Music Never Dies

This is the (slightly adapted) text of a sermon preached at the funeral of an elderly gentleman – Joe - who was a highly regarded music teacher. (Joe is a pseudonym.)

Music has a way of moving most people unlike anything else.

An American psychologist called Anne Rosenfeld has called music "the beautiful disturber" She comments,

"Music can move us to tears or to dance, to fight or make love. It can inspire our most exalted religious feelings and ease our anxious and lonely moments. Its pleasures are many, but it can also be alien, irksome, almost maddening." (Psychology Today, December 1985, p. 48)

Best of all, music is a channel for the grace of God. Music can be a way for us to feel the presence of God. In listening to music we can be transported to somewhere else. A place where we sense God.

The German theologian Martin Luther once said:

“I have no pleasure in any man who despises music. It is no invention of ours: it is a gift of God. I place it next to theology. Satan hates music: he knows how it drives the evil spirit out of us.” Martin Luther

I have to disagree slightly with Luther. Firstly, the music of the bagpipes has more to do with Satan than God in my opinion! And while I agree that music is God given, I would argue that theology and music aren’t side by side as Luther suggests. Rather they are interlinked.

Of course when we think of all the different types of music there are in the world, depending on our own personal tastes we may find some music less conducive to contemplating God than others. But it seems to me if the music we listen to gives us pleasure, and puts us in a better frame of mind, then the music is God given.

During one of the conversations I had with Joe, I asked him what kinds of music he liked. He said “I like all kinds of music as long as it is good.” Though as Joe’s son said to me when we met “What Dad meant was ‘I like all kinds of music as long as I tell you what is good!”

Joe was I gather a great lover of Bach and most German classical music. I’ve heard him say “I don’t like that French stuff!” With this in mind I’m sure Joe would approve of something the great Johann Sebastian Bach himself said:

“Music is an agreeable harmony for the honour of God and the permissible delights of the soul.”

I don’t know if Joe liked jazz. There is a story that the great American jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis was playing in a small jazz club in New York in 2001. He was playing a soulful, mournful ballad called "I Don't Stand a Ghost of a Chance With You.”

At the song's most heart-rending point, a mobile phone rang completely spoiling the mood. Marsalis froze. This rude interruption could have ended the concert. Marsalis could have walked off stage in disgust.

After a few seconds, however, Marsalis did something amazing. Without missing a beat, he picked up on the tune of the phone's ring and incorporated it into the song he was playing. He performed variations on it - blending it with what he'd planned to play - and then drew the whole ballad back to the original theme.

The stunning result brought down the house. Wynton Marsalis transformed a rude interruption into a moment of glory. He didn't allow an unexpected shock to stun or silence him. Instead, he turned this setback into a comeback.

Source http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2003/03/wyntons-blues/302684/

That's what good musicians do.

We gather today because life has been interrupted. The discordant, shrill ring of death has seemingly overcome the music and melody of life. Hearing and experiencing death's ring makes us angry and frustrated. We want to know who's responsible for this interruption. Death makes us wonder whether we'll ever have a "ghost of a chance" of understanding, of getting back in tune with life, of feeling the music once again.

But we need to recognize that God improvises a different tune, a variation on a theme. Somehow God, the master Musician, is able to take the discordant ring of death, the interruption and turn it into something beautiful. That's really what resurrection is about. Jesus walked out of the tomb, showing us that even death doesn't stop the music. The song goes on, perhaps a bit differently, more improvised, more subtly beautiful, but it goes on.

The death of someone close to us can force us to walk away, or it can be an opportunity for improvisation - to find new ways of celebrating life amid tragedy. In Romans 8:28, the apostle Paul put it this way:

Romans 8:28 Good News Translation (GNT)

28 We know that in all things God works for good with those who love him,[a] those whom he has called according to his purpose.

That's a powerful image. No matter how hurtful, how tragic, how unfair or how out of tune we might feel, God can work variations on the theme of life within us and turn it into something beautiful.

God's direction for us today is to follow his lead, to improvise, to start something new.

Music never dies. And because of God's promise of the Resurrection, neither do the people we care about. That is our hope for Joe and it is our hope for ourselves too. Amen.

Acknowledgement: Photograph of Wynton Marsalis from The Guardian web site.