HIGHER than the highest human thought can reach is God's ideal for His children. Godliness—godlikeness—is the goal to be reached. Before the student there is opened a path of continual progress."—Education, p. 18.
Perfection, high ideals, high standards, the best in everything—such are the hopes we have as a people. No minister is satisfied to preach a poor sermon. He is always striving to improve his work, if he is a conscientious worker. We are sure all our workers are earnestly aiming for top achievement.
The musician is trying to excel and perfect his abilities to the glory of God. He is studying to show himself a good workman, and to present to God the finest music available. In our colleges there are many musicians who have the highest standards and who are inspiring our young people to reach the highest attainment in musical skill for the honor of God, who should be worshiped with the best music that has been written.
But how often he hears from workers and laymen alike: Don't give us music over our heads! We don't want the music of Bach and Brahms! We are common people and we want common music. Why don't you give us something that we like, something that we can understand? We want music that is popular with the masses of the people. We like this luscious, soulful, popular religious music we hear over the radio and the television.
It is an amazing experience to college musicians to be told to lower their standards, to give the people what they want. For this is exactly what must be done when the wishes of the masses are taken as a guide. In matters of music taste it has never been safe to follow the leading of popular majorities. The musical taste of the majority of the public is not high in either secular or religious music. It is the high privilege of the school and the church to hold up a higher standard than that represented by majority opinion.
The musicians chosen to teach in our colleges have made a special study of the field of music, and some have specialized in the music of the church. They know that the masterpieces of Bach, such as his beautiful motets, chorales, The St. Matthew Passion, and the great choral works of Handel, Mendelssohn, Brahms, and others, represent the highest achievement of man in creating music. Truly many of these works seem inspired. These musicians also know that there are many superior hymn tunes, many of which appear in our Church Hymnal. These musicians also know that some of our workers and laymen are not in sympathy with these high ideals.
People without sufficient musical background set up their own taste as a criterion for the church. We should learn to recognize the authority of those who have made sacred music a special study, and not set up our own taste as a standard. Just because we like something does not make that thing good. We recognize this principle in other things. It is just as valid in the field of taste in music.
It is difficult sometimes to realize that great popularity is not necessarily an index of great worth. Many an inferior song has become popular with the masses. The history of religious music shows that the people have often sung and loved music of little value. In our own denomination some of the music from Christ in Song, which was greatly beloved at one time, has proved to be unworthy and inferior music. This does not mean that those who love this music are inferior or lacking in spiritual experience. It simply means that there is better music available to the church, music of greater power and beauty.
We may like a certain style of organ playing represented by such men as Paul Carson and Lorin Whitney. We may like a certain style of crooning religious songs. We may like the lush and sensuous orchestral settings of some religious music. In these days there is a lot of this type of thing being sold for religious music, and it may have a strong sentimental appeal to us, and the majority of people may like this kind of religious music. But there are many highly trained musicians, musicians trained in the best traditions of religious music, who emphatically denounce this music as being unworthy of use.
The writer does not believe it is a sin to use this music. He is not an extremist. If our people get enjoyment from this music and wish to enjoy it in their homes, that is a matter of personal taste. But he does object strongly to having this standard of music held up as the choice of the church, representing the standards of our denomination. This does not represent seeking the best, reaching for the highest standard in our music. It is mediocrity in music. As a church we should not be satisfied with this. If our musicians were given encouragement they could do much to raise the standards in all our churches.
The spiritual standards would also be raised, for the finest hymns and religious music are far superior in spiritual values as well as artistic values. The church would not suffer a spiritual decline by accepting a higher standard in religious music.
When one learns the great religious choruses of the masters, such as "How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place," by Brahms, he experiences something that makes him dislike the unworthy and trivial music so often used. The same is true of great hymns. When one has learned twenty or thirty of the best hymns ever written he no longer takes the same interest in the weak and insipid hymns frequently sung.
The impact of the mediocre and even "secular" religious music on television and radio upon our churches is frightening to serious Seventh-day Adventist musicians. It is most serious to our musicians to realize that this inroad of secularism and mediocrity is being accomplished in the name of spirituality and sincerity of purpose. People whose spiritual purpose cannot be questioned often fall under the influence of this inferior music. They are guilty not of sin but of bad taste.
It is time to seek the help of thoroughly trained musicians to lead us away from such errors in bad taste so that the church can present to the world a message associated with the best in religious music. This is not an impossible goal.
The church would do well to give this matter serious study, for there is an increasing number of young people in the church who are longing to be fed by a better class of music than is sometimes used. In music as in all other things we should be eager to learn and to use the very best.
