The Voice, one of the America’s most-watched TV shows, exhibits distinctly different styles of music by different color. , including American country music, Latin music, R, Jazz, Gospel music, etc. However, it’s tough to distinguish which style a certain song belongs to. It arouses my interest to find out what impacted western music during Its long-term development and what the western music derived from. This article provides brief introductions of the origin of western music, the Bible, and its influence on western music.
Keywords: Western music, the Bible, Christianity, origin, Influence I.
Introduction As one saying goes, if you can understand music, you’re close to the god. Western culture Is Inseparable to the Bible. Western music, as a crucial section of western culture, also expresses faith of Christianity. Over the long history, western music undergo the important period of Hebrew, the Middle Ages, Renaissance, Religious Reform, etc. Western music comes to life in every different era.
Thus, it’s of great significance to comprehend the origin of western music and how the western music as Influenced by the Bible In respective time. II.
The orally of western music In terms of the relationship between western music and the Bible, it could date back to the age of Hebrew. According to the Old Testament, in Genesis, “ Cabal was the father of all who play stringed instruments and pipes. ” [1] In addition, in Chronicles, “ All the Levities who were musicians stood on the east side of the altar, playing cymbals, harps and lyres. They were accompanied by 120 priests sounding trumpets.
The trumpeters and musicians Joined in unison to give praise and thanks to the LORD. ” [2] Thus it can be seen that, at the age of Hebrew, music existed and was exerted In large sacrifices.
Hebrew was nation which fascinated music. Christianity Inherited the musical tradition of Hebrew, becoming “ Singing Religion”. Western classical music, to some extent, originated from Christian music. [1 1] In consequence, Christian music, influenced by Hebrew, paid a lot attention to music.
With the establishment of Christianity, western music flourished and stepped Into a new era, the Middle Ages. Ill. The Middle Ages From the fall of Western Roman Empire in the 5th century to the end of 13th century, it was the middle ages of western music.
After Christianity was established as the state religion, Christianity regarded music as the tool of propagating its faith to strength the religion asceticism. In the long time of middle ages, music became the slave of Christianity.
[121 As far as I’m concerned, although the religion asceticism was favorable to achieve authoritarianism, it indeed fettered people’s thinking and creativity. Under the rigorous thought control, people lack of liberty to express their al mind. Frequently, the great artists draw Inspirations from moments of life, Including true love, new baby, speechifying, etc.
Nevertheless, under the asceticism, there is no chance for people to experience the pleasure of human nature.
1 OFF music was reduced to tool of church, it still was listed on the top seven advanced arts, including grammar, rhetoric, logic, geometry, count, astronomy and music. [5] However, at the end of the Middle Ages, the establishment of Gregorian chant brought positive effect to the music, blowing fresh air to the Middle Ages. ‘ V. Baroque Religious Reform Christian culture, no doubt, was one of the origins of modern western culture.
Meanwhile, western music originated from religious music.
After Renaissance, the bible theory was still the mainstream thought in temporal society. It appeared a peak of arts during the development western culture, the Baroque. In this period, musicians drew inspirations and passion of creation from Christian, producing raft of Nell-known Christian oratorio. [9] Messiah is an English-language oratorio composed in 1741 by George Frederic Handel, with a scriptural text from the King James Bible, ND from the Psalms included with the Book of Common Prayer.
It was first performed in Dublin in 1742 and received its London premiere nearly a year later.
After an initially modest public reception, the oratorio gained in popularity, eventually becoming one of the best-known and most frequently performed choral Norms in Western music. [10] In 1516, a papal commissioner for indulgences was sent to Germany by the Roman Catholic Church to sell indulgences to raise money to rebuild SST. Pewter’s Basilica in Rome. Luther wrote to his bishop, protesting the sale of Indulgences.
He enclosed in his letter a copy which came to be known as The Ninety- Five Theses.
[7] Confronted with the Inquisition, Luther said “ everyone have the rights to directly communicate with god. Unless someone can prove me wrong through the Bible word, I will never give up my opinion. ” [3] Religious Reform abided by the Bible. Ere only difference between the Protestantism and the Christianity is whether ordinary people can directly talk to the god. With the new wave of Religious Reform, a new round of thought liberation was increasingly spread.
As other form of art, Nesters music achieved further development. Especially, “ Martin Luther also wrote songs for religious service in collaboration with a composer J. Walter. ” [4] So you can see that western music also enjoy the free atmosphere to reform and promote in this period. V. Western Music in Modern Society Twentieth-century music brought new freedom and wide experimentation with new musical styles and forms that challenged the accepted rules of music of earlier periods.
Nevertheless, a large amount of contemporary songs still based on Bible Tories and Bible theories.
For instance, there is a famous song Time for Miracles by Adam Lambert. [8] As far as I’m concerned, the meaning of miracle symbolizes the supernatural things created by god in Bible. Miracle always appears in western Norms of art.
The Bible theory roots in the westerns mind and influences their daily life all the time. VI. Conclusion: or sum up, without the Bible, the musical forms will be completely disparate. From “ hat has been mentioned above, the western music was impacted by the Bible theory in different period.