The Proto- Liturgicality of Bjork
this blog has some gaps which I intend to fill later when I'm more motivated. - B
May I? / Or should I? / Or have I too often/ Craved miracles?
moon
PART I: THE LITURGY
The liturgy is the public prayer of the Body of Christ, the Church. The liturgy marks, commemorates, and sanctifies time. The liturgy is the Word incarnate in the senses, it is sacramental because spiritual things are signified by sensory things. The Sacraments abide within the Liturgy.
The liturgy is open to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, who sows where He will. The liturgy is also structured, and every expression, every action, and every word has its place.
The liturgy is sublime in that, while emotions may be enkindled, experienced, or unexperienced throughout, the effect is ultimately beyond emotions. It is over and above the senses, though the senses play a part, because we are heilomorphs - that is, both body and soul, and our soul is spoken to through the body.
The liturgy is chanted, in the West as Gregorian Chant, and in the East, as many ancient variants of chants. All of it has links back to the ancient chants which passed each hour in the Holy of Holies in Jerusalem.
The liturgy is primarily vocal. It is often also accompanied by the organ, an ancient instrument which originated in Greece and was baptized into the prayer of the Church as She grew across the world. The music elevates the Word and draws out its sublime nature so that mortals may contemplate it.
The Liturgy has silence, walls of sound, repetitions, antiphons, responses, refrains, hymns, sequences, and prayers. There are times to cry out LORD HAVE MERCY, times to beat ones breast, even times to make horrendous noise like the earthquake which rent the veil of the temple, which broke open the divide between heaven and earth. There are times to lie prostrate with your nose grinding into the ground, and times to stand humbly while ashes pour over your head. There are times for the old self to be drowned in water and the new self sprinkled lightly from a sprig of hyssop. There are times to be silent as a churchmouse, and times to shout for joy, even in various places perhaps to dance or to clap your hands, as the ancient psalmist urges us on.
The liturgy is not a performance, though it is performative at times. And it is not merely any of its parts. Nor is it merely the sum of its parts. It is transcendent, and it is over and above itself because it is about God, Who transcends all else. Jesus is the protagonist of the Liturgy, and our prayers all go through Him, with Him, and in the Unity of the Holy Spirit.
The liturgy lives in cycles and patterns which connect and contrast in different moments in the cycles of nature. It is not divorced from, but is rather integrated with, the seasons and the phases and natural processes of creation.
The liturgy is the two rivers which extended from the temple in Ezekiel, and it is the two rivers which sprayed out upon the ground at the foot of the cross when Christ's side was pierced. It is the life force by which we live, and the transfusion of life injected into us from Him who provides all by His life, death, and resurrection.
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PART II: BJORK AND LITURGICALITY
Though Bjork is not a Christian and has little to do with the Liturgy or the Church, I struggle not to call the music of Bjork somehow liturgical. I ascribe liturgicality to it. It has the sense of being liturgical. And I struggle to decide whether this is merely accidental rather than substantial.
I'd like to focus on her 2011 album Biophilia. The album sprouts from the idea of Biophilia, which is naturalist Edward O. Wilson's theory that humanity has an "innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes", and that "to the degree that we come to understand other organisms, we will place a greater value on them, and on ourselves".
Upon listening and digesting this album, we cannot say that Bjork's music is explicitly about God, nor does it have any Christian scriptural basis. But let's tackle the low-hanging fruit first.
Here are some ways the accidents of Bjork's music reflect a sense of Liturgicality:
1. There is organ.
Yep, I think right off the bat I hear organ and I wonder when the last time I heard organ in a pop song, and I realize that Bjork is using this instrument because of the gravity it holds. She's seeking more than bops here.
2. There is chant, choral harmony, repetition, and nonmetrical singing.
Bjork is chanting in most of her songs. She also has a choir which sings harmonies around her. A key component of chant, especially Gregorian chant, is that it is not metrical. For the most part, the rhythms and timing are determined by the text itself. In this way the text is allowed to be the text, without being confined or subjugated to any particular elements of the music. In this way, the music elevates and is directed toward the meaning innate in the text. It's the salt and pepper which does not denature the steak, but rather allows the steak's natural flavor to flourish in its fullness upon contact with our tastebuds. Bjork floats above the beats and the other harmonies. Her voice stands out and is not confined. It also is not even confined by words necessarily.
There are moments in the Liturgy when the joy exceeds the bounds of language, and the chant simply takes us for a ride. It's like the scene in a film like How to Train Your Dragon, where the protagonist has their first ride on a flying beast.
In Dark Matter, there are no lyrics, and all of the vocalizations are actually gibberish. And they are not merely gibberish, but gratuitous gibberish. I find certain moments of this piece are as enthralling as a piece of deeply melismatic chant. Dark Matter explores the foundational elements of the universe, the origin of everything. And Gregorian Chant is an eternal song, which winds and curls its way from the eternal source and returns to it, winding and curling through the voices of man.
There is some precious inexcusable similarity here. Wherein one example is raw and primal, the other is formed of the same materials, but imbued with the surety and hope of Divine Revelation.
3. There is commemoration of natural cycles and eternal, cosmic imagery being united in a vision of the drama of the life of a person.
"The Earth, like the heart, slopes in its seat / And, like that, it travels along an elliptical path /Drawn into the darkness"
4. There is ritual
(See the Biophilia Live Performances)
5. There is the pursuit of unity through sacrifice
"What you resist persists / Nuance makes heat / To counteract distance / I know you gave it all / Offered me harmony / If things were done your way / My Eurasian plate subsumed /Forming a mutual core"
mutual core
7. There is reconciliation
"Build a bridge to her / Initiate a touch / Before it's too late / Say the words to her / That will make her shine / Tell her that you love her"
sacrifice
6. There is deep wonder
An openness to wonder about the universe that characterizes so much of her music.
This wonder is expressed in its fullness in the fourth track "Cosmogony", in which Bjork expresses openness to different creation myths, including the modern "myth" (It probably happened) of the Big Bang:
"Heaven, heaven's bodies / Whirl around me, make me wonder
And they say back then our universe wasn't even there / Until a sudden bang and then there was light, was sound, was matter/ And it all became the world we know
Heaven, heaven's bodies /Whirl around me and dance eternal"
cosmogony
More on wonder in the next section.
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PART III: OBJECTIONS AND RESPONSES
There are many more elements to discuss, but now that which runs counter to my argument must be addressed:
1. Bjork's music is not explicitly about God
There is no biblical text. The closest we get are references to creation myths from other cultures. RIP. However, I believe that a case can be made that she is reaching towards her creator, much like a blind pup will reach his every fibre of being toward his mother, the source of his sustenance. He may not know what she looks like, but he knows that there is milk to be had. And furthermore, there is gratitude and frustration with the Divine spark of inspiration, as in this line:
"And I'll never know / From whose hands, deeply humble / Dangerous gifts as such to mine come"
thunderbolt
No, Bjork's music has no doxologies, nor does it quote the words of our Savior. But it is nonetheless in a position of receptivity to the Divine.
2. Bjork's music is not intended for liturgy
Yeah, as far as I know, this music is made for performance in a concert setting. However, it is interesting to note that it also lives in an app and is also involved in other interactive exhibits in museums around the world. The music is for more than merely performance. It is meant to enliven other elements of humanity. It may be pageantry and ritual, but it is not capital L Liturgy.
3. Bjork is, in fact, a pagan
Indeed, Bjork's religion is more or less animist or neopagan, "nature worship", if you will, and her music reflects this belief.
However, despite this contrasting set of beliefs, we shouldn't immediately divorce her music from the subject of liturgicality or even the aims of Christianity, especially within the liturgy. Indeed in an interview, Bishop Robert Barron, in talking about one of his influences, Robert Sokolowski, mentions: "If you stop being Christian, I recommend you become pagan...... There is something really deep and true and noble in paganism." Conversely, this is not to discount the truth of Christianity, but rather it highlights the fact that paganism was, and may still be in fact, the fertile ground from which the fruit of Christianity did and may grow.
In fact, wonder at the natural world and the idea of Biophilia very much factors in to the recognition of the Divine. It is a prerequisite, if you will, and this type of paganism has it in spades, perhaps more dramatically and fully than many who would claim a personal relationship with the Divine in the Holy Trinity.
There is a type of wonder which the Christian is not often wont to have, but is nevertheless essential to delving into the nature of God. In "Virus", Bjork speaks from the perspective of a harmful virus seeking to infiltrate a host. She names the host "My sweet adversary". "The LORD giveth and the LORD taketh away, Blessed be the LORD'. Would that we could embrace the harder-to-appreciate elements of creation, and see them as in some way blessing the Lord despite how repulsive they seem to be.
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PART III: CONCLUSION - PROTO-LITURGICALITY
Does Bjork's music have liturgicality? I might actually call it proto-liturgicality. Her music may very well be or reflect the best liturgical expression of man outside the realm of the Christian faith. It is not liturgy, but it is the disposition of a pagan man who has yet to meet Jesus, but who is nonetheless primed in his heart to meet him. There is no resistance, there is only openness and wonder. There is also sensitivity to all the things he could latch onto as religion apart from Revelation - Natural phenomena and cycles in all its forms.
To whom does she address this stanza?:
"My Ancestors have access"..."Hollow / Like a bead in necklace / Thread me upon this chain / I'm part of it, ohh / The everlasting necklace"
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