Major-Minor

A recent discussion on a musicians news-list got me thinking about major and minor tonality in worship.

As grade school students many of us were taught that major-keyed music was happy and joyful while minor tonalities were sad and slow. Aside from the wrongfulness of any sweeping generalization, I hope we all know this really is not true.

But the concept stuck at least for some. A colleague was writing that someone at their church was insistent that there be no minor-keyed music in worship because worship was supposed to be joyful and celebratory. And certainly the organ offertory couldn't be in a minor key, because that would lead to lower amounts in the collection plates.

So couple of things leap to mind. There is some incredibly joyous minor-keyed music for organ out there. And there are times when a little somber-ness is appropriate for worship. Finally I hope no one really thinks that the key signature of a piece of music is going to so powerfully sway someone that they cut back their offering to God based on what they hear coming from the organ. One's offering to God is a God-thing, not a music thing. Really.

I'll be playing a very sprightly and joyful prelude this week, in G minor. And I am not going to add a Picardy third to the end (that's changing the third tone of the chord to make it major instead of minor). I haven't encountered anyone in our congregation who has voiced opinions like those I mentioned above. I hope if these sort of views come up we can address them clearly with examples. And I hope to show by example that the simple major-minor paradigm doesn't go nearly far enough to describe the power of music to illicit feelings of joy or quiet introspection.