In Harmonium

Posted By Marc on June 25, 2009

Last night, I caught the second half of The Music Instinct: Science & Song on PBS (yes, we get PBS in Canada).  Two sections really caught my attention – Oliver Sachs speaking on the Importance of Early Musical Training (1:22) and How music can change the brain (1:03).  What was most intriguing, for me at any rate, was that the changes operated in several areas including a) enhanced language (communicative) abilities and b) an increased connectivity in the corpus collosum.

For years now, I have been teaching that symbols are composed of two main parts: the sign and the emotional connotations associated with it.  After watching that program, I think I am going to have to pull that apart further in to three analytically distinct areas: the sign (sensory input), the emotional connotation, and the interpretive schema.  And, to make it even more complex, which is, after all, what academics do , I suspect that we will have to analyze each sensory track of a symbol separately and conjointly.

What does this have to do with cross-cultural communications?  Well, we already know that music is closely attuned with language (and specific languages at that, i.e. french music somehow “sounds” like the French language, etc.).  Stephen Mithen actually argues in the video that music is an evolved psychological mechanism for enhancing “culture”, at least in the sense of creating group boundaries.  You know, he may be right.

I “know”, from personal experience, that singing a piece of music where it was composed gives you a certain “gut level” feel for the perceived ideals of the composer.  By way of example, singing Bach’s Komm Jesu, Komm in the Thomaskirche is totally different from singing it anywhere else.  But that difference is hard to put into words, since it is felt in the body – a result of the resonance of the performance space, the other singers, the light, etc., etc.  Performance, then, of a composition in as close to its original settings and conditions, then, is a form of archeo-ethnomusicology; a way of gaining a “gut level” understanding (θυμός in Greek) of the “spirit” of the culture at that time.

We often hear that music can communicate across cultures, regardless of language (which conditions the rational, interpretive schemas).  But, as with all communications, the act of communication does not imply that the same message is received or accepted by the receiver.  Consider the following video

(NB: the original song was the Lancashire Lad, but it isn’t as well known as Men of Harlach).

If you listen to the two groups singing, you will note that each song (in the broad sense) “promises” (threatens?) what will happen to the other.  Furthermore, each group acts out the promise inherent in their singing.  The act of singing, by both groups, is not merely for moral, it is a statement of intent and an entrainment of a mind state.  We see similar “statements” and entrainments in the current conflicts, although the “promise”, mind state and music are quite different.  Consider the following:

(NB: I’ve been searching YouTube trying to find any Taliban or AQ songs for comparison.  If someone could shoot me one, I would appreciate it.)

As I mentioned earlier, we often hear that music communicates across language and across culture but, as with all communications, we have to be able to decode them.  And, while even successful decoding and the mythical “perfect communications” does not mean that the actors involved will accept the positions communicated by each other, at least it decreases the chance of mis-communications that can only increase suffering.

Category: Music
Tags: Military Music, Symbols