A Prescriptive Approach-Part 7

A Prescriptive Approach-Part 7

 Today we return we return to the question, “Does the church have the right and responsibility to prescribe what is best suited for music worship?”  Yes, the church has both.  How to go about making these choices has become difficult but that does not remove either the right or  the responsibility of establishing standards for church music.

       Does anyone but churches approach music from a prescriptive standpoint?  Could you imagine playing “Three Blind Mice” for a university piano entrance audition?  How far would you get?  Why the necessity of playing something like a Beethoven piano sonata?  Why does a university prescribe what music is proper, suitable, and appropriate for an entrance exam?  The reason is that they believe in all of the above as well as profundity in music.  Most university piano professors actually believe that Beethoven’s sonatas are more profound than “Three Blind Mice”.

       So, when it comes to wise choices for undergraduate or graduate study they prescribe which music is proper etc. for every student to perform.  Why?  Because public universities believe that Music Matters.  They certainly believe in making wise choices and “Three Blind Mice” is simply not the appropriate music for undergraduate or graduate study.

       To these professors music is most definitely an art form with standards of correctness.  Why shouldn’t Christian musicians have equally high expectations for church music?  Where did church musicians get the philosophy that there is no profundity in church music, no absolutes, and no standards of correctness or appropriateness?  Whether educating or edifying, there are absolutes in music.  Therefore it is possible to make wise and unwise choices of both.

Quote for the day-Prescriptive Approach Part 7

"If they [non-Christians] are tired  of the noise which the world offers and seek music which feeds the spirit, does your church music attract them or does it have the same qualities and sound as the world's?"  Music in the Balance, Frank Garlock & Kurt Woetzel, pg. 92.