The quality of performances may also be called into question because the church is run totally by volunteers. We need a group of women to sing a musical number, so let’s pick a random group of people who will say yes. They have never sung together before, and never will again. The performance will be less than inspiring to the audience, but it will be meaningful to the women singing.

We cannot continue to hold our sacrament meeting musical numbers, or even stake conference choirs, to the standard of the MoTab or paid professionals. And the music that is written for church is often put together quickly for a very specific purpose or deadline not far off, and is often written to suit the abilities of a very amateur ward choir. We hold back, not to be condescending to the audience, but because we would like our music to not be too painful to hear when placed in the hands of a well-meaning, but unpolished performing group.

But it is possible to write and perform something simple, without being simplistic. It can still touch the soul. Think of “I Am a Child of God.” It is true, simple, repetitive, and every child’s favorite Primary song. I think the Church is looking for more like that. And I think that kind of quality is harder to come by than the ability to write a fugue.

Sorry, me again. This is one of the points on which I diverge (philosophically) a little from the committee. I think the idea of meeting the audience where they’re at–though it may be viewed as an act of kindness–can easily become a sweet condescension of the wrong sort. There seems to be an implicit judgment of the audience–and I think we need to be careful about that.

Though the example I use above about Bach and his students may be viewed in the same problematic way, we need to remember that Bach was once a student. In like fashion, remembering that we were all once children will help us meet children at their level. But the dichotomy is a little different between artists and the audience. The audience (generally speaking) doesn’t intend to become artists. But they do (I would hope) expect to be treated like adults–and this is where I would have a hard time as an audience. That is, if I new that artists were holding back because of their doubts about my ability to appreciate a more challenging aesthetic. I’d feel rather patronized.

I think the trick is to meet the audience where they’re at without drifting into the insipid popular silliness we see/hear/read so often in the church. Maybe that’s where we run into trouble with “immature emotionality” as you say.

A good example might be how Bach wrote pieces that were sensitive to the level of his students. Think of his delightful minuet in G. It’s a timeless gem and yet “Bach” through and through. There’s nothing lacking in it aesthetically–it’s art.

No if we could just figure out how to do that–though it’s probably unfair for me to invoke the masters in my argument.

One thing that I didn’t say a lot about in my post was how much Warner talked about considering the audience. I think in regular art (i.e. not for Church art) the audience comes to the artist and seeking some sort of experience. In the Church, I think the tables are turned. The artists seek the audience and try to invite the Spirit. The artist meets the audience where they already are and then, perhaps, tries to take them a few steps beyond that. But always the artist starts where the audience already is–and maybe that is why some of it comes off as emotional immaturity. That may also be why the bare aesthetic doesn’t get used. Most audiences would be unnerved by a lack of set and costume. I think sets, costumes, props, lighting, etc. help people suspend their disbelief and work as signals that something artistic is coming. A lot of audiences need the warning.

And as for conflation of feelings and the Spirit, I think it is a real danger. Which is why feelings constitute holy ground. You have to be careful not only to invite the Spirit and not drive it, but like one of you said, not distract from it either. Easier said than done! Maybe that’s why so much of our art relies on pat representations of “immature” emotionality!

Are you’re referring to the idea of the preacher and the hearer both being edified together by the same spirit? If so, I think the committee would say that that’s their ultimate goal and that any sense of (sweet) condescension is really only the artists allowing themselves to be lead by counsel–the “condescension” being manifest in the putting aside of aesthetic preferences in order to better serve one’s brothers and sisters.

BTW, “condescension” is my word choice, not theirs. I must say, though, that after reading your comment I can see how it may come across a little jarring.

But with Christianity it is quite a charged one, isn’t it? Perhaps, then, this ‘condescension’ in aesthetics, is a Christian act.

I’m too much of a purist to believe that oversimplification, but it might give some insight to current church thinking.

doesn’t seem very worthy of D&C 50, though, does it?

Perhaps your view of “Savior of the World” is more objective than mine as I had some idea of the committee’s goals before I saw it. Still, it seems to me that there were real attempts to avoid certain popular theatrical conventions while maintaining a wide-open accessibility.

One of the big questions for me is: how mediocre can art be and still retain it’s usefulness in the church? It seems to me (depending on the criteria for judgment) that art can be reduced to practically nothing aesthetically and still open the way for communion with God (not that art per se has the power to do that). And so, as it relates to what’s going on at the Conference Center, what the committee is most interested in is opening the way for that possibility (communion) even if it means sacrificing the “art” to get it–and I think this more than anything else is where we get a sense of some of the “poor-ness” you speak of, Trevor.

That said, I hope for the day when high aesthetic and deep communion will not be viewed in such a mutually exclusive way–as it seems we do in the church.