Any Christians making music here?

[aMUSEd]

But in any case, I was referring to equal temperament and the system of "consonant" intervals that are used wherever people use keyboards, which is just about anyplace these days.

Certainly there are many ancient musical cultures that have venerable traditions of polyphonic musical practice. Bali and Java in particular come to mind.

But our systems of notation, tuning, intonation, intervals, scales, chords, counterpoint, key, and tonality derive from a theoretical structure that began in the medieval european world of the Roman catholic church, not in Bali or Java or India. This is a matter of accident, not because of merit. That is how history usually works: luck and the caprices of nature have much more to do with it than merit.

I myself feel much closer to the music of Bali than to most western classical stuff like Beethoven or Haydn or Brahms. I would love nothing more than to see the Balinese Ketjak when it was still a form of exorcism, or to go to Tenganan, the only place where the oldest form of gamelan music: gamelan selunding, can still be heard.

But if I were to try to write music that reflected this interest that I have , I would be using keyboards and notational systems that derive from western tradition. Not because I like that tradition, but because I like the tools it has given us.

Well yes the Balinese etc did not have a notational system but they did have Polyphony (and very sophisticated too) which is what you referred to. And so did other even older cultures such as some African cultures which also had people singing different lines at the same time. Of course if you want to qualify what you mean by polyphony then that's another issue but what you said was "POLYPHONIC MUSIC BEGAN AS CHRISTIAN MUSIC. It didn't. Polyphonic music in it's western form may have begun as Christian music (though possibly with influences from other cultures such as the Greeks) but that's not the whole story of Polyphony.

[VicDiesel]

[quote="herodotus
Put whatever (latin) words you want to it, this would still say "Christian" to me.

Nice recording, no?[/quote]

Gregorian chant? sure.

But zillions of masses have been written using the "l'hommme arm'ee" theme, which is secular. Bach recycled worldly music for church purposes and the other way around.

[king syrus]

The mechanical clock was also invented in China during the 12th century, but only placed in the Imperial Place. In the past, the Imperial court has to measure and calculate the most auspicious time where the Emperor will sleep with his concubine in order to conceive the heir. The calculation is important as it will determine the rise or fall of the empire.
Thus, mechanical clock technology was only available to the imperial court.

Sorry I don't have knowledge of which scrolls this history appears in the court histories.

i believe the monks did it in the 13th century, no?

[aMUSEd]

http://library.thinkquest.org/23062/mclock.html

[VicDiesel]

does all Messiaen's music have lyrics, does Bach's?

Can you tell that the "catalogue" is secular and birdsong in "meditations" is not?

If Bach recycles the music of a church cantata for the coronation of some ruler, does that change the nature of the music?

[aMUSEd]

Polyphony invened in China?

That was probably in Africa too

http://www.cambridge.org/aus/catalogue/ ... 0521616018

http://www.plumart.com/va1299/html/body ... afric.html

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761 ... Music.html

[Hovmod]

The good thinga about church music is that the singers
a) don't think they'll get laid after the show so they don't put on a big ego, and
b) most of the choir girls actually believe in that crap and think god's listening, so they work a bit extra on their intonation.

Also, for that big SCARE THE PEASENTS effect, many churches have nice acoustics.

[VicDiesel]

not trying to burst your bubble, but the chinese invented clocks centuries before your beloved monks

And polyphonic music has been invented (discovered) many times in many cultures - some way before western polyphony

You sure? Polyphony and harmony seem to be pretty much the province of western music, where other cultures emphasize more rhythm and melody.

[Meffy]

our systems

Perhaps "the most commonly used systems" would be a better fit. I was raised in a number of musical traditions (of which the various Western traditions [and there are rather a lot of those too] were just a subset) without overtly having preferences imposed on me and don't see any one as "mine" or even "ours."

I consider this an advantage.

[aMUSEd]

does all Messiaen's music have lyrics, does Bach's?

Can you tell that the "catalogue" is secular and birdsong in "meditations" is not?

If Bach recycles the music of a church cantata for the coronation of some ruler, does that change the nature of the music?

To an extent I think it is possible to tell but I can see what you're saying; that another listener can only tell for definite if it has Christian lyrics (or presumably title might give a clue). For that matter - not knowing much latin - it's hard for me to tell which songs in Carmina Burana are sacred or profane. But Messiaen etc might as well not have bothered if they thought their non lyrical music did not communicate something of what they felt, thought, experienced. They wrote that music as a form of devotion or prayer and maybe didn't even care if someone like me could tell exactly what it meant in it's entirety - maybe they cared more what was in their hearts at the time (and what their god heard). I'm not myself a Christian or religious but I do think that people can listen with their hearts too - so maybe for someone else who is able to hear that way they could tell better than I can.

[Wopelka]

If Bach recycles the music of a church cantata for the coronation of some ruler, does that change the nature of the music?

he never re-used a theme composed for a religious piece in a profane one. always the other way around.

edit: it doesn't change your point, i know, but it was good to correct a fact that has a symbolic importance in Bach's mind.

[nuffink]

he never re-used a theme composed for a religious piece in a profane one. always the other way around.

So he didn't mind contaminating his superstitious work with a bit of reality but baulked at the opposite.

Good lad.

[Reverend Rhythm]

We've come a long way from, "Any Christians making music here?

[Meffy]

Good. Topic tectonics will do that. :-) Besides, that question got anwsered pretty quick, didn't it?

Meffy
humble first prophet of bentoism

[Bunnyboy]

what was the answer??