Contemporary Music and the Liturgy (1957)

There has been a certain amount of discussion in recent weeks of the nature of contemporary music and its use in the liturgy. Among the more interesting sources of discussion has been the article published in the Nov.-Dec. issue of Musart by Father Richard Schuler. It is the formal text of his address given at the NCMEA Convention in St. Louis last spring. Because of the allegedly severe criticisms we made of Father Schuler's address in the May-June issue of the Gregorian Review, the editors of Musart decided to publish the text as a means of permitting its readers to form their own opinions. This is an example of the laudable attitude of Musart and the NCMEA in all our contacts with that fine organization. It is most certainly the most direct route to the truth, which is what we all wish to find.

Contemporary music, a category of our art which necessarily includes all the many styles of present-day composition, is usually construed to mean those styles and techniques of writing which are somewhat more "dissonant" and "progressive" in comparison with classical examples. Thus we usually exclude from this category the late Jan Sibelius, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Ignace Paderewski and similarly conservative and backward-looking composers. Even Richard Strauss, for all of his unorthodox approach to harmony and texture, is normally considered to be nineteenth century in style and outlook. Thus it is not just a question of when a composer lived that will determine his classification as "contemporary" or "traditional" in the eyes of the professional musician, but it is more a question of his style and aesthetic outlook. We find, therefore, that men who died at a time when Sibelius, Rachmaninoff, Padrewski [sic] and Strauss were still in the ascendency [sic] can be considered as more "modern" or "contemporary" in regard to style. These would include [33] Busoni, Szymanowski, Roussel and even Ravel, although the impressionistic composers are usually excluded from the list of really avant-garde craftsmen.

Who are the great composers of our day, then? We cannot say with any real certainty, since we stand too close to our own era to be impartial or accurate judges. We can, however, name the more significant composers on the basis of the influence they have exerted on techniques and styles.

One of the first, of course, is Schoenberg, who broke with romantic 19th century traditions at about the same time that Stravinsky was writing his Firebird Ballet. Stravinsky moved completely away from the romantic techniques of his teacher, Rimsky-Korsakov, with his Sacre du Printemps, produced shortly before the first world war [sic]. It is our own choice, of course, but if we were asked to name a third person of importance to the formation of present-day trends in those early years, we would say that Darius Milhaud was possibly the most far-reaching in his influence, although that influence was not more apparent at first than that of the other members of the French "Six". Since those early years many other names have come to prominence, including Hindemith, Bartok, Honegger and dozens of others too familiar to the musician to need mention here. Who, if any, of these many talented composers will survive in living masterpieces in the repertoire of the next century? We cannot say. Be that as it may, we Catholics must realize that contemporary techniques are being applied by our young composers to the writing of masses, motets and organ music, and that very important contributions to liturgical music are being made in this way.

What are the marks of contemporary music? This is a matter on which we must take issue with Father Schuler. We are fully aware of the difficulties involved in presenting a clear picture of such a complex subject in the short time allotted him at St. Louis. Nevertheless, when generalities must be used, it is well that we state in emphatic terms that there [34] are exceptions to the points being stated. One cannot assume that one's listeners will recognize a generality when the subject at hand is as lamentably little-known as is contemporary music. Moreover, we cannot concede that the generalities set forth by Father Schuler are in every case true, even with large quantities of salt.

Now inasmuch as our present-day church music does not exist in a vacuum, and since the really well-trained composers of the Church have been taught and thoroughly influenced by the persons, schools and trends of the best concert-music of our day, we may reasonably expect to find that our Catholic composers use the devices and techniques, and to a certain extent the styles, of the principal composers of our day.

Unfortunately, there are not many first-rate American Catholic composers of church music in what we can call "contemporary" techniques. There are a few more, per capita, perhaps, in the European countries, but in general, we can form our best opinions through the examination of the music and of the working principles of our foremost composers of concert-music.

The first characteristic which strikes the serious student of present-day composition is the enormous variety of styles and techniques. In past centuries, too, the difference between composers in style, technique and temperament was considerable.

Wagner differs greatly from Brahms, not in his vocabulary of chords and devices, but in their use and in the all-important movement of his works. Chopin is most certainly not a Wagner, nor is he a Brahms. He differs from Schumann and from Mendelssohn, in fact, from all his important contemporaries.

In an earlier era, Bach differs greatly from Handel, and a few years later, Haydn and Mozart, although usually classed together in music histories, are as different as night and day.

[35] This distinction of musical personalities holds true today. Bartok is certainly a far cry from Schoenberg, and Hindemith is obviously leagues removed from Prokofieff [sic], even in basic techniques. Even within the national "schools" there is a sharp difference between the major writers. Honegger is clearly more introspective and complex in his approach to composition than Milhaud, and neither of these masters is very closely related by music to Caplet.

What then, we repeat, is the predominant characteristic of our present-day music? Until a very few years ago we could have said that it was a kind of vigorous experimentation. Lately, mainly since the end of the second world war [sic], there has been a change of direction, toward mastery and fluency in the techniques developed during the last fifty years. Certain composers, like Hindemith and Stravinsky, have seemed to become remarkably conservative.

Are there any techniques which have become so widely used that we may say that they are part of our contemporary style? We have reason to think so.

There is a general tendency today to write music in more than four parts. This is a natural tendency in the light of the complexity of modern harmony compared with the classical variety. Even when a present-day composer writes, let us say, a three-part a cappella motet, he frequently implies through his part-writing and broken "chord" figures a multi-voiced harmony or counterpoint. During the earlier years of this century, the result of writing in many parts and in lines borrowed from two scales at once produced what we now call "polyharmony," and when the two scales were maintained for a certain length of time in strong independence, the result was a sort of "polytonality." This was at first a conscious experimentation, but today many composers write freely and fluently in this way, and the resultant polyharmony or polytonality is a product, not a device.

Consecutive fifths and fourths are not regarded as useful parts of a composer's technique, not simply as undesirable [36] errors. The former objections to such consecutives lay in the fact that they made one part subservient to another, which in a four-part texture was too much for the equilibrium of the music. Moreover, the prominence given the lower note of the fifth or the upper note of the fourth was frequently such as to remove the feeling of free part-writing. In five-part writing the classical composers permitted occasional consecutive fifths, of course, and in our present-day complex textures, they are accepted by the ear without a qualm. Even in thin textures, they are heard by the ear as a kind of organum, not as errors of technique.

Very rarely do we find dissonance of an intensity greater than those found in the music of the nineteenth century. Often our present-day composer uses a dissonance of a much milder kind, but he then treats it differently. Where the nineteenth century composer used the dissonance as a fence post between relatively longer consonant sonorities, the present-day composer often extends the dissonant sounds to lengths as great or greater than those of his more consonant structures. It is obvious that an ear brought up exclusively on classical music takes more readily to the momentary dissonances of the nineteenth century than it does to the more extended and often unresolved dissonance of our day, in spite of the relative mildness of 20th century dissonance.

What, the reader will say, therefore, is dissonance? Since it is pointless to give arbitrary definitions based on what we would like dissonance to be, in order that it might fit some all-inclusive concept that would answer once-and-for-all the problems surrounding it, we must define it by what it has been in the course of music history.

In classical music a dissonance was a simultaneous sounding of two or more notes, usually at the interval of a second, a fourth or a tritone, or a combination of these in several parts. Sometimes these dissonances were said to "resolve" when they changed to "consonant" intervals on a succeeding beat or part of a beat. It would seem that notes related to a given note above the value of its fifth harmonic [37] were considered dissonant. Thus in classical procedures a triad was considered consonant, and a seventh chord was considered either as a dissonance, or as an "active consonance." During the nineteenth century, however, nearly any note of the twelve-tone chromatic scale could be used against any other note, and the harmonic texture was used to "explain" these dissonances, as appoggiaturas, anticipations, passing tones, or even as escape notes.

Our present day composers have not changed the concept of the dissonance, but merely its use. Instead of requiring that the dissonance be momentary and that it be explained as an anticipation of a succeeding chord tone, as a passing note between chords or as a similar dash of harmonic spice, the present-day composer incorporates certain of the dissonances as part of his vocabulary, to be used as self-sufficient and "non-resolving" intervals in his textures. In other words, some of the nineteenth century spices and seasonings have become main ingredients, and their importance and their proportion of allotted time in the texture have increased accordingly.

The advantages of the use of dissonant intervals between parts are obvious. One hears the parts more clearly because of the acoustical clash of the overtones of each of the parts. It is possible to write more parts without duplication of others from time to time at the octave. It is also, therefore, easier to hear all the parts of an eight-part texture of Honegger, for example, or of Bartok, than of Brahms. These are advantages, of course, only so long as the composer intends that the listener hear the parts clearly.

We could discuss other purely technical points now in general use, but it would not serve to illustrate anything which the reader could not get more effectively from an afternoon with a phonograph and a few of the representative works of the principal present-day composers.

What shall we say, then, of Father Schuler's four marks of today's modern church music?

[38] Father says that it is linear; it is polyphonic or contrapuntal; it is frequently dissonant; it is often athematic.

With the third point there can be little argument. It is a fact which can be observed by anyone who will take the time to listen to a half-dozen works of men of the calibre [sic] of Bartok, Hindemith, Stravinsky or their colleagues.

With the other points there is room for discussion. It would be better to qualify the statement that our modern music is "linear" with the adverb "frequently," as was done for the third point mentioned. Although interest in linear writing is strong, there are certain important works which have strongly harmonic textures.

The same can be said of the second statement, with perhaps more emphasis. Unfortunately, we have lost sight of the real nature of counterpoint today in contrast with two other more frequently used procedures: heterophony and quod libet. Often the clever combination of parts and themes gives the impression of a type of masterly counterpoint written by Bach for inversion at the octave, tenth or twelfth. True counterpoint, however, is a kind of writing in which the vertical sonorities are not ignored. Any two melodies or parts will combine, but will they "fit" together, or will they merely go their own ways in utter disregard for the intervals produced? Will any two parts be sufficient in themselves, or will they require the accompaniment of other parts to make them convincing? Let it be understood that we do not mean that modern counterpoint must obey classical rules, or that quod libet or heterophony have no value. On the contrary, when they are used by a composer with full knowledge of what he is doing, the results are often splendid. Many of us who have had the experience of "ad libbing" a familiar theme into a familiar but entirely different classical texture know that this can be fun, and the classical composers knew that it could often be powerfully moving and effective. The insignificant clashes and discrepancies of counterpoint in such cases are unimportant in the light of the end result. Perhaps the best example we know of this type of quod libet is the insertion of the Toreador Song from Bizet's Carmen [39] as a gay intruder in the Meistersinger Prelude of Wagner. It fits, after a fashion, and can be used by a wit in the cello section to baffle a student conductor, but it is the ridiculous part of a technique which can also be sublime. The exalted use of quod libet is best typified by the tone poems of Richard Strauss, in which significant recapitulations of leit-motivs [sic] in the midst of quite independent textures achieve results of unity and coherence beyond the power of any merely literal repetition. The momentary raw edges where such themes fall recklessly into a texture not intended originally to receive them pass almost unnoticed in the success of the general effect. This, however, is not counterpoint. Neither is heterophony, in spite of its often dazzling and delightful effect. The combination of a simple melody with its ornamental version in thirds, sixths or any other interval is not real counterpoint. If it were, the nineteenth century would have to be credited with more good counterpoint than any other era, since this kind of heterophony was a common practice.

Let us now consider the fourth point of Father Schuler's description of our present-day music. He says that it is frequently athematic.

Now the present writer gave a great deal of thought to this point, not in regard to its truth, since it is clearly false, but with the purpose of divining just what Father Schuler could have meant by such a statement, since he must know from his considerable listening experience that composers up to and including those living today have constantly used themes of one kind or another so that through repetition or recapitulation a kind of unity could be achieved.

It may be that Father means that modern composers usually write themes which are not of the "whistleable," tuneful kind. This is a matter of opinion, and it depends a great deal on whether or not one's ear is attuned to contemporary themes. Certainly from time to time many of us find ourselves humming some of the rich themes of Stravinsky's Petrouchka, Hindemith's Mathis der Maler, Prokofieff's Fifth Symphony, Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra or [40] any of a hundred major works of present-day composers. The Catholic composers are not less thematic in their construction of works for the liturgy. The music of Paul Creston, for example, or that of Father Woollen, is certainly based on the careful use of themes, which, although they differ in certain respects from classical themes, are nevertheless real themes.

Perhaps Father Schuler has a special meaning for the word "theme," different from the meaning implied by every composer from Lassus to our own day. If so, he would have done well to explain it to his listeners at St. Louis. From his remarks on page 47 of the above-mentioned issue of Musart, it would seem that Father restricts his concept of thematic material to "tunes." This would automatically classify much of the music written from Bach to our day as "athematic," a classification which would be grossly unfair to both the music and the listener who tries to learn something from Father Schuler's discussion. The great composers of the past have sometimes used chord patterns as themes, sometimes merely a rhythmic pattern. Some of the themes of certain works for the violin would never be recognized as "tunes," but despite their wide range and acrobatics, they are themes in every sense of the word.

Father mentions Gregorian chant and Renaissance polyphony as two kinds of music which often do not have themes or melodies (again on page 47 of the Musart issue). The factors involved here are slightly different. Chant melodies are relatively short, and they are based on prose phrase lengths of varying proportions. For this reason an introit, for example, is more like a cavatina than an art-song. The entire antiphon is a single theme, repeated after intervening sections of psalmody. There is no reason to expect that a brief chant would contain two or three repetitions of a single short theme. The same is true of polyphony. As long as relatively brief sections are the only concern of the composer, he can afford to write somewhat freely, with the declamation of the text as his guide. The problem of thematic unity is automatically solved in many cases by repetition, as called for by the Missal, Graduale [41] or other source from which the text is derived. It is significant, however, that the more extended pieces, such as Lassus' Book of Job, or in the chant, the Tract Qui habitat, use the principle of thematic repetition to maintain unity. These themes are often nothing more than little formulae or melodic fragments, but since even the more extended chants or polyphonic compositions are nowhere near as long as classical concert movements, this is sufficient for the composer's purpose.

Is there, then, any really a-thematic music? Perhaps, but it is the self-conscious product of a special technique or, as in the case of some of the works of composers like Charles Ives, it is a product of a peculiar mentality. Although the author has had the opportunity of hearing and performing much of the standard concert repertoire from Bach to Debussy, most of the chant repertoire, large parts of the polyphonic repertoire and a great deal of present-day music, he would be hard put to name more than a few works in which thematic content was either absent or very small. There are classical cavatinas, of course, but they are obviously not athematic.

There is no reason to assume that a present-day composer might not write some very successful music with a minimum of thematic content, possibly with contrasting movements in his masses. This is not the point. The fact of the matter is that most of our present day composers do not avoid thematic repetition, simply because there is no point in omitting such a useful device.

To summarize our viewpoints regarding this question of "themes," let us say that we have noted that themes can take many forms, from that of a square-cut tune to an irregular snatch of melody, and from a mere rhythm to a complex, many-voiced texture. Thematic content is minimized in very short pieces, although some short pieces are really complete themes in themselves, without repetitions. Longer pieces use more obvious themes, with contrasting sections which serve to emphasize the themes when they appear. To say that present-day music is "often athematic" [42] is as unjustified as to say that music of the past was athematic. Fortunately for the vigor and growth of our present-day music, our modern composers have retained many of the great and useful devices developed in the past, including that of the thematic exposition, transformation and development.

One other point of Father Schuler's address deserves to be mentioned. He makes a great deal of the term "affective music" as opposed to a type of objective music which merely "adorns" the text. He states that the objective kind of music was predominant until the seventeenth century and that affective music took over during that period of musical history. Father also says that the Church looks askance on affective music, and that chant and Renaissance polyphony make little or no use of affective writing.

Affective writing, since it is well that we define our terms, is construed by Father Schuler to mean that type of music which attempts to express, by devices or similar means, the emotional content of the text. He attributes the advent of this kind of writing to the Baroque period of music history.

We submit the following assertions in this regard:

1. Composers have always used and continue to use, in any period of music history, both objective styles and other styles more closely related to the moods and content of the text. As examples from the chant, we call the reader's attention to the use of the modes to express certain moods. We do not sense these moods ourselves in the chant, but we are many centuries removed from medieval customs and aesthetics. From the writings of the theoreticians of the middle ages we can determine that there was a real emotional value in the use of certain modes, at least for the people of that era. Some chant melodies, too, contain passages which are explicable only in the light of the expressive intent of the composer. One such piece is the offertory Ascendit, in which the opening passages leave no doubt as to the fact [43] that the Lord did ascend into Heaven. We may try to protest that no word painting is intended by this rising passage, but if so, it is hard to explain why there is no other passage of similar structure anywhere else in the chant repertoire. Another example of the use of contrast and intensity to bring out textual values may be seen in the communion verse Dicit Dominus. It begins with a simple formula and cadence on the words "The Lord says:", then the words "Fill up the water-jars and take them to the chief steward" are set to two characteristic sixth mode formulae, the second resembling the ornate psalm tone in its simplicity. The words "When the chief steward had tasted the water made into wine," continue the quiet, impersonal type of "adornment" music. The words "he said to the bridegroom" are somewhat more insistent. Then the culminating speech of the steward: "You have saved the good wine until now," are set to a soaring, ornate melody, obviously intended to contrast with the simple phrases of statement which precede it. The emphasis on the essence of the  miracle is further heightened by the anticlimactic statement which concludes the piece, set to an almost syllabic formula: "This was the first sign which Jesus made before his disciples." This is a simple case of a composer's deliberately selecting a form and order which would best bring out the text. Obviously this is not mere adornment.

As examples from other music, we have the expressive use of devices such as the chromatically descending bass in Bach's Crucifixus of the B Minor Mass, or the opening chorus of the Cantata Jesu, Thou My Weary Spirit, or countless other works; the distant modulations of Handel's recitatives and similar procedures. Yet these same composers wrote enormous quantities of music which must be classified as forming a great part of the known repertoire of really objective music. Was it not Bach who brought the fugue to its greatest perspectives, together with many other polyphonic and purely objective techniques? The Baroque composers wrote what suited the purpose and scope of each work in its turn, sometimes producing objective music, sometimes highly subjective music, sometimes music which [44] changes from one facet to another in the course of a single composition or group of compositions.

The classical composers were not less flexible. Mozart has given us splendid examples of music which in no way attempts to express its texts, but merely to adorn them. This is so true that many of his great Masses which we hear today in concert are written in the athletic style of his symphonies, with the voice lines closely following those of his comic operas. This is no obstacle to their achieving greatness, and it provides us with splendid examples of the application of a single style of music to a number of texts of sharply contrasting meanings and potential emotions. We might compare, for example, the fugal Kyrie of Mozart's Requiem in its purely objective and structural declamation, with the emotional setting of the offertory Domine Jesu Christe of the same work.

Even in works of the late nineteenth century, dominated to a great extent by the so-called romantic spirit, we find excellent examples of fundamentally objective and structural music. We might mention the fugal works of the Brahms Requiem and the finale to his Fourth Symphony, the similar contrapuntal structures of the French composers of that day and other works of that type.

Later, in the early twentieth century, while Debussy was writing romantic music of his own, men like Milhaud, Satie and Stravinsky were working in more objective lines. Satie's music for Socrate is a good example of a style which is as independent of the events and text which accompany it as anything ever composed.

In contrast, we have twentieth century composers who write from an admittedly expressive or subjective viewpoint. We could mention Barber, Menotti, Honegger, Bartok and others. Honegger has spoken a great deal of his viewpoints. Like Schoenberg, he was a twentieth-century romantic, of a sort. He viewed his works in reaction against Stravinskian objectivity. In his opinion, music can be expressive, and "if the worse elements are not improved, at least the good will [45] remain and will be complete in itself, a vehicle of a human or divine meaning. A really 'objective' music ought to be able to stand on its own, without explanation. Why, then, does Stravinsky give so many? Honegger is convinced that music can convey great messages or more intimate ones, and his works, such as the Symphonie Liturgique, are not afraid of giving sub-titles . . . " Honegger's recent death removed only one of the many proponents of this "affective" kind of modern music. There are many others, many of them composers of first rank, who continue his aesthetic viewpoints. There are many others, too, who, without being extremists and without feeling themselves obliged to theorize about what they compose, utilize obviously expressive means in setting a text, even a Latin liturgical text, whenever it suits their purpose.

If our present-day music is more suited to liturgical ideals than the music of the Baroque era or that of the nineteenth century, it is because of three very important factors:

1. It is more concise and compact in its forms than most Baroque works would permit, and it is often of lyric rather than dramatic style, which is the principal distinction between it and classical music. In short, the present-day "sense of movement" is both direct and relatively brief as compared with 18th or 19th century music.

2. Today many composers are working with particular emphasis on liturgical compositions. This means that the new sounds and styles of our modern music will be associated from the outset with the church and its ceremonies. There will then be little danger that church music will later on bring to mind suggestions of the theater or the ballroom, as was the case when the 19th century composer, who wrote primarily for concerts or the opera, tried to apply his dramatic and romantic style to the liturgy.

[46] 3. Contrary to the notion implied by Father Schuler, the composer of today is perhaps more aware of the text and its meanings than were the composers of the Baroque and romantic periods. The obstacle to the use of the masses of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, etc., in the liturgy is formed by the intrusion of concert style in pieces which should have been conceived on other lines if they were to be used in church. In other words, the texts are treated much like any other text, secular or sacred, with no special consideration of the milieu in which they are to be sung. The music is great . . . among the greatest ever written, but it is not functional, at least in regard to the proportions and scope of the Roman liturgy.

Today our composers may use expressive devices more conservatively in their masses than they do in their secular works, but in a representative handful of works which lie before this author at this very moment, expressive devices are very apparent. In a beautiful four-part a capella mass by one of our most talented Catholic composers, we note, in passing, the brilliant treatment of the Glorificamus te, the Tu solus Altissimus (containing the highest note in the piece), the Hosanna in excelsis, and similar passages, in contrast with the more delicate treatment of the Et incarnatus est and like passages. The piece also contains a great quantity of purely objective music, too, which shows the range of style in a composer of real mastery.

Volumes could be written on this important subject, but it would be better for the sincere church musician to take upon himself the rewarding task of becoming familiar with our present-day church music first-hand. Father Schuler has some excellent words to say in that regard, as he does on other points, lest we appear to be over-critical of his remarks. The main thing is that we listen to as much music as we can. Whether or not the reader choose to adopt Father Schuler's viewpoints or those of this writer, or other entirely different ones, is not as important as his duty to his art and his Church to familiarize himself, retaining an open mind, with all new sounds and styles in church music. Naturally there is a lot of inept and weakly-conceived [sic] music [47] in the avant-garde repertoire. The experienced musician, however, will develop his taste in this aspect of the art just as he developed it in the sphere of traditional music, that is, by listening and evaluation over the course of many years.

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Source: J. Robert Caroll, "Contemporary Music and the Liturgy," The Gregorian Review 4, no. 6 (November-December 1957): 32–47.