Lego Christian Zeal and Activity by John Adams

As a side project while working on the next big lego opera... which will be pretty grand... I wanted to try something a little different. Christian Zeal and Activity is one of the lesser known, but incredibly powerful, pieces by the American composer John Adams. Growing up in rural churches across Indiana, this piece just makes sense to me. It captures the value and beauty in a religion that's often plagued with bad stereotypes. There are sections in this piece that have been cut.. the original is a little over 10 minutes longs, but the spoken parts in this video have remained uncut and are presented as Adams intended... with the exception of all the lego people.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Lego
• Opera
• Christian
• Zeal
• John
• Adams
• minimalism
• American
• composer

[ikshields]

It is kind of funny how many people take this piece as though it were straight sentimentalism or religiosity.

Adams's fascination with how words become blather, and how chorale harmonies can make vanilla of anything, apparently glide past, unnoticed, by some in this audience.

(He's not playing a joke AGAINST you, you know. You're actually expected to notice that something's a little fishy with the sentimentality -- it's the purpose of the whole piece.)

This is a little disturbing!

[barkingbartok]

It was a little disturbing at first- the obvious use of banter in the religious context (because it's never quite as obvious in the actual services), but over the years of listening to it, I've realize that this banter is an element of my identity and the identity of so many others. The soft musical background does frame the piece in a certain context- there's no cleverness there- so what I really enjoy is the true authenticity of the speaker. It can be a religious experience.

[benmillerintx]

See it a little different. I thought that the sermon is reduced to clips to show that the power of the sermon is in the music of the speaker, i. e. his tones, so that actually, removing just enough to deny the rigid doctrine from converging, we can see that much, well, teaching, can be done through music. I know If I had attended the actual sermon I'd have walked out. A bunch of mechanisms to cloud the brain, etc. But here it's just a pinch more than the aural power, few words+music. Justmytake

[Gunnarr123abc]

We won't know what Adam really meant with this music unless he told us. It could be anything.

Personally I think it is showing how the human voice is music. That's just what popped in my head when I listened to this music, besides the beauty. It makes one appreciate humanity... and even if you don't believe in religion or Jesus, I would think you can agree it is a touching addition.

But as far as we know, he might have just put the voice in for no reason and was bored, and didn't plan a thing!

[themonkthatcamedown]

who is the preacher sampled?

[scottxu]

Some mega-churches should perhaps commission some symphonic works on Christian themes to be done. However I object to using piece of sermon as sampling to be repeated as mantras.

[scottxu]

I was just thinking about who of the living composers would be able to compose symphonic works on each of the great books in the New Testament, and on the Early Church, the Reformation and the Missionary Movements, and I discovered this!

Great.

[VicLabs]

This is a great example of not being able to think outside of ourselves. Those who are critical of religion understand "Christian zeal" to be jihadism and hear the words of this piece as an indictment of the sentimentality of mysticism. Those who believe in a meta, however, might find beauty in the idea of a personal God wanting to be involved in the world, in order to heal and redeem it. This is actually the message of a lot of churches, it's not all westboro baptist.

[nickperri]

@HiAdrian Word

[Ilkeyrion]

@mcconthebus It's not in the version used in Sid Meier's Civilization IV :P

[HiAdrian]

I think this piece greatly demonstrates the mechanism that has many people drawn to preaching. I'm not religious, but i definitely had brain activity in my reward centers.

[TheDavid2222]

as an atheist I thought christian zeal and activity would be a dark foreboding and despairing piece. If I composed a piece that had anything to do with religion it would be entitled THE TRIUMPH OF REASON. I would make sure to dedicate it to Friedrich Nietzsche and saying YES to life

[javaman9999]

@barkingbartok Actually the score doesn't specifically note the use of that particular audio clip. The score says to use "sonic found objects" in the performance. The conductor of this performance chose a sermon.