Thursday, May 03, 2018
Music and Religion
E.S.P. Haynes (1877-1949), The Lawyer: A Conversation Piece. Selected from the Lawyer's Notebooks and Other Writings (London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1951), p. xlii:
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My musical gods are Handel, Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Corelli and Scarlatti, and the old English composers. I find in music all the alleged consolations of religion, but it is becoming more difficult to hear since the B.B.C. adopted the idiotic method of counting heads in the matter and of substituting a quantity of jazz and some pretentious cacophony for their old programmes. Modern developments of discord are no doubt due to two wars and general unhappiness. I venture to say that Corelli's Christmas music reflects a higher civilisation than the music which is now called modern and which reeks of industrialisation.
I do not wish to denigrate religion. Like Lord Melbourne, I feel a great respect for the Church so long as it does not unduly interfere with private life.
