Joshua W. Mills
25 May 2005
If we take modernism as stretching from approximately the middle of the fifteenth to the middle of the twentieth centuries, the genres and styles of artistic expression the Western world has known would take many pages to simply list, let alone describe. The contrasts between the musical expressions found in the high and late Renaissance alone are so drastic that it is a daunting task to attempt to view them both as manifestations of the same Zeitgeist. When looking at western music over the course of modernity, let alone literature or the visual arts, this is well near impossible. It is ludicrous to speak of the unified artist style of modernity—no such thing exists! If postmodernity (which as of yet seems no more stylistically unified than the course of modernity) can only be properly understood in relationship to modernity, it should be equally ludicrous to speak of an overarching postmodern artistic style, and yet the music, literature, and architecture of the late twentieth century is frequently described as ‘postmodern’. What can this possibly mean?
Of course, attempting to describe a trans-discipline ‘modern’ artistic style is a fool's errand. Even to narrow it to just the field of music leaves styles as different as Palestrina's neat and clean high Renaissance motets are from Liszt's gushing romantic piano works. Clearly if we are to speak of modernism (in the broadest sense) or postmodernism in music, or in any or all the arts, we must speak in much broader terms than simply that of ‘style’.
Music in the modern West can be viewed several ways from broad perspectives. One such is the struggle and oscillation between Apollonian and Dionysian trends, such as the contrast between the passionate energy so relished by later Romantic composers and the balance and cleanliness demonstrated by Classical composers. Another is the cycle of increasing complexity of a style until it collapses and is replaced by a new and simple language which soon develops complexities of its own. Perhaps the most visible of all the musical metanarratives is that of the evolution and disintegration of the system of tonality. Even this, though, can be viewed as based on something more fundamental: all of Western music during the modern period was motivated by the ideals of progress and control.
Jean-François Lyotard defined postmodernism as incredulity towards metanarratives, and this rings true when looking at music. The musicians and composers of the modern period always saw themselves as advancing their practice, improving upon or breaking free from the music of their predecessor; it was not until the middle of the nineteenth century that a serious interest in the music of earlier periods began to appear. Composers also sought tight control over their musical materials, although this tendency typically followed the cycles of the Apollonian/Dionysian alternation.
A prime example of the two metanarratives of progress and control working in tandem is seen in the music of the Second Viennese School. Schönberg, following in the tradition of Brahms and the great German Romantics, came to the conclusion that tonality had been pushed to its limit, that it could not possibly get any more complex without collapsing. The next logical step in the progress of German music was to abandon tonality completely. He began to write music without a tonal center or traditional harmonies, but he quickly discovered that without the system of tonality that had evolved over the years, his music could not support itself; by trying to write atonal music with complete freedom, he discovered that he had absolutely no control.
As Stravinsky wrote in his Poetics of Music, ‘The more art is controlled, limited, worked over, the more it is free. . . . If everything is permissible to me, the best and the worst; if nothing offers me any resistance, then any effort is inconceivable, and I cannot use anything as a basis, and consequently every undertaking becomes futile.’ The solution Schönberg developed to deal with this lack of controlling force inherent in free atonality was the twelve-tone serial technique which allowed him a level of control over the pitch content of his compositions far greater than the tonal masters had. Serial technique would be adopted by later composers for not just pitch but for rhythm, dynamics, orchestration, form—any variable in music could be completely controlled mathematically.
This desire for control was a manifestation of the Enlightenment goals of control through a thorough scientific understanding of nature, ideals which play a key role in the edifice of modern thought. It is the letting go, or outright rejection, of this desire for absolute control which defines much of postmodern music. One of the earliest examples of this is John Cage, who desired to simply let sound be sound without the interference of a composer. Randomness in sound (which does not even qualify as music by many) was his end product, which, ironically, sounded remarkably similar to the music of the total-serialist, arch-modernist Pierre Boulez.
The Enlightenment myth of progress which was reflected is the course of Western music, especially in the early twentieth century, was also abandoned by postmodern composers. Progress implies the present being an improvement upon the past, and the very idea of improvement requires a continuum of goodness, something which much of postmodern thought with roots going back to Nietzsche has rejected. This has at least two important implications, and doubtless many more.
Firstly, in place of such an absolute and universal continuum, things are judged according to their cultural context. It is interesting to note that this requires a grounding and fixity which Jacques Derrida and many other postmodern thinkers claim is unimportant. The requirement of a cultural context for evaluation weakens the concept of a piece of music as an isolated text which should be deconstructed without regard to authorship or intent. Evaluating musics with respect to their context also opened the door for musics not within the high Western tradition to be taken seriously.
Secondly, by abandoning the idea of progress, composers became free to draw on whatever sources they choose, resulting in an eclecticism unique to recent years. This eclecticism is perhaps the other single most important feature of postmodernism in the arts. Charles Jencks in his writings on architecture argues that eclecticism is one of the most important defining features, perhaps the most essential feature or even the sine quo non, of postmodernism. While not necessarily true outside of architecture (as there can be stylistically unified pieces of literature or music which are easily identifiable as postmodern), eclecticism has proven to be of remarkable importance in postmodern music. This ranges from a haphazard throwing together of disparate elements for shock value to clever and pleasantly surprising combination of quasi-related elements to a careful and profound integration which communicates tensions in ways that a perfectly unified work cannot. This last element I feel is one of postmodernism's most important contributions to music and all the arts.
Postmodernism embraces the tensions resulting from various perspectives, and sensitive artists know that the reality which they seek to portray or reflect is never as simple as we might like it to be. By combining different perspectives, the composer, author, painter, or architect can effect a dissonant beauty that resonates with the soul far more than can modernist aims at perfect integration and a universal standard.
This eclecticism is also theologically sound. Revelation 9.9–10 reads: ‘After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”’ (ESV) Christ is the one Lord of all of creation, not just of high Western culture. As such, Christians should embrace integrated eclecticism in much the same way as postmodern art, especially music and architecture, has.
It will be fascinating to see how these trends play out over the coming years. We are living in a time the likes of which the world has never seen. Musicians and all artists have at their disposal more tools and palettes than ever before, and Christians and the Church have the opportunity to use these in ways that are almost unlimited. Christianity should prove to be uniquely positioned to utilize these elements of postmodernism for the glory of God.
