Sacred World Music

The Sacred World Music Project represents an ongoing travel-centered research inquiry that inspects themes, vocalized and instrument playing patterns, words and their sacred or spiritual meanings, specific rhythmic patterns, and musical instruments like drums, used in sacred world music traditions.

From my experience, these factors specifically articulate crucial insights that reflect a given religion’s or spirit system’s beliefs or practices. From scholarship and my experiential evidence, the methodology used for this experiment analyses the results with the purpose of learning if, through sacred world music, increased understanding of those who are different may lead to the reduction of human hatred and greater empathy for the stranger.

In Outre-mer: A pilgrimage beyond the sea, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1835) described his travels around Europe and, what he learned about culture and society during his excursions. He stated, “music is the universal language of mankind”.

Nearly all of the world's major religions, spiritual collectives, sacred communal traditions hold that the stranger is to treated with hospitality, love, and a welcoming spirit.

Many of humanity's deeply held sentiments about life can be unearthed from these traditions. Their sacred music expressions serve as a window into their rituals and liturgical and communal expressions.

Heralded works such as the primary texts of the Vedas in Hinduism, The Holy Koran of Islam, The Torah of Judaism, The Tripitaka employed in Buddhism. The Holy Bible, used by Christians, provides instruction on, as well as reasons why and how to treat others, meaning the stranger(s) or those who are different.

Some of these sacred works have been wrongfully employed to create fear, hatred of those who are different or believe differently, justify the killing of innocent humans, war, and people's marginalization. A close review of these sacred texts reveals their real purpose, dedicated in part to the stranger's welcoming and kind treatment.

Each of these celebrated works illumines how humans have labored and failed, despite framed instruction and models, to overcome and cure this tragic condition.

Exclusionary and polarizing nationalism, racism, gender discrimination, xenophobia, and religious intolerance continue to contribute to human hatred worldwide. This human condition has existed since the beginning of time, in which humans have historically struggled to find a binding cure for the disease hatred for those who are different. The 'challenge' continues today.

A host of internationally recognized musicians have and continue to speak out through their music-making on the destructive nature of hatred. The vast list includes Ben Harper, Bono, Angélique Kidjo, Yasmin Levy, the late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Peter Gabriel, Bono, Oliver Mtukudzi, Stevie Wonder, the late Mercedes Sosa, and many, many more.

Others around the globe have joined and boldly championed and proclaimed their belief that music has the potential to cure human hatred because of its ability to communicate fundamental human emotions that depict the human condition in edifying and sometimes transformative ways.

The story ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, is a European fairy tale about a young girl and a big bad wolf. It was first published by Charles Perraulta about a girl who goes on a walk through the forest in route to her grandmother’s house. On her way, she meets a wolf, who at first appears to be nice. She tells the wolf where she’s going, which later leads to the downfall of her grandmother. The overall theme of this story for some is, “do not trust strangers”.

Musicians with an international following have dedicated their artistic work to eradicating the world of hatred. One example on an extensive list includes Arto Tuncboyaciyan, a famous Armenian musician and composer who lives in the United States. Yasar Kurt, who learned of his Armenian origins after the age of 40, produced an album in Armenia. Musically the recording speaks out 'against hate and animosity.

This recording, and a host of others, illuminates the belief held by many musicians across the globe that music has the power to change our ill-directed perceptions about each other. The longstanding belief that music is "the universal language of humanity" is an idea steeped in widespread appeal among musicians today.

This famous adage embraced as truth is not accepted through the academy and remains a somewhat elusive notion. Some researchers ask whether or not any given set of musically distinctive commonalities or attributes in music worldwide actually exist. Empirical evidence linked to ethnomusicology, regardless of analytical approaches, consistently demonstrates universally one thing: that humans craft nearly all forms of music.

Another viable characteristic grounded in considerable debate posing, "can any aspect of musical expression be labeled universal?". This question also challenges the aim of assigning "music," let alone the fashionable term "world music," a universally accepted definition.

These factors, coupled with limitations pointing to authorship and the range of evaluating music's functionality within a given culture, make it relatively clear why divergent perceptions within the academy will continue. This investigation acknowledges the disputation and chooses to use the term "world music" primarily because it survives, continues to be broadly used across the music-making industry, and is a fundamental part of this presentation.

Conversely, some acknowledged inquiries on the global network of common musical phrases, pitches, rhythmic patterns, performance genres, thematic parallels, timbre, comparative vocalized approaches to the art of singing, melodies, socially-conscious content inform how human rituals and behaviors intersect with group musical inclinations around the world.

Unfortunately, and despite such a vast array of resources and research, there remains a sea of less-traveled approaches assigned to exploring potential 'universalisms' in music.

Despite the backdrop of continued discourse on terms including "universalisms in music, "world music," and the like, there remains an ever-increasing interest in various genres of music authored around the world.

This interest from the review of this presenter dates back several decades with a surge in university courses, more international music festivals and concerts, vastly more produced recordings, the influence of tourism and the expansion of research, publications on lesser-known music styles and access to music from around the world housed on the internet confirms that music created around the world is finding new and larger audiences. With this appeal comes an opportunity to better understand the human condition and to change how humans view each other through the lens of music.

This blog strives to explore a different pathway by navigating human expression linked to sacred-religious ideas that this presenter believes expose humanity's deeply rooted rituals, daily practices, and devout sentiments. Attitudes about self, others (how to treat the 'stranger') can be unearthed in this realm, be they definitively theological, sacred, or enshrined spiritual systems. This idea is linked to how people have over time used musical instruments and singing to express their most intimate sentiments that include but are not limited to social issues, the environment, politics, marriage, birth, cultural traditions, historical events, love, the harvest, hunger, marriage, children, war, deities, and death.

However, when these ideas are explicitly directed toward or on behalf of the divine, they 'transform' the practitioner, the follower, the believer, or the adherent who, as history has shown, carried out acts for good and evil toward those who are 'different.' My view holds that within this transformative space lies potentially new discoveries and the opportunity to re-evaluate old cultural and sacred paradigms that have the power to create a greater understanding of the stranger.

Various sacred world music genres contain many central themes that are critically viable to each religion or spiritual system's expressions. Such themes, routinely found in narratives, verses, or passages that describe a central idea that is housed within. Commonly, the subject matter of a specific theme is represented as a message or lesson the author(s) deems important and want to convey.

It is not uncommon for the practitioner to 'study' such stories over the course of their lifetime as a pathway to living a fulfilled life. This practice is sustained in nearly all sacred traditions.

This analytical framework may or may not subscribe to some of today's customary beliefs about sacred religious expressions, particular cultures or, what constitutes a religious musical expression. Furthermore, rites, daily rituals, public and private ceremonies may or may not be acceptable to more broadly recognizable, universal, or widespread traditional concepts about religion or what such institutions deem musically sacred.

Those select music styles investigated, their usage patterns or genres of sacred music will be (1) set apart from secular musical expressions, (2) must be crafted initially, (3) are or may be tribal, community, or globally shared and (4), are reviewed as a means of increasing our understanding of the other, celebrating and illuminating the 'good' in humanity by a specific group of people. This researcher holds that a culture's traditional roots music, indigenous or folk music, may have profoundly sacred elements within.

This inquiry on sacred music may or may not represent a group's adherence to more customary sacred or religious norms. In the context of this research, sacred music may or may not be crafted and thoroughly-composed for highly established liturgical presentations or public performances.

I recognize the differences in how, why, and where sacred tools (ex. voice, instrumentation, rhythmic patterns, timbre, percussion, etc.) are used and that they may or may not follow a widely accepted pattern of standard musical notation where for example, an elaborate vocal or instrumental compositional structure typically assigned to Eurocentric "classical" composition technique exists.

Some of the sacred works considered will likely be rooted in an orally sustained structure unique to many cultures worldwide.

Conversely, some of the musical expressions examined that will be considered sacred may in fact mirror or be linked in some manner to broadly influential religious settings where for example, a free-standing edifice, group participation, reverence or devotion to a god(s) or deity(s), exists.