A few years ago – when my spirit was in a different land of the living – I posted a couple of blogs on long-forgotten artists that I titled “A Long Forgotten Art” and “A Long Forgotten Art (2)”. Being either without or on a different wave of inspiration these days, I am tempted to blog in the negative, as in the title above.
“Long forgotten artists” is a perhaps self-explanatory phrase. I first heard the phrase in a song, which had the slightly poetic lyric: “you shot me with a cannonball of history & long forgotten art” (Golden Heart, by Mark Knopfler). I liked that. Sometimes researching history brings one face to face with creative work of yesteryear which was unknown. But “unknown to whom?” There is a question.
My maternal grandfather was known in his day for having a lot of orally-transmitted Irish instrumental airs that were unfamiliar to others. People speak of “traditional” music, but what is “tradition”? My late mother idolised Gustav Mahler for much of her life. Last night, I came across a quote, attributed to Mahler, in a remarkable traditional music album: “Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.” If fire symbols creativity, tradition is not a “long forgotten” or “past” culture. It is a “living culture”, as well as a creative one. How many living cultures are unknown, not because they are “long forgotten” (clearly, they have not been), but simply because we have never been exposed to them, or understood the creative impulse within them?
Exposing myself to “traditional music” much more frequently this past year has led me to begin to hear it with different ears. It has a history, but does it make sense to frame that history with words? It lives if it is played, not if it is written about or, indeed, only written on a page.
Being beyond words, where does it begin and where does it end? Earlier generations framed it with sheet music. Recent generations have embraced ethnomusicology as a form of analysis. But if the music is European, is this appropriate?
“Writing about music is like dancing about economics” is an old American expression. It makes little sense to do so, particularly when its content is without words. Lorcán Mac Mathúna’s CD album An Bhuatais can be acquired in a book format, with remarkable essays in it on everything from G.M. Hopkins’ Christian poetry to the symbolism of the Achilles-Hector and Táin myths. As he deals with songs with lyrics, such a use of words is excusable. It is inspired even (as, indeed, is much of the music itself). I am used to “writing about history”. But if, as currently tempted, I am to begin writing about “musical history” a degree of inspiration will be required that, at present, escapes me. Perhaps I will require “a new muse”! Or else, just a much greater sensitivity to how cyclical musical processes can be – and not just historical “processes” – within the proverbial “traditional arts”. Witness this reiteration of music collected in pre-famine Ireland but unknown to all prior to 1963 and unpublished until 1998, but seemingly alive and well “today”.
