Monkeybot

Many, many Christmas carols. I find that I tend to like the melodies of religious Christmas songs more than those of secular ones ("What Child Is This" vs. "Frosty the Snowman"... no contest).

Demigawd

Despite my anti-christian and anti-church sentimentalities, I still am moved by "Amazing Grace". Particularly as performed by Chris Squire of Yes.

Bree

O Holy Night
Jesu, Thou Joy of Man's Desiring
Ave Maria

The Messiah
Requiem (Mozart)

Strawberry

Monkeybot: "What Child Is This" usurped the famous old English folk tune "Greensleeves," which has a very secular, courtly-love-type text. It was all part of the plan to convert the Pagans...

Also many of the German hymn tunes that Bach used and that are popular in hymnals today were originally secular tunes. Martin Luther pulled the bawdiest tunes out of the beer halls and set sacred words to them, also as part of the plan to convert the "sinners." So lots of the favorite religious music here actually has secular origins, so you don't have to feel as guilty about liking it.

Jagged

I was never much into "praise music," but I was extremely into Christian recording artists. It's been interesting to see which records actually survived my "deconversion." Very, very few. The one group that still has my full respect for artistic integrity and beauty is Sixpence None the Richer. True artists, not interested in towing any fundy lines. Their "This Beautiful Mess" album is a masterpiece. Interesting to note that my choice for the most honest Christian group is also the most full of anguish. Their lead songwriter was often seriously depressed, but he turned it into amazing music which was real helpful to me since I felt the same way.

"Bleeding" by Sixpence:

deep inside the darkest night
is drinking in the light
from pinholes pricked, holy needles knicked
in a canopy of white
i'm alone, i'm alone
and i'm beating my soul to make it bleed a drop of hope
then i'll drink it up in a golden cup and let it grow inside

and i fear that you've gone away
but you must be somewhere near

the fire fades so the deepest shades
slowly trickle down the wall
in a room i hide will i come outside
and have some kind of fall
all my words, all my words
they have lost all their worth
nothing's good enough for anyone
and the look on my face
leaves a subtle trace of the change
that is to come
-Slocum

wow, reading over these lyrics again i'm understanding it more. how much he's just trying, trying so hard to do it all right with faith, honestly saying 'god help me, i'll do whatever you want,' but peace and happiness elude him and he's just in so much pain. yet he's sure that the problem is with him and he can't get out of the cycle. that's how i felt too.

<a href="http://www.maranooka.de/ccmlyrics/archives/s/Sixpence_None_the_Richer/0-This_Beautiful_Mess.htm" target="_blank">More Sixpence</a> if you're interested.

btw forget their recent stuff.

[ November 10, 2002: Message edited by: Jagged Little Pill ]</p>

The Admiral

The Vatican Rag by Tom Lehrer.

The Admiral

Egoinos

I have to admit to a liking for lots of hymns Not the new ones, but the old ones. I find the new ones too sappy, and too sugary for my liking.

I like "I vow to thee my country", and <a href="http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/a/n/anddidtf.htm" target="_blank">"Jerusalem"</a>. When I was younger "When A Knight Won His Spurs" was my favourite Especially the alternate version Alan Ahlberg did! When I was at school we used to sing a lovely two-part version of <a href="http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/f/b/fbeautye.htm" target="_blank">"For the Beauty of the Earth"</a> (the tune we sang isn't on that site), which we were keen on because it doesn't really mention God. The <a href="http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/b/h/bhymnotr.htm" target="_blank">"Battle-Hymn of the Republic"</a> is pretty cool, too! Favourite carol has to be <a href="http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/i/t/itcameup.htm" target="_blank">"It came upon the midnight clear"</a>. Especially the last verse:

It Came Upon the Midnight Clear

It came upon the midnight clear, that glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth, to touch their harps of gold;
“Peace on the earth, good will to men, from heaven’s all gracious King.”
The world in solemn stillness lay, to hear the angels sing.

Still through the cloven skies they come with peaceful wings unfurled,
And still their heavenly music floats o’er all the weary world;
Above its sad and lowly plains, they bend on hovering wing,
And ever over its Babel sounds the blessèd angels sing.

Yet with the woes of sin and strife the world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel strain have rolled two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not the love song which they bring;
O hush the noise, ye men of strife and hear the angels sing.

And ye, beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow,
Look now! for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing.
O rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing!

For lo! the days are hastening on, by prophet bards foretold,
When with the ever circling years comes round the age of gold;
When peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendors fling,
And the whole world send back the song which now the angels sing.

---

But my absolute favourite is this, though you rarely hear it sung, and often they don't use these words or the tune we used anyway:

Hills of the North, Rejoice!

Hills of the North, rejoice;
River and mountain-spring,
Hark to the advent voice;
Valley and lowland, sing;
Though absent long, your Lord is nigh;
He judgement brings and victory.

Isles of the southern seas,
Deep in your coral caves
Pent be each warring breeze,
Lulled be your restless waves:
He comes to reign with boundless sway,
And makes your wastes his great highway.

Lands of the East, awake,
Soon shall your sons be free;
The sleep of ages break,
And rise to liberty.
On your far hills, long cold and grey,
Has dawned the everlasting day.

Shores of the utmost West,
Ye that have waited long,
Unvisited, unblest,
Break forth to swelling song;
High raise the note, that Jesus died,
Yet lives and reigns, the Crucified.

Shout, while ye journey home;
Songs be in every mouth;
Lo, from the North we come,
From East, and West, and South.
City of God, the bond are free,
We come to live and reign in thee!

---

When all's said and done, the poetry of the hymns, and of the bible itself, and of the other forms of Christian piety in our language are perhaps the best legacy of Christianity. Beyond all the crap fundamentalists spout, there are some good things about it

The Vatican Rag is pretty good too though

[Edited because I can't spell for toffee]

[ November 10, 2002: Message edited by: Egoinos ]</p>

Jack

I'll narrow it down a little more:

The "Lacrimosa" from the Mozart "Requiem". I've sung all these pieces many times and Mozart's "Lacrimosa" is still the most emmotionally effective.

Jack

yahwehyadayada

In the spirit of Nightshade's post "Losing my Religion", I like Blind Melon's cover of "The Pusher"

I'm oh so tired
of you pushin' that thorny crown
down onto my head so hard
my knees are 2 inches in the ground.
And I said goddamn
goddamn that bible pushin' man

Opera Nut

When I was at summer music camp way back in high school, at Lawrence KS, this is what I learned:

The Catholic kid taught me ROCK AROUND THE CROSS

THe Protestant kid taught me PLASTIC JESUS

and the Jewish kid taught me THE FIVE CONSTIPATED MEN IN THE BIBLE (I can only remember 2 - Moses - he took two tablets and Solomon - he sat for forty years).

===
I've been sick to death of Amazing Grace for years. Overplayed and I don't like the word "wretch". And I'm not crazy about bagpipes either (esp. for somebody whose mother's maiden name was McEachern of the Stuarts).

===Real stuff: I like the Mozart, Faure & Berlioz & Brahms Requiea. (requiems?)

"Vissi d'arte" from Tosca is a sort of prayer, as are some other well known arias.
Vissi d'arte, vissi d'amore, non feci mi male ad anima viva (I lived for art, I lived for love, I never harmed any living thing.)

I used to sing church solos when I was a church goer. After I studied opera for a couple of years (I'm a 3 octave mezzo ) church music hasn't held any attraction for me, it's too simple, hymns tend to turn into dirges, and I have already sung in big masses in high school and college. I would much rather sing secular stuff in foreign languages, as it is more challenging. IOW, only in a Unitarian church could I get by with that.

The only classical solo (not a hymn tune) that I have sung in a regular church is O Divine Redeemer by Gounod, and I am not crazy about the tune, personally. I have played the Bach Ave Maria and the Meditation from Thais in church, on the fiddle and those are common solos.

====
Actually, since I identify myself so strongly as a musician, and have studied it my entire life, I consider any "good" music to be "sacred" in that it celebrates life, and that "sacred" and "secular" is an artificial distinction. The criterion for sacred or secular is the words, pretty much...does it talk about God or faith or whatever? I know "Good music" is quite subjective.

I hope a lot of people can understand that I think the fundamental question is, is it good or bad? Not "sacred" or "secular". I have had plenty of artistic religious experiences (getting insight into the nature of humanity) at the opera house or at the symphony listening to a soloist.

U2 is an example of an overtly Xtian band that is not considered to be "Xtian rock" but they admit they are asking spiritual questions in their music. They have a lot of bible imagery in their songs but I wouldn't say they were trying to convert anybody in particular.
The fundies wouldn't like them because they don't beat on God and Jesus constantly in the lyrics, since fundies like extreme repetition. And they have done enough songs about war and the Catholic/Protestant wars in Ireland and the damage it has done to their society.