I've really been enjoying this guy's music as of late.

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One of the things I love about music is the way in which it evokes emotions and feelings, and sometimes memories in you. There are certain songs and styles of music that, for some reason or other, have become associated with certain memories so that when I hear that song or type of music, I recall that memory.

One of those styles is the gentle and soothing sound of an oboe. This morning at work I was listening to the NPR member station here in Orlando, which plays classical music during the day, and I heard Mozart's Oboe Concerto in C-major. Immediately I recalled a childhood memory from nearly twenty years ago when our family still lived in Toronto. Sunday's would usually include going over to my grandparents' house for coffee and cake after the morning service. I loved the little house they lived in; there was something so cozy and comfortable about it.

There was a remarkable warmth to that home, and especially the living room. There was an old wood stove in that room. In the cold grip of winter, that wood stove acted as a sort of refuge. When we came in to the house, it was always burning, inviting us to sit around it. But it was not just the wood stove giving off its gentle, radiant heat. It was more--the conversation, family, the quiet and peaceful classical music in the background. But above all, it was the love, I think, which held it all together. For some reason, when I hear the sound of an oboe, it brings those feelings back of that time and place. The music has that kind of power.

That room, that fire, that music. One of my best childhood memories.

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This is real music. Pure, natural, unmanufactured. There's something to be said for keeping it all acoustic.

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Where words fail, music speaks.

-- Hans Christian Andersen

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Fr. Stephen Freeman is an Orthodox priest in Tennessee. He was formerly an Episcopalian priest before he converted to Orthodoxy. I’ve been reading his blog, "Glory to God for All Things," for some time, and have really enjoyed it. He provides some wonderful insights into Orthodoxy, and sometimes also deals with Orthodoxy in the American context.

In his latest two posts, Fr. Stephen has dealt with this relation of America and the Orthodox church. In one post, he spoke of the growing trend in American evangelical churches towards marketing (though I may disagree that it is a "growing" trend---it may have reached a plateau with the advent of postmodern Christianity and the Emerging Church movement). Specifically speaking of worship music, Fr. Stephen says that the American church tends to enculturate its music style in order to grow the church. In contrast, of Orthodoxy he says this:

There is no way to say to someone, 'Our music is superior to yours.' That's a very arguable statement. I do prefer the theological substance and meat of an Orthodox hymn when compared to the average American 'praise song,' but I will not claim musical superiority. What I can observe is that Orthodox music (indeed Orthodox everything) is not market driven. It is what it is and you learn it as it is. The same is true for the faith. We teach what was given us and what has been 'organically' part of the Orthodox Tradition. The faith remains the same whether the 'market' is a village in Africa or a suburb of Los Angeles. It is thus truly 'inclusive' and 'universal' in the extreme.

I gather that Fr. Stephen is making the argument that a church should stick what it has developed organically. Appealing to the longevity of the Orthodox Church and it's preservation of worship and tradition, Fr. Stephen says,

Tragically, I’ve heard of some market-driven Churches seeking to put together services that would feel more 'ancient,' with a bit of ritual, incense and chant. It is tragic because these things are not organically part of who they are but simply another stab at the American market. As such it cannot save because it itself is captive to mammon and the culture of the market.

Whether these current phenomena will continue in Evangelicalism is anybody's guess. I have no idea. What Orthodoxy will continue to do I can describe with a fair assurance of being right. We'll be doing what we've always done, with occasional new hymns written (we do still write music) - but it will be much like what has gone before. For some that is a comfort.

I'll have more response to this to follow.

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