Alexis Leggett:The Holy Sound :Class Reading Entry #1

Reading: Van Der Leeuw, Sacred and Profane Beauty: The Holy Sound pg 213

This section of the book discusses music in its relation to holiness.  I found the part on drums to be particularly interesting to me.  Van Der Leeuw introduces the drum as the most primitive and popular of all instruments.  He starts by discussing rhythm to be the most primitive of the three attributes of music (melody and harmony being the other two).  Rhythm, belonging to dance (sine dance is more primitive than music), therefor can be considered the catalyst of dance.  For the past three years now I have been exposed on a regular basis to the sound of the drum as my boyfriend is a drummer.  After reading this text I decided to listen more closely the next time he played.  I have become accustomed to it so most of the time I just tune it out, but I decided to listen more critically.  I sat in on one of his band practices.  The instruments incorporated were the drum, the bass, and the guitar.  Among all of the instruments the drums were more audibly profound.  It was not the guitar or the bass that made me want to dance or my foot tap, but the drums. I asked that they play the same song without the drums, and the difference was huge.  The song sounded entirely different without the drums.  Without the drums the song felt incomplete.  I tried to envision what I may have thought if I heard the song originally without the drums, but I concluded that the drums are a fundamental part to the sound. He also played his bongo drums for me.  The strong ryhtemic beat of the bongo drums made me instantly want to dance.  It brought out the primitive side of me that Van Der Leeuw discusses.  However, I wonder if this is because I already associated the sound of bongo drums with primitive tribal dance?  I have already been exposed to it so it would make sense that I automatically make that association in my mind.  Is is that the beat of the bongo drum is truly primitive in itself or does it give off a primitive sound because we already associate it with it?  I more so lean to it is primitive in nature because when it was originally played long ago it evoked such dance.