There are some absolutes about music. Out of tune music is bad. Period. You can listen to music from another culture and not just enjoy it, but also think of it as very good.
Then how do you explain ethnic Asian music which employs microtones? It sounds horribly out of tune to Western ears. Asians like it and have been writing it for centuries.
I'm not arguing that good music came from God. I'm arguing that God created such crazy things as the idea of good and bad music. That doesn't mean that everyone is going to like the same kind of music. God created everyone to be a little bit diffferent and unique, however, there are general ideas about good and bad music that most people share. When God set the Homo sapiens apart from the rest of the animal kingdom, one thing he gave us was ideas of good and bad. Different groups of people created different kinds of music, but every group created their own and kept progressing music that they felt was good.Â
Except there is no good or bad music. Again... subjective labels. I think Brahms is good music. Lots of people hate Brahms... including people who know a great deal about music. I hate 50 cent. Apparently, millions of people think he's a great musician.  That's not 'a little bit different,' dude. We're talking about EXTREME differences in the approach to music, and I maintain that the differences are the result of the creative process undertaken by the individual artists and their individual skill. I like Brahms because he writes complex music, and that is precisely why many people feel his music is boring.
Again, the fact that different cultures developed very different kinds of music is more an argument against the existence of God than it is for God if your point is that people have the same idea of what constitutes good or bad music. Â
Music does not come from God. Composers don't listen for God to just come down and tell them what to write. I never argued that, nor would I. What I am arguing is that the very idea of good and bad music was given to us by God. Then we make what we can with it. Good composers are can produce good music, and good musicians can play good music. Since the idea of good and bad music exists in every culture (remember that music is just organized sound, which is just waves varying amounts of air pressure) then this idea must have come from somewhere. I am suggesting that the idea came from a higher power. If you have some other reasonable explanation I would like to hear it.
But music is not 'good' or 'bad.' I hate 50 cent. But I can't say his music is 'bad.' I can just say it's unsophisticated, which it is. But clearly, it's great music for a lot of people. The idea of good and bad music is entirely a personal issue, not a societal one. A lot of people may like a certain kind of music, but you can't say an entire SOCIETY thinks one type of music is good and another is bad. I dislike most of the music that most of the people in my society love. And that didn't come from a higher power. It came from my training and background... just as people like the music they like because of their background (and training, if applicable). Ever wonder why people tend to identify most with music they heard as children and teens? Ever wonder why people of advanced years have more trouble accepting new kinds of music?
Different cultures respond differently to music. The only real universal link between all cultures is an affinity for rhythm. It is inherent to all music of all cultures. It is supported by dance, which is known to exist in all cultures. And it is the most obvious thing that makes music ordered by comparison to sound which is not ordered. Our brains like order in any form, because we can understand order better than we can understand disorder. And our survival depended very much on our sense of order. That's the plain truth of it. No deities required. This, of course, is not a refutation of God, but rather a refutation of the claim that music is in any way connected to God, or that our appreciation of it requires God.
Acemaster27
Log in to comment