The Bible and Music

Should composers of spiritual/ religious music believe in the things that they are writing about? This is the question we explored in class on Monday. The general consensus was that it did not matter what the composer’s own personal beliefs were, so long as the music they made was serving its purpose to the consumers it reached. We talked about Wagner and how he was anti-semitic, yet his music is widely known. Basically, it doesn’t matter what a composer’s personal beliefs are as long as their music is good.