The Pursuit of Excellence in Conservative Christian Music
Part 1 – Personal Observations
I grew up in a home with two very musical Christian parents who gave me an awareness and appreciation of all kinds of music. After I my conversion at 15, I mostly listened to the popular Christian music of the day. Throughout elementary, middle, and high school I took music lessons and participated in school musical groups and community orchestras, specializing in orchestral percussion instruments. In college, as I grew spiritually, I put away the Contemporary Christian Music of my youth, replacing it with a more conservative Christian music style. Along the way, I switched from playing instruments focus to voice training. I took a few years of voice lessons while in college and have enjoyed singing in various groups for church ever since. In short, my life has been filled with music in one form or another.
After college, I entered pastoral ministry and became the father of twin children. My wife and I made a conscientious effort to both promote godly music and provide excellent musical training for our children. We sang to our children when they were still in the womb and provided them with music lessons since they were young. Both children excelled in their instruments and are currently enrolled in highly respected musical conservatories. They each desire to use their training for the cause of Christ, helping the next generation of musicians pursue godly, conservative, high quality Christian music.
I say all that not in any way to brag, but to simply communicate that this topic is something I have invested in, studied, and am greatly burdened about. I realize that our home is not the “norm” for Christians today, and that not everyone is going to excel musically. That’s not the focus of my burden. My burden is this: 1) that Christian musicians today publish, produce, and “perform” genuinely good and beautifully excellent music, rather than follow a train of musical mediocrity, and 2) that Christian parents would grasp the need to train their children in strong musical endeavors.
For many centuries, prior to the age of Enlightenment, the musical center of culture was in “the church.” Because of a predominantly God-centeredness in its outlook in western civilizations, the church was the primary shaper of cultural expressions, including music. That has now changed. No longer is the church driving the culture; rather, it is the culture (specifically pop culture) that is shaping and dominating the church. Our post-modern, post-Christian culture has moved far away from a God-centered outlook on life and is forehead deep into a self-centered outlook on life. What is true generally in western culture is also true specifically in much of Christian music.
While the shift from being God-centered to self-centered came about over the last two hundred years, my observations have been particularly over the past twenty-five years, specifically within the realm of broader “conservative” Christian music. Changes can be seen in the source of our Christian music, the style in which songs are played or sung, an adoption of a pop culture mentality, and a general lack of excellent vocal or musical technique.
This change didn’t happen overnight, it has been a slow but steady shift. Nonetheless, the result is church music that is often trite, sentimental, musically poor and uninteresting, and vocally done in a lazy or “pop” style. The excellence desired in musical expression has shifted away from higher cultural forms as seen in the classical realm including technique and ability, to nearly exclusively being concerned about being “accessible,” “authentic,” and simply “text-driven.”
There are many reasons for this digression, too many to articulate here. Yet I offer the following observations as a musician who is also a senior pastor and who has been involved in Christian music ministry for over thirty years.
Fear of “high church” model
Though somewhat difficult to define, it seems that there is a fear in much of conservative Christianity of a higher, more formally trained vocal or musical technique because it sounds too much like the “high church” of yesteryear. I am not saying that every Christian vocalist needs to sound like Luciano Pavarotti or Kathleen Battle. However, their vocal training was top notch, and it seems that many within conservative circles are afraid of such vocal excellence within the church. The same goes with instrumentalists. Not everyone is a YoYo Ma virtuoso, yet high quality instrumental training and technique should not be scorned by Christians.
My experience as a musician and father of musicians is that this kind of high-quality musical training is mostly found in secular circles rather than sacred circles. When well-meaning but ill-trained Christian musical teachers give mediocre musical instruction to young students, what is most often produced is more musical mediocrity rather than excellence. Christian parents should not be afraid to pursue secular, highly and classically trained musical teachers to instruct their children musically. Obviously, discernment and careful observation are needed on the part of the parents. The initial sacrifice of time, money, and gas will pay great dividends in the end.
Christian Music has been “popified”
By this I mean that pop music, along with all its accoutrements, has flooded into Christianity. This can be evidenced in multiple ways.
1) There is an affinity for what is new rather than what is older and enduring. Musicians seem to think that music must be constantly newly produced, written, or arranged to remain relevant and to appease the consumer. However, this often just produces more, not better, music, and it leads to weaker musical tastes in those who practice it or listen to it.
2) There is an underlying philosophy of appealing to the masses. This is true, for instance, in most hymnals produced. They contain a vast array of hymns to appeal to more types of churches so that the cost of production is “worth it.” But beyond this, music is often written and produced for the “hoi polloi” (“the common man”). That means it is often done quicker, in a more formulaic way, and following the pop form to appeal to more people.
3) What is new and appealing must also be accessible for the masses. Because fewer and fewer people are concerned about high artistic form, music must be written in such a way that doesn’t require much training. However, that bar of accessibility continues to drop lower and lower.
4) The “pop” outlook of our culture leads to shorter attention spans, requiring, musical expressions that emphasize the energetic and the emotional to hold the attention of the musician and audience. Also, songs may not be longer than three or four minutes, for fear of losing the audience’s attention.
Pop culture and the pop style of music in general has infiltrated and reshaped much of the thinking, writing, arranging, and performing of Christian music, even within much of “conservative” Christianity. Again, this is not a new phenomenon; I’ve watched these changes for the past 30 years or so.
Increasing Consumption of Pop Music
This is perhaps one of the biggest factors contributing to the overall problem. With the ubiquitous nature of cell phones, especially with young people, the opportunity to listen to any kind of pop music by any musician is literally a few clicks away. Add in their earbuds, and they can tuck their phone in their pocket and listen with relative ease and ambiguity to whatever they want. When it comes time for those young people to sing in church, they will generally sing and play in a style like what they’ve been listening to. As with so much in our Christian lives, what we allow into our lives will often come out. Such is the case with music. We will emulate what we listen to, especially vocally.
Conclusion
I recognize that I am using broad brushes to paint this picture, and I understand the weaknesses in broad brush arguments. Obviously, there are exceptions, and my observations may not be match yours exactly. I also realize that I am myself a small fish in a relatively small pond (though my pond has expanded much over the years). However, what I am writing here is the fruit of many years of observation, biblical study, and pastoral ministry. In other words, I am not simply “shooting from the hip” but rather raising concerns, hopefully thoughtfully and humbly, about a growing trend within conservative Christianity. In future articles I want to suggest how we can turn things around. I don’t want to simply point out problems. I want to offer solutions as well.
Taigen Joos is the pastor of Heritage Baptist Church in Dover, NH.
Photo by Tyler Callahan on Unsplash