bloggedy blog: the personal weblog of a music lover and aging punk wannabe

:: Thursday, October 14, 2004 ::

Punk prophets, Bohemian oracles, whatev
I really don't know how Gideon Strauss does it. Whenever I read his posts, I always come away feeling both smarter and dumber. Gideon can even turn something as insipid as my recent punk songs countdown and turn it into an intellectual exercise. But I must admit, I gave him the ammo. I thought I might lend an aura of erudition to my punk countdown by quoting a French historian/literary critic like Jacques Attali (whom I wouldn't know from Adam if I hadn't read Jon Savage's England's Dreaming). But that's no match for Gideon, who name-drops some pretty heavy-sounding theologian types in his post riffing off the Attali "music is prophecy" statement I included in my final post of the countdown.

Notes Gideon:
I am not sure what I think about the idea that music is prophecy. Francis Schaeffer always suggested that there is a kind of staircase of culture influence, so that the changes in philosophy in one generation are reflected in the high arts sometime later, followed by changes in the popular arts and then by changes in the everyday lives of people, and if he was right then in a sense music can be seen as prophecy. But as Calvin Seerveld (and probably Hans Rookmaaker) argued again and again, the Romantic and post-romantic idea of the artist as a bohemian oracle is mistaken, and needs to be replaced with a more artisanal understanding of the work of artistry. Hmmm. I'll have to think about this some more. Do the two claims - (1) that music is prophecy, and (2) that music is artisanal work - demand an either/or or a both/and judgement?

Well, yeah. Maybe Seerveld thinks that, but Rookmaaker only probably concurs.

Oooh. My head. I think I need to go lie down and listen to something soothing until this goes away.

Must... have... Ramones...

Ahh, that's better (Quicktime).

:: Andrew 15:15 + ::
...

from our sponsors

bloggedy blog

About

Syndicate

music to my ears

bookish blogs

media & politics

pop culture

emerging churchies

jambalaya

my writings

bloggedy blog recommends

In rotation

bloggedy tags

from our sponsors

for your viewing pleasure

where in the world?