On May 7, instead of a sermon, our music director, Randy Fayan, played an extended piece on the organ — J. S. Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor (BWV 582). Unfortunately, we are not able to present a recording of this worship service. However, here is Rev. Dan Harper’s introduction to the music:
Today, instead of hearing a sermon, Randy Fayan, our music director, will play an extended piece of music. I shouldn’t say he will play the music instead of a sermon: it will be the sermon. And instead of a reading this morning, I’d like to say a few words about music in churches.
As I was talking with Randy about this worship service, I asked him what his thoughts w ere about music in churches. Randy pointed out that In Unitarian Universalist churches, people brings many of their own ideas to church; as a non-creedal religion, we Unitarian Universalists have a great openness to a variety of religious ideas. And nowhere is that more obvious than when music — because when you’re listening to music, you have to bring yourself into contact with the music; you have t o bring your own ideas, your spirit, to the music; for only then can it make sense.
Randy put it this way: “The more you invest in listening to the music, the more you get out of it.”
At this point, I said to Randy that this sounds a lot like religion. Not only that, I said that more and more these days I believe that both listening to music and doing religion are more meaningful when they are done in community.
To which Randy responded that he listens to recorded music less these days; there’s something about listening to live music, with all its imperfections, that is superior to even the best recorded music. I believe t he same is true of religion: you need to be there in the room with other people.
This helps explain why we come to church to listen to Randy’s music. We could just as easily stay home and listen to a CD of the exact same music: but something would be missing. We could even drive to Boston or Providence or New York and hear some famous performer play the same piece of music: but while this would be better, it would still be different. Part of the difference is that when you listen to music in a church, you are listening to music in the way it’s really meant to be played: for listening to and playing music is always a sacred act. And music is meant to be heard, not in some big anonymous group, but in a crowd with people you know and care for.
Here in a worship setting is where music is meant to be heard. Here, you can invest yourself into the music, let it move you, knowing that you are surrounded by people who care. Here you don’t have to applaud — in fact Randy has asked that you completely refrain from applause until after the postlude is over — you don’t have to applaud, because in a community like this, everyone knows that we appreciate Randy’s music, and we don’t have to show him that by applauding — and that way, too, we’ll hear the music as it is meant to be heard: as a prelude to meditation, as an accompaniment to your own soul-work. So during the sermon, when Randy is playing, you can sit and let the music move you and take your spirit places you may not have known existed.