Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Quiet Music

Have had dangled before me the possibility of playing some 'quiet worship songs' during part of the archdeacon's visitation (non-Anglicans, don't ask, it'll take all day and the outcome will not be edifying).

What do you think they mean? 'Psychosomatic ecstasy dressed by Laura Ashley' was one of my old mentor's descriptions of the sort of stuff that was done under this pretext in the 1970s and 80s. Recognisable twee choruses played instrumentally without too heavy a hand, the dancers long departed through the 'great worship experiments with which we didn't proceed' double doors.

Once again I will have to resist the temptation to play my own preferred quiet worship music (an evolving jazz progression around a minor seventh plus fourth - the sound of angels praying for the soul of Ramsay Lewis) and try and anticipate the preferences of the archdeaconry.

I think pitching it somewhere between the background music for Lillettes and Dulcoease will be about right. Pass it on.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Music worshipping who exactly?! ;-)

Rich Burley said...

The music I get most annoyed at in churches is the quiet, heartstring-pulling instrumental music they play when they want you to think introspectively about a reading/sermon/etc. I always feel it sounds like the kind of music they play on Neighbours when someone dies.