Quartier calls himself a hands-on expert on silence. Not least because he lives in a monastery, where much time and space is devoted to silence. The silence Thomas refers to is not so much about the absence of sound. Indeed, it is rather the opposite. “A hushed environment can lead to inner peace. This cannot be measured in decibels. Gregorian chant is a great contrast in this respect, because singing is first and foremost not internalising. On the contrary! If you look purely at what happens physically, singing is an expressive activity. Not a contemplative one. And yet contemplation is exactly what happens in Gregorian chant.”
Breaking listening patterns
This stillness, says Quartier, comes from a number of things. “You start softly and you bend each line back to silence. What's more, Gregorian chant has no sharply defined tonal steps, rather flowing tones. There is also no metre, so you cannot count along. Gregorian chant takes you out of the delusion of the day; it turns your listening habits upside down, because it does not do what you expect music to do. It's fluid and you can't just mimic it. In doing so, it breaks your listening patterns, creating space for inner silence.”
Hitting an associative chord
There is a meaningful dimension in Gregorian chant that has to do with the language and tradition from which this music arises. “The text is often in Latin, which for most people is no longer an intelligible language. And yet, it strikes a certain chord that does something to your imagination or feelings. Also, the realisation that generations of monks have been chanting it for centuries gives it something sacred, something alive. After my performance at the Radboud Sounds festival, people said they could almost smell the incense. Those elements of language and tradition are important aspects of stillness. Because otherwise you might as well be singing the phone book.”
Mystical experience through experimental metal
There are other styles of music that also take people out of their comfort zone or into a different state of consciousness. “A good example of this, in my opinion, is the band Sunn O))). Their work forms a great contrast with Gregorian chant, which is very soft. Sunn O))) use pitch and an incredible amount of noise to do the exact opposite, but still they share the same principles and thoughts. With such a high degree of overstimulation, you can have a silence breakthrough, an inner silence breakthrough. What matters is that you break from your normal way of listening. This puts you in a kind of ritual state. Which is when crazy, mystical things can happen. The more experimental the music, the more likely this is to happen.”
Heart palpitations from New Age
The idea that music has a particularly calming effect can be found far and wide in history and across different cultures. “Take trance or techno music, for example. The volume combined with a staccato rhythm has roots in ancient tribal cultures. Such music can almost put you in a trance, in a mystical state. It slows you down. The reverse can also happen, for example with New Age music. The even calm in this kind of meditative music can sometimes give people heart palpitations, leading to an arousal breakthrough. The basic principle is that what you articulate strongly can turn into its opposite. And then strange things start to happen.”
This article was inspired by the lustrum festival Radboud Sounds.
Text: Pleuni van Keulen voor Radboud Recharge. Photo via PXfuel
Radboud Recharge: the Sound of Summer, playlist
This summer on Radboud Recharge: the Sound of Summer. Featuring five articles on music, approached scientifically. And with a playlist on Spotify: Radboud Recharge: the Sound of Summer. Thomas Quertier added these numbers: * Te Deum, Cistercian Monks of Stift Heiligenkreuz* Christus Factus Est, Cistercian Monks of Stift Heiligenkreuz