litany of simple, unimaginative hymns we’d learnt in Grade 2, and the only excitement in singing them was to ensure that we CBC boys would drown out any attempt by the Loreto Convent choir to have their voices heard.

I agree completely with the honest and heartfelt sentiments raised by Fr Chris Townsend in The Southern Cross of December 15, when he wrote about the singularly uninspiring music in the Catholic Church in South Africa today. Well done to him for having the courage to speak out so succinctly.

Later in life I would learn about the crucial role music played in business. Shoppers would be encouraged to spend more if the right kind of music was played in the background. People in lifts would have their claustrophobia allayed by gentle music, and, above all, advertising would use it mercilessly to set moods and create brand loyalty links between products and consumers.

From a religious point of view, we have seen on television how the Baptist churches in the southern states of America use music to raise congregations from worldly humdrum to a wonderfully higher state of praise and thanksgiving.

But still today, I wonder why so many congregations in South Africa disregard the quite remarkable potential music has to elevate our praise of God from what is often the mechanical routine we call Sunday Mass to something far more emotional, focused and meaningful.

Many parishes seem to be stuck with something inappropriately called The Celebration Hymnal for Everyone. It is filled to the brim with wonderful prayers set to largely boring and childish music selected for us by two people in Britain who probably have no idea where South Africa is and who not only make a lot of money out of the business, but also have the impertinence to tell us precisely what hymns we should sing on what Sundays.

And a look at the back of this hymnal shows that the majority of hymns are subject to the payment of royalties. And here for all these years I naively thought that people who wrote hymns did so for the love of the Almighty and not to line their pockets with filthy lucre.

And if we are serious about ensuring that our youngsters continue to come to church when they are too old to be dragged there by their parents, we might well find that The Celebration Hymnal turns out to be more hindrance than help.

Interestingly enough, black Catholic congregations have long cast aside hymnals from abroad and have adopted an inculturated and meaningful style of praising God in music.

I have noticed recently that a lot of churches have started playing pieces of recorded music, particularly during Communion. And what a difference that makes.

Luciano Pavarotti’s rendition of “Panis Angelicus” certainly raises my soul a notch or two above those often bland songs of praise into which our usually undermanned choirs try so valiantly to bring life.

If we really want to stem the movement of people, particularly youngsters,  away from the Catholic Church, we might need to put nostalgia aside and look very seriously at the calibre of music that is currently being used in our churches.