Thursday, June 12, 2008

Heaven and Nature Sing

A couple of years ago my wife, Ruth, gave me this fun tee-shirt from Hately Designs. You can see the critters making celebratory noise and the inscription "and heaven and nature sing" come sfrom the hymn Joy to the World. While we tend to warble this one at Christmas it is really a hymn of praise that can be sung at any time of the year.

Do creatures other than humans make music? While in Nova Scotia I listened to an interview with musician and author David Rothenberg who has written a book called Thousand Mile Song: Whale Music in a Sea of Sound. He has carefully studies the music of Humpback Whales in the Pacific Ocean and realizes that a whale song can travel a thousand miles underwater. Even more significant, the males sing the same song which may change year to year, month to month, week to week. Why do they sing? Apparently for the hell of it -- or the heaven of it. These songs don't attract female Humpbacks, or have any apparent purpose. They could simply be joyous music. Rothenberg speaks of how evolution has equipped birds and other creatures to make elaborate song which is music. I wonder if it is both evolution and the intention of the creator.

I just finished the novel Diary of a Bad Year by J.M. Coetzee the Nobel and Booker prize winner.
The elderly man at the centre of the story muses:

What Cartesian nonsense to think of birdsong as pre-programmed cries uttered by birds to advertise their presence to the opposite sex, and so forth! Each bird-cry is a full-hearted release of the self into the air, accompanied by such joy as wew can barely comprehend. "I" says each cry:"I, what a miracle."

I know that several of my readers make music as a form of worship and praise, including the bass player at the church we attended on Sunday. He seemed quite transported as he played.

Is creaturely song a reflection of the divine glory? Why do you make music?

5 comments:

Nancy said...

I love to sit quietly in our backyard and listen to the songs that the birds sing every evening. I often wonder if our children hear them too. It became apparent yesterday morning at 5:45a.m. that children do hear the sounds of nature. Our 8 year old was wide awake, dressed and ready for school. When asked why she was up and ready before I was even awake, her response was, "I was awakened by an annoying chirping bird!" Later in the morning I found her "chirping" away as she prepared her books for school. Song is a part of all of our live, we just need to slow down more and "hear the music".

David Mundy said...

Cute! It's good to know that Caleigh is paying attention to the world around her, even though she was frustrated.

I'm glad you wrote because I was thinking of the junior choir and its joyful noise as I wrote. They aren't perfect, but they are exuberant singers and we feel God's joy as they stand at the fron of the sanctuary.

Nancy said...

Yes, and often the songs that Caileag sings are those she has learned through Sunday School, Junior Choir or VBS. It is amazing what is retained through song, ie the books of the Bible she was singing the other day! Maybe we should put more of our learning into song.:)

David Mundy said...

I knew I was running the risk of the wrong spelling for Caileag!

In the Middle Ages the depictions of biblical scenes in stained glass and the chanting of the psalms taught scripture. Maybe we're not as advanced as we think we are and need these teaching aids today.

Deborah Laforet said...

I make music because I have to. It is a part of my very being. Music expresses who I am, and when I am in worship, it is how I express my praise, my joy, and sometimes my lament.