Improvement Era, 1914 by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Religion

Songs and Music of the Latter-Day Saints By Evan Stephens, Director of the Salt Lake Tabernacle Choir

The songs and music of the Latter-day Saints are in perfect accord with the spirit of the newly revealed gospel of Jesus Christ, as restored in modern times through the medium of the Prophet, Joseph Smith.

In contrast to that generally used by the churches of the day in which this Church was set up anew upon the earth, they are as light to darkuess, or brightness to gloom. Expressions of fear and sorrow, the terrible confessions of and lamentations over sin, the constant dwelling upon the sufferings of our crucified Savior, and the eternal tortures in store for sinners, give place in the songs of the Latter-day Saints to expressions of hope, joy and the sense of sins forgiven. More emphasis is placed upon the love and the glorious conquest of our Redeemer than upon his earthly sufferings; more, on the final redemption of all erring humanity than upon a never-ending torment of souls. When the heart-strings and the fount of tears are to be specially touched at all, it is with tenderness, sympathy and joy, rather than with terror and sorrow. This is equally true of the keynote of text and music, when the songs are really characteristic of the prevailing spirit of "Mormonism." That much of the opposite is brought in and used, by some of the leaders of singing in our midst, does not alter this fact; and while too often such songs are in a spirit of charity and deference to the artistic notions of the musicians, allowed and passed by without censure, even the congregations, without fully catching the texts, feel there is a lack of harmony between such music and the prevailing spirit of the meetings at which they are rendered.

A young professor of music recently put to me the question, "What would you term the 'Mormonistic' in music?" I replied. "That which breathes optimism and not pessimism; music in which the sombre must not predominate, but be used only as a means of contrast to heighten the effects of the bright." I would add, in which the minor is used only to make more effective the major, if I adhered to the prevailing idea that the minor is mournful and the major joyful, which I do not, believing that the effect of each or either in the main depends upon how they happen to be used. A musician may express not only merriment in minor modes, but absolute levity, and the reverse to the most solemnly sublime expressions in the major modes.

This famous body of singers (known generally as the "Mormon" Tabernacle Choir) was organized by President Brigham Young, in the early days of the state. The original conductors of the choir, in order of their service, have been as follows: John Parry, Stephen Goddard, James Smithies, Prof, Charles J. Thomas, William Sands, Prof. George Careless, Prof. E. Beesley, and Prof. Evan Stephens, the present incumbent. The

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