Music taste is so often only a superficial query to start a conversation. I'm going to quickly make the case that taste and choice are vastly different things. It's a fair thing to say that music is like food--one may have a preference for a certain type, style, or culture's food/music, but one may also choose certain foods/music that is healthy. This statement is based on the general principle that 99% of food and music (not counting lyrics) are objectively good. That 1% includes Twinkies and chaotic music, like that one song which had instructions like "release the penguins" and "have a nice day" scrawled in the margins of the sheets. Not that these things can't serve some purpose--Twinkies have calories and chaotic music might wake the dead.
I've got a personal embargo against mushrooms at all and tomatoes in solid forms. I don't know how I'm going to fit that eating disorder into this metaphor. I'll just leave out eating disorders, since it's understood that we are "out-of-order."
Music, that semi-universal language that does not need words to emote and draw pictures and invoke feelings as deep as satisfaction, is not to be taken lightly. It has such dramatic effects, one of the newest branches of the field of psychology (which is fledgling in itself) is a musical therapy of sorts--using music to create feelings (generally "good" feelings, whatever standard modern psychology uses to objectify as the "goodness" of the "psyche") to quell patients. As patience would have it, I'll look past the problem of objectifying "goodness" for just a moment, since I did promise to explain how I think "goodness" as it relates to music is objective. This "Music Therapy" brings my mind to the story of David and King Saul of the Bible:
So it came about whenever the evil spirit from God came to Saul, David would take the harp and play it with his hand; and Saul would be refreshed and be well, and the evil spirit would depart from him.
I Samuel 16:23
Now, I'm not trying to say that modern psychologists should try to exorcise their patients. I believe that demonic forces have been trapped, as Revelation has it, for a pretty long time. But that's beside the point. David, the "beloved" of God, would soon replace Saul as the anointed King of Israel. His history is important to consider, if only for a moment. David is from the tribe of Judah, and from his loins the true Messiah-King would be anointed as Savior. Judah was named with the words "now I will praise the LORD." The topic of this post is not about the genealogy of Jesus, but it is from this connection of song with praise that I believe our modern conception of praise as being musical arose.
So how would we objectively qualify music? How does one objectively make statements about art without words? I don't know. Does a certain style of musical order or beat pattern or rhythmic speed or time signature appeal to me, as the subject, because it is good in its own right virtue, or because of some ambiguous or arbitrary choice of mine? Is music, and art in general, really dependent on the subject? No, that can't be true. That would eradicate beauty. Is beauty (art) good because it draws the intended reaction from its participant/recipient as expected? Is beauty (art) good because it follows a pattern that ends on a tonic key/note/chord, to fulfill the psychological journey the listener unwittingly and joyfully embarks on? Is beauty (art) good because it makes the listener want to dance? Does it matter for which reasons that person would want to dance, who they would want to dance with, or how they would choose to dance?
I don't know the answers to these questions. Unfortunately, the Bible didn't come with a CD-songbook. But it did come with general principles for meditation, as Vicki points out, quoting Philippians 4:8 (NKJV).
Since it's too hard for me to figure out qualitative goodness in pure song, I'm going to tap out (Ha!) and simply give a 10-second rant on my personal vice: musical lyrics. Lyrics get stuck in my head, as I'm sure many of you can commiserate, and they won't go away for hours! I thank God that they don't last more than a night. But because I've found that I have songs being sung in my mind almost constantly, it's become a choice of mine to purify my playlist. Besides the fact that music is a powerful tool to add to words to drive home messages, it is the responsibility of the listener to be well-educated on these messages intended for consumption, just as it is the responsibility of persons with food allergies to check labels. Likewise, as a music junkie, it's my responsibility to check labels and thoughtfully choose what songs to fill my appetite and digest throughout the day.
Glean this, reader: words are incredibly powerful. Jesus is called the Logos: the Word, the Thesis, the Argument, the Conversation. God's creation and maintenance is through words, sung in order and in tune, and our small voices are granted back-stage privileges to enter the stage for just a second.
After all, "when we sing, [especially hymns] we are praying twice." --Gary Beaston
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