A beloved tradition of a college of the Lutheran church, the annual St. Olaf Christmas Festival echoes the Reformation musical theology and embodies Martin Luther’s perception\u00a0of music and religion in many ways. First and foremost, Luther constructed his cosmology of music upon this core statement that music is next to the Word of God. According to Luther,\u00a0music is a divine gift uniquely assigned to humans as a medium to praise and thank God for His forgiveness\u00a0and love.\u00a0As a result, music has long been an essential part of Lutheran worship tradition. Correspondingly, serving the traditional Christian holiday, Christmas Fest centralizes on religious repertoire\u00a0while incorporates essential\u00a0worship rituals\u00a0such as gospel readings in between music performances. We can argue that Christmas Fest is necessarily Lutheran because\u00a0in this event, music is valued as effective and significant as\u00a0text readings in terms of\u00a0fulfilling the demand of Christian holiday celebration.<\/p>\n
Beyond the\u00a0fundamental appreciation to music itself, distinctive from many other Christian beliefs, Lutherans\u00a0tolerate and value diverse mediums of making music, embracing both vocal and\u00a0instrumental music, as well as virtuosity in musical performances. Christmas Fest inherits the Lutheran\u00a0acknowledgement to the variety approaches of music making by\u00a0including both choral repertoire and\u00a0instrumental piece into the event, although vocal music always dominates the program. In addition, Christmas Fest features fairly virtuosic performing groups, such as the St. Olaf Choir and \u00a0the St. Olaf Orchestra, and the choices of repertoire are\u00a0particularly\u00a0demanding as well.<\/p>\n
Despite of these connections with Luther’s statements about\u00a0on music and its effectiveness in worship, Christmas Fest does face several fundamental problems in regard to the Reformation musical theology. One essential premise for the Reformation Theology\u00a0to function\u00a0is the existence of faith in Christ. However, Christmas Fest inevitably involves\u00a0individuals who are of other or without religious belief in both the participants and the audience,\u00a0due to\u00a0the college setting of this event. This\u00a0problem of lack of religious devotion is augmented when\u00a0the college\u00a0advertises the event as a school concert and sales tickets for it, which\u00a0conflicts with Lutheran’s idea that making music is justified primly and essentially because of the religious motivation.<\/p>\n
Therefore, through this brief discussion about the consistency\u00a0and discordance between the Reformation musical theology and Christmas Fest, it is fairly clear that\u00a0Christmas Fest\u00a0does not carry one\u00a0single function but is rather a multi-functional event that serves different groups of people for both sacred and secular meanings. Instead of arguing that the sacred and secular aspects of the event conflict with each other, I would rather say Christmas Fest is a confluence of diverse needs existed in a\u00a0college campus, since eventually the event\u00a0functions as a great opportunity to gather the community together with joyful spirits no matter what is the rationale behind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A beloved tradition of a college of the Lutheran church, the annual St. Olaf Christmas Festival echoes the Reformation musical theology and embodies Martin Luther’s perception\u00a0of music and religion in many ways. First and foremost, Luther constructed his cosmology of … Continue reading