Marialilia Cavallaro gives a working paper on 'Music and the Gods. The Harmony of Bow and Lyre in the Imagery on Apollo'

The reference to the fragment 51 (DK) of Heraclitus, in the title of this paper, aims to start a reflection on the opposition between music and war and, more broadly, on the opposition between soul and body, humans and gods, politics and religion.

At the basis of the argument there are two considerations on the role of the mousikē technē in the ancient Greek societies: 1) musical rituals always preceded the establishment of the divine cults performed during the Greek period; 2) proceeding towards the classical age, it becomes even more evident that the performances of musical rituals within the cults were related to their growing social importance rather than to their pertinence to some religious competences of the gods.

This second aspect appears even more controversial in the case of Apollo, since we are used to think of his figure as mainly associated with the musical arts, although the god had a primary characterization as archer/warrior An historical analysis on the developments of the divine figure of Apollo, based on literary and archaeological sources, allows to reconstruct the opposition between his archaic competences as archer and the image of the god as mousikōs, that was spread in the Greek imagery from the end of the 6^th century B.C. Beyond the apparent contradictions of the representations of Apollo, the bow and the lyre seem to find harmony under the wing of his human, or social, affinities, that well suit with the social use of the musical practices.

Moving forward with this reflection, the way in which the imagery on the god was conceived in the literature also complies with the image of Apollo spread by contemporary festivals, and it is particularly interesting the case of the Spartan Gymnopaidiai. The anthropological analysis of the musical rituals performed at the Gymnopaidiai, at the end of the paper, brought the discussion to its beginning, pointing out both the actual absence of strict connections between Greek gods and musical rituals, and the socio-political role of the mousikē technē in the construction of social memories. A unique instance of an entirely civic Greek festival, with the musical features of all its rituals, the Gymnopaidiai expressed, in the most exemplar way, all the socio-political potential that was assigned to the religion. Conversely, they also reveal how well-known the religious aspects of politics were.

Jasmin Kutzner presents a working paper on 'Tradition and Ritualism as Indicators of Jewish Self-Perception'

The paper deals with the question of conditions for individually construction of a national-Jewish felt art music. An autobiographic inside into the important stages of life of the composers Joachim Stutschewsky and Arnold Schoenberg manifests the Neue Juedische Schule as a movement with open and fluent boundaries. The art-musical inclusion of tradition and ritualism rather go beyond the frame of the association as a part of individually (Jewish) self-placement.

Jasmin Kutzner is presenting a working paper on 'The Influence of Synagogal Liturgy and Ritual Practices of Judaism in the Works of the Neue Jüdische Schule'

Hélène Clément & Jascha Nemtsov play Alexander Weprik - "Chant rigoureux"  

The project is dedicated to the appearance of national Jewish art music in the first decades of the 20th century. With the changes of the social position of the Jewish population in Europe and their participation in political, economic, and cultural life, a new self-confidence arose in regard to religious and cultural traditions and ethical principles, especially in Eastern Europe. Russia not only became the nutrient medium of a national Jewish renaissance, what led to the creation of a national school of Jewish music in the early 20th century - initially also the most important centre of Jewish artmusic - which later on inspired many composers of different countries to artistic disputes about the independent Jewish language of music. In the centre of the research interest are compositions of the Neue Jüdische Schule, which was an association of composers characterised by Zionist ideas and institutionally organized with the Gesellschaft für jüdische Volksmusik in St. Petersburg (1908-1920), the Gesellschaft für jüdische Musik in Moskow (1923-1931) and with the Verein zur Förderung jüdischer Musik in Vienna (1928-1938). Within the project selected musical works of Jewish composers will be analyzed regarding the question of the influence of liturgical elements and ritual practices of Judaism to them. In a second step, they will be put into the context of (music-)historical and cultural processing and identity-founding strategies. The scientific discussion about both synagogal and folkloristic music and about ritual practices of the Judaism, with respect to their historical development, functionality and social influence, are the starting point and basic concept of the project. The research project is strongly linked to the Potsdamer Archiv der Neuen Jüdischen Schule initiated and built up by Jascha Nemtsov. The goal of the research project is the discursive interpreting examination of the musical collections of the archive paying special attention to the interconnections of liturgical, traditional, and ritual practices of Judaism with art-musical forms of expression. The scholarly interest also follows the questions of underlying musical and sociological ideals of the Neue Jüdische Schule, the tense relationship within the association of composers and to the social reality. Furthermore, the topic music as a political symbol and medium for dissemination of a national consciousness will be addressed. Furthermore, the interdisciplinary oriented research project wants to give birth to analytical results regarding structural elements of the Jewish music-language and also of the positioning of the Neue Jüdische Schule in the musical field of tension between tradition and innovation.

Mark Porter is presenting a paper on 'Singing, resonance and ascetic struggle'

In my work at Max-Weber I am interested in exploring ideas of resonance in relation to Christian congregational music. In contrast to common contemporary ideals of authenticity, the idea of resonance allows the opportunity to foreground bi-directional back and forth relationships in sonic, social and spiritual realms. Through a series of exploratory case studies I am exploring the nature of such relationships and the potential for such an approach to illuminate and bring together aspects of congregational music not typically foregrounded in this manner.

Following my previous exploration of theories of resonance, in this paper I explore my first case study: the 4^th century desert fathers. The music of the desert rarely takes a prominent role in discussions of church music history, we have no surviving musical scores, we have no grand theories about the role and nature of music, in fact we have remarkably little discussion of it whatsoever. It is not a moment which obviously serves to advance musical composition in any substantial way, and music is very much a background rather than foreground presence in most of the surviving writings. In contrast to such neglect, I suggest that attention to patterns of resonance, and an exploration of singing within its broader bodily, spiritual and spatial ecology serves to illuminate desert psalmody, presenting with utmost clarity an individual’s struggle as they attempt to pursue with single-minded, but often- frustrated determination their path of spiritual and bodily destruction, formation and witness.

Mark Porter gives a paper on 2.2.2016: 'Sounding back and forth: dimensions and directions of resonance in congregational musicking'

In this paper he aims to lay some initial conceptual foundations for later exploration of particular case studies in terms of resonance. He is going to survey existing social and sonic usages of the term and suggests the need to hold together a number of different understandings in order to take full advantage of resonance’s messy and expansive ability to point towards multi-directional and multi-dimensional complexes of relationships surrounding the activity of congregational music. He suggests, rather than aiming to arrive at a strict definition of resonance as a phenomenon, that it is useful to allow a degree of messiness and suggest, instead, that a list of questions might serve as a more useful starting point for further exploration.

The paper is part of the larger project on 'Axes of resonance in Christian congregational music':

 

The rise of contemporary worship music in the latter part of the 20th century has been bound up closely with ideals of personal authenticity. The use of popular musical styles in church is, at least in part, the result of a pragmatic desire for the music of the church to act as a natural expression of worshippers’ everyday lives, whilst at the same time the need for ‘personal sincerity’ in worship has resulted in an emphasis on the role of the individual’s inward attitudes in the activity of sung worship. As my own recent work, alongside that of a number of others has highlighted, this project has come to face numerous challenges over the course of its development: the diversity of musical lives present in contemporary society calls into question any straightforward relationship between individuals’ musical lives and the music employed in a congregational environment, whilst discourses and ideals of personal authenticity have led to contradictory and problematic dynamics as they have collided with the performative spaces of the commercialised worship industry and the social dynamics and needs of local church communities.

Such analyses are not limited to the academic realm, and a number of popular commentators have charted a generational retreat away from the pragmatic strategies of contemporary worship music environments. Sensing the need to articulate new understandings, some individuals have found themselves turning to alternative models and ideas in order to understand the contemporary musical practices they find themselves embedded within, exploring, for example an understanding of worship as a formational practice or as a sacramental activity. Such ideas challenge the notion of musical worship as a product of the authentic self in favour of the self as produced by and receptive of divine and social dynamics as transmitted through music. However, at the same time, they continue an on-going quest which sets out to describe and prescribe an appropriate relationship between the individual and the social, spiritual and musical context that they find themselves in within congregational worship.

Such dynamics can usefully be illuminated by an appeal to Hartmut Rosa’s application of the concept of resonance. We can understand the quest for authenticity in musical worship as one particular attempt at forming a resonant relationship between individual, world, group, music and the divine. The individual, through a dynamic of authenticity stemming from both protestant theology and consumer ideologies, is able to appropriate the world around them through its reflection of their everyday self and through their investment and expression into it of their inner spiritual devotion. If this relationship breaks down, then we can ask whether this might be a result of the situation of the contemporary worship music industry’s appropriation of and situation within the paradoxical dynamics and conditions of modernity. At the same time, we can potentially see the quest of the Millenials as a search for alternative models of world resonance, embarking on precisely the same task as a previous generation of worshippers but setting out on a range of different paths in order to do so. This research project will take such contemporary dynamics as its starting point in order to explore the concept of resonance as it applies to Christian congregational music. If the quest for resonance through patterns of personal authenticity has found itself encountering significant challenges, then what axes and processes of resonance can we trace through Christian congregational music’s long and diverse period of existence? What forms of resonance does congregational music permit? What processes have enabled individuals to appropriate this musical and social environment in a resonant manner? How do social and sonic theories of resonance complement, contradict or combine in congregational music?