Pessimism predisposes one to miss opportunities and to fail to recognize what is good.
This thread will deal with optimism, and how easy it is to write off the good that is still present under out very noses. We all fall for it, at some point or another.
Since I definitely am a nerd, bear with me as I open with one of the great speeches, this one from The Lord of the Rings, by Sam, as he tried to comfort Frodo, who was losing all hope and strength to carry on.
Frodo : I can’t do this, Sam.
Sam : I know.
It’s all wrong
By rights we shouldn’t even be here.
But we are.
It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo.
The ones that really mattered.
Full of darkness and danger they were,
and sometimes you didn’t want to know the end.
Because how could the end be happy.
How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad happened.
But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow.
Even darkness must pass.
A new day will come.
And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer.
Those were the stories that stayed with you.
That meant something.
Even if you were too small to understand why.
But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand.
I know now.
Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t.
Because they were holding on to something.Frodo : What are we holding on to, Sam?
Sam : That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it’s worth fighting for.
Here, the simple Sam, who loved food and song and gardening above all else, catches and understands the depth of hope, and expresses it so powerfully. It always touches me, every time I read or hear it.
The angle I’ll take for this post, will be music. Song, more specifically. This will be a bit of an interactive thread, feel free to open each clip and listen/watch, or skip and focus only on the text. It’ll be a richer reading experience.
Singing is one of those underrated and misunderstood gifts to humanity. It is immensely powerful, as it can reach emotions beyond our consciousness. It can create instant bonds and understanding beyond language and culture. It can soften extreme emotions, or it can rouse them. It can express piety and awe, or it can be an outlet for rebellion and anger.
We know this, to some degree.
Our ancestors did, too. They had moments where they would start singing. During work, after work, for breaks, in celebration, for pure entertainment, or even as activism. They had a rich culture, where music held a firm place.
Now, I divide music in 3 broad groups: the sacred music, the professional music, and the folk music.
Sacred music is all such music that is written for direct religious purposes. You had people devoting their lives to such music, used in sacred liturgy, and from there it was brought to the people at large.
Assyrian Eastern Orthodox Archimandrite (monk priest) Serafim from Tbilisi, Georgia chanting the Assyrian Trisagion (triple invocation of God as ‘holy’): “Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, Have mercy on us”.
Professional music is music that is made by professional musicians, music for the sake of music. Ars Musica. Pushing boundaries, exploring either in depth or in width.
This was music made for performance, generally not to be participated in. Important to note that this type often requires maecanate funding.
A more contemporary example is Takashi Yoshimatsu, in his Concerto for piano & orchestra ‘Memo Flora’, Op. 67.
And lastly, what I call ‘folk music’ (NOT in the American sense, even if there is some relation). It is the music made by unprofessional musicians, expressing daily life: its sorrows, joys, struggles, victories. It is meant to be shared and/or to be participated in.
Seediq Bale warrior song, from the movie “Warriors of the Rainbow” (if you want a movie that will blow you away, this is one of those, highly recommended!).
We all know the Irish songs, which are mostly folk songs: songs about war, about loved ones taken away, about hunger, about love, about everyday things.
Or even about simple things, such as the 1973 event when a pIRA member hijacked a helicopter, and freed 3 imprisoned fellow IRA-members by picking them from the prison yard. A major embarrassment for the British, and immediately turned into a song. (Yeah, got to give it to the Irish, they knew how to tell a good tale!)
Religious songs are aimed first at the transcendental, in secundary degree at instruction on a broader level. Professional music is aimed at the here and now, at entertainment, at art for the sake of art. As such, it is more of a luxury that not every culture or time period can afford. Finally, folk music is aimed at the living experience of the people, and on passing that on as a lesson or memory.
They overlap, too, such as the magistral Miserere mei, Deus, by Allegri (even if this absolutely stunning and haunting piece is based on a –very fortunate- transcription error), which is both religious and professional.
Or this amazing Samoan ‘pese’, hymn, a mix between religious and folk. (The Samoan soldiers of Bravo and Charlie company 100 Battalion 442 Infantry Regiment, rehearsing for a memorial service for a fallen comrade). Interesting tidbit: no matter if they are Catholic, Methodist, or any other Christian denomination: the Samoans all know and share the same hymns. A great example!
Anyways, that is a long intro (I just wanted to share some of those songs, too).
Point is, I thought I had witnessed the death of music culture. I remember, growing up, that they blocked off my street (we lived in a typical row house in a typical Belgian city), for sewer repair on one end of the street. People took out their chairs, and sat on the sidewalk of the now quiet and empty street, and started talking to each other. That is what my grandparents talked about! A social life, shared with neighbors, on the streets, and something that I caught a glimpse of that day.
Or the simple joys of going to certain bars or events, and meet people who’d sing together, bring out their instruments, and play together. And being able to join them in song. It made you feel part of your culture, of your history, through those shared songs and that shared music.
(I have friends in common with the guys in this video, as skilled musicians as them, and spend great evenings singing and listing to them play. And drinking the best beers in the world, too. Definitely helped!)
I see how certain societal poisons have crept in, a lethal apathy. The deadly terror attack in Paris, eg, a few years back, was launched from a Brussels suburb, a well-known hotbed of extremism that is mostly tolerated by a government that is too busy surviving politically.
I see my culture being cancelled, replaced with either faceless mega pop culture, soulless music and art, a new generation that no longer has social skills, let alone an appreciation for socially lived and experienced culture.
Our technology didn’t help, either. Instead of having to go to a church, or concert hall, or pub or barn, to hear music performed, or to partake in it, we now have our own individual devices, streaming any music we want. Totally divorced from any context, devoid of any social factor.
One could argue, by the way, that we don’t listen to actual music anymore, but only to ‘recordings’ of it. Without being a luddite (after all, I AM providing you the youtube links, am I not?), there is nothing that replaces seeing a real concert, seeing musicians perform live.
As a side note: look how recorded music has destroyed our experience of music. We have music literally in the palms of our hands, and can listen to any song or piece, at any time, at any place, and most often by ourselves. It becomes a very self-centered endeavor, cut off from the very important social ties and purpose it had. For a while, people thought that concerts would be a thing of the past, as music became easier and cheaper to buy than ever. Yet we saw concerts return. People yearn for that experience. We even buy music that was ‘recorded live’, to catch some of that. We all know: music is meant to be heard in person, to be shared, in order to fully participate and enter into it.
I love my culture, I know my traditional folk dances, I know my traditional songs, the foods, the celebrations, the history, the intricacies and idiosyncrasies that makes Flanders so, well, Flemish. And I love every bit of it, as it opened me to understand and know and love other culture as well.
Now, however, that would be called ‘nationalism’, something evil. And it should be replaced not by love for your own culture, but love for ALL cultures (at the detriment of your own, it seems, for bonus points). That is the woke mantra. Summed up by the word ‘multiculturalism’.
I remember going to this world music concert, with bands from all over the world performing. Black Africa, Peru, Mexico, China, India, name it. Some of my fellow students, of leftist stripe, would love going there. Dreadlocked, with their didgeridoo in their patchwork bag at their side, ‘jamming along’ all those different music styles and dances and songs.
Then I asked one of my lefty friends this simple question:
“If any of those performers would come down the stage, and approach you, and would ask if you could teach him a song and dance from your culture, too, could you?”
Stunned silence.
He would not have gotten further than singing Lennon’s Imagine, and perhaps some crude imitations of folk dance, hopping around like a fool.
But I could have. I know the traditional songs and dances of my culture, and some of several other European cultures. I was able to recognize what those groups on stage were singing about: the joy about a successful hunt, a successful harvest, a successful voyage and return, all to convey the same relief that they brought food back to their families, for example. That is a shared human emotion, something that I could recognize from the dances and songs and stories from my own culture.
I can teach something back. But to those same leftists, I would be the fascist, the bigot, the hater, the, gasp, ‘nationalist’, because I insisted to learn and practice my own traditional culture and songs and music.
And the rich irony is that those ‘world citizens’ are the actual leeches, consuming the traditions of other people, without ever sharing anything back. Again, those so quick to see and condemn exploitation everywhere, are often the worst examples of *actual* exploitation. Color me shocked.
You cannot have a proper multicultural society unless you have individuals who uphold and share their OWN culture, and KEEP doing that. Otherwise, you have a monoculture within a single generation, where everything is the same: a drab grey of mixed elements, nothing unique about unique people and circumstances left. One size fits all. And suddenly, we’re back in communism’s hellish utopia as we’ve observed so many times…
So I really love my culture and history. But seeing it all disappear, step by step? Swallowed up in modernity, in e-Music, left in the hands of poorly educated and heavily indoctrinated children who dare each other to eat tide pods? Who think ‘the classics’ are 80s and 90s music, with some luck?
To see beloved expressions of popular culture I grew up with, such as Sinterklaas and Black Pete, being relentlessly attacked by woke but ignorant mobs who see slavery and mockery everywhere, except where it actually is?
It felt very depressing for a while, and I had to make my peace with the idea that the Europe I grew up, that I loved so dearly, was gone and lost forever. That the level of culture I so cherished, was not being handed down anymore, save in groups of ‘extremists’ that were so burned in the eyes of the world, it might as well be lost, anyway.
To my surprise, then, I was made aware over a year ago of this particular TikTok sensation (of all places!), where Nathan Evans, a Scottish mailman, became quite a viral sensation, with over 8 million views. What did he do? He sang a rendition of a ‘sea shanty’, ‘the Wellerman’.
This is so far my favorite rendition:
Those shanties are ‘folk songs’, in my classification, made up and sung, in this case, by sailors. Their goal was to cheer each other up, to find solace with their plight and hard work, to find a moment of peace and togetherness in the midst of the constant battle with the ocean and those enormous whales, always risking their very lives, and the hope for the ‘wellerman’, the company representative, to come by with resupplies and pay for the whale oil they had harvested.
But now, I saw all those ‘lost’ young people, ignorant of any culture, very woke, do exactly what I had feared lost: they got together, albeit virtually, to sing together. To add their own voice to the song, coming together with their gifts. Or not sing along, but to sit in and listen along, and thoroughly enjoy that moment of skill, song, togetherness. Or to add their own instrument, whatever it was, from traditional violins to modern synthesizers to add a beat. It made the world feel warm and good, for that moment, amids the craze cold and isolation and fear of the lockdown in full Covid time. And it is good. It is warming.
Now, one swallow doesn’t make a summer. But it is a green bud, a flower even, on a tree I thought dead and barren. Those people are reinventing the wheel, rediscovering the absolute joy of singing together like that. How the music builds up, and isn’t just about individual entertainment, but about a shared experience. It is no coincidence that it was this song about hoping for the wellerman to come, that attracked so many, starving for hope, and starving for contact, yearning for sharing their lives…
I realized a deeper meaning in this quote:
I knew not to worry about the ashes, but I worried about the quality of the logs that were to feed the fire. Green, wet, unsuited. But even that can dry out nicely, and turn into a raging fire, once more.
My culture, OUR culture, is stronger that it seems.
(And we shouldn’t always want a blind return to ‘how it was before’, but to ‘better’, ‘forward’. It applies to culture, but that is the bedrock of our society, of which our politics aren’t but an expression.)
There is plenty of reason to remain optimistic, to be positive, to be hopeful. Excitedly so, as we won’t know what form the future will take, but confident that the fire we were given, is being passed on. Slowly, but surely. And in this time of war and uncertainty and inflation and political upheaval, we need to remain positive, and hopeful.
The wellerman WILL come, and bring RUM.
All is well.
____________________
Addendum:
I forgot to add this one thing:
While i love the religious and professional music, the folk music speaks most to me, as it opens up shared life with anybody else, regardless of their specific culture.
Such depth and richness, and virtuosity even, can be found there.
Perhaps not a filet mignon with champagne meal, but fine comfort food, nonetheless.
And just because, I will share 2 favorites. One from Russia, that i discovered fairly recently, and one from Ukraine. May there soon be peace again!
This is a classic Russian folk song, about a horse and his rider, and the fields they’d ride in. “I’ll go out to the field with the horse in the night”, it starts. The last stanza sings about their love for their country:
”The year for the crops will be good,
There was anything, anything will pass,
Sing Gold rye, sing curly flax,
Sing about how I’m in love with Russia,
Sing Gold rye, sing curly flax,
Both of us with horse are walking through the field.”
This version is also unique: it is the best rendition of this song I’ve found, so far. The Moscow Cossack Choir has a whole repertoire of songs, which they perform on stage, very polished, very well put together. Almost breaking from folk music into professional music. Yet in this one, they got together on Zoom, mid pandemic, just to sing together, for the sheer joy of it. Not a concert, not a performance, but simply for themselves. You can tell, the joy and emotion, the smiles on their faces, some at home, others in their car, but ‘together’ again, finally, and singing along with each other!
This is by a Ukrainian folk-rock band, The Ukrainians. It is an old cossack song, about riding out in the forrest and the flowering bushes, about getting together, drinking, and fighting to defend what they love. Not that different from the Russian song above, or so many of the songs you and I know, from our own cultures…
Get up, Cossacks
Get up, Cossacks
In the forest viburnum, red viburnum
Get up, Cossacks
Let's go together
Let's go together
Hey, celebrate, hey, get drunk
Let's go together
Across the river, across the grove
The swallow flew
Across the field, across the edge
The sawdust rustled
Let's get ready quickly
Let's get ready quickly
Defend again
To fight again
Let's get ready quickly
With great skill, singing, then letting the musicians let loose, going faster and faster, and you can imagine some half or totally drunk cossack trying to keep up dancing on the music. A joy, an expression of shared life, and the lesson of their duty. Again, very human, very relatable.
What are your favorite expressions of music?
Delightful. Love the folk music from my ancestors, Irish and Scot!