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The Secret Power of Music: The Transformation of Self and Society through Musical Energy
This study of the hidden side of music and its subtle effects is one of the most detailed books ever written on the subject.
- GenresMusicNonfiction
304 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
October 4, 2018
I was not actually review this book until I had finished it but could not resist the temptation because I am seriously concerned about what dark turn it would get in the proceeding pages. Before reading the book I strongly recommend to read the reviews, especially the negative ones, because they will at least mentally prepare you to things will come in the second chapter. I personally did read them and shrugged author's contempt of popular music as a minor nuisance because, let's face it, demonizing and denigrating modern popular music is a very common theme in the sociology of music literature - especially among relatively older authors like David Tame. Besides, I was personally more interested in the pre-modern uses of music, so I didn't take much note of it.
As far as I have read, the book really delivers in that sense. The chapter on ancient Chinese music was highly informative and interesting to read, given that I had no single idea about it and I am sure he will deliver the same on his account of Indian music. But, when it came to Tame's take on the "new music" of twentieth century (which he associates with materialistic or intellectual humanism for some reason) I started to get concerned because so far there are no real scholarly, or even logical, basis to what he is suggesting. Let me give you one example - this is an excerpt about his opinions on the "revolution of materialism" in classical music, starting with Mussorgsky and reaching its apex with Tchaikovsky (keep in mind that this passage belongs to a general narrative on how their music is spiritually "worthless" than their predecessors like Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, etc.):
"A still more significant composer whose life and personal weaknesses also dictated the final stages of his music was Mussorgsky's compatriot, Tchaikovsky. [...] [He] was a deserving as a man could be of the title, Born Musician. So naturally did music of deep beauty come to him that there was, on the face of it, no need for him to ever gone astray from the idealistic artistic precepts of his classical predecessors."
...Nothing wrong so far, right? Let us proceed to the next paragraph then:
"Throughout the entire span of his adult life, however, Tchaikovsky was a man tormented. For he was homosexual. Inwardly horrified with himself and his tendencies, and embarrassed in the eyes of those who shared his secret, Tchaikovsky nevertheless failed to overcome his sexual inclinations. His homosexuality became the obsessive defect of his life [...] Always nervous and highly strung, the composer found his life to be a ceaseless struggle against moral weakness and over-emotionalism. And it was a struggle from which, ultimately, he failed to emerge as victor." (pp. 82-83)
This was also the exact point where I stopped reading, noted "What the f***?!" on the page and penned this review. Now let's put aside the abhorrent tints of homophobia lurking beneath this text and just look from a purely intellectualist pointview: what does Tchaikovksy's personal life have to do anything with him conducting decadent albeit melodically beautiful music? And this comes right after a passage on Mussorgsky and his vices: his lack of faith and belief in atheism, his inability to hold a high-level occupation and eventual financial ruining and in the end "having become an alcoholic, died poverty-stricken and alone". The implied correlation between these composers' lack of faith in a higher power and their moral decadence with the deterioration of music in general is not only scientifically unsound but also ethically reprehensible.
Yet in the end it is his book and I guess he can take whatever normative point he wants to take. But hating popular music or the "materialist revolutions" in classical music is one thing and insinuating a link between people's "decadent" personal experiences and their music's overall corrupting effect on music's evolution is totally another. Perhaps I edit this review when I am finished with it but as of now I am highly concerned about what will follow next. If Tchaikovsky get this much negative commentary, I am sincerely afraid to read anything about Freddie Mercury or David Bowie.
Edit: I have decided not to wait until I have finished the book because I am afraid I will never get to see the end of this incoherent ramblings of a puritan elitist - his scorn of anything other than 19th century music is just so much to take. What is surprising about this book is that, at the time of it's publishing the author was only 31 years old! So I can't help but imagine him, cooped up in his room with anger and frustration while his contemporaries having fun and partying, listening to rock music while he is summoning the ghost of Beethoven to have some company. Even his passive-aggressive remarks and his holier-than-thou attitude can't conceal the fact that deep-down this guy is really angry because he was born in the wrong century.
This book should not be taken seriously by any scholar worth of his salt. Perhaps other religious education students who also likes to sniff their own farts and hate everything that does not suit their personal tastes may like it. But other than that, this is pretty much the literary equivalent of Bill O'Reilly ranting about Democrats. Did you know that Debussy was a "feline Frenchman"??? Oh, also Stravinsky used to consume a lot of whisky, and this is very relevant because music patterns are influenced by personal life patterns of conductors and then they can also influence patterns of civilization. And everything wrong with the modern Western world is the doings of these avant-garde musicians and expressionists! Sorry for constantly trashing this book but, honestly, he was one argument away from blaming World War I on Schoenberg's atonality! In the later of the book, he even goes further to suggest that there is an objectively good music and objectively bad music simply because some scientist with nothing better to do found out that plants that have been subjected to Led Zeppelin and Vanilla Fudge died after weeks and plants who "listened" devotional music (whatever that means) prospered! To which he concludes that only a "misguided segment of society" can "like" (his quotation marks) this objectively bad music - which is apparently anything other than classical idealist music of 18th and 19th century.
I don't know how to wrap up this Comedy Central Roast of David Tame. Eventually I will give this book two stars just for the sake of his investigation of ancient music. But chapter 2 might be one of the worst things I have ever read in a book that shamelessly feigning to be scientific. There are some serious flaws in the whole rationale of this book simply because the author can't help to insert his own personal beliefs and parade them as objective truths. One of the most credential sources he relies on is even a guy who apparently, according to Wikipedia, is an anti-rock music television evangelist and exorcist! So no wonder he concludes that the uninformed segments of society who "likes" to listens to rock music for some perverted reason will either die because their heart rhythms are out of their natural order, have digestion problems, or go permanently deaf and condemned to feel an emptiness all of their lives - just because they prefer Rolling Stones over Beethoven. At one point he even humbly asserts that "although no research has yet been conducted on the subject [...] it also seems likely that the heart-rate of such people [rock music listeners] is faster than that of other people even throughout the day, while they are not listening to the music itself" (p. 139) For some reason he found it plausible to emphasis his argument in italics although admittedly he has no knowledge of any scientific research.
I am still halfway through this books and if there are any prospective readers of it I highly recommend them to avoid this book at all costs. This is nothing but a conservative, evangelical uptake on sociology of music parading itself to be scientific and objective truth. I guess, as of all religions parade themselves to be.
As far as I have read, the book really delivers in that sense. The chapter on ancient Chinese music was highly informative and interesting to read, given that I had no single idea about it and I am sure he will deliver the same on his account of Indian music. But, when it came to Tame's take on the "new music" of twentieth century (which he associates with materialistic or intellectual humanism for some reason) I started to get concerned because so far there are no real scholarly, or even logical, basis to what he is suggesting. Let me give you one example - this is an excerpt about his opinions on the "revolution of materialism" in classical music, starting with Mussorgsky and reaching its apex with Tchaikovsky (keep in mind that this passage belongs to a general narrative on how their music is spiritually "worthless" than their predecessors like Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, etc.):
"A still more significant composer whose life and personal weaknesses also dictated the final stages of his music was Mussorgsky's compatriot, Tchaikovsky. [...] [He] was a deserving as a man could be of the title, Born Musician. So naturally did music of deep beauty come to him that there was, on the face of it, no need for him to ever gone astray from the idealistic artistic precepts of his classical predecessors."
...Nothing wrong so far, right? Let us proceed to the next paragraph then:
"Throughout the entire span of his adult life, however, Tchaikovsky was a man tormented. For he was homosexual. Inwardly horrified with himself and his tendencies, and embarrassed in the eyes of those who shared his secret, Tchaikovsky nevertheless failed to overcome his sexual inclinations. His homosexuality became the obsessive defect of his life [...] Always nervous and highly strung, the composer found his life to be a ceaseless struggle against moral weakness and over-emotionalism. And it was a struggle from which, ultimately, he failed to emerge as victor." (pp. 82-83)
This was also the exact point where I stopped reading, noted "What the f***?!" on the page and penned this review. Now let's put aside the abhorrent tints of homophobia lurking beneath this text and just look from a purely intellectualist pointview: what does Tchaikovksy's personal life have to do anything with him conducting decadent albeit melodically beautiful music? And this comes right after a passage on Mussorgsky and his vices: his lack of faith and belief in atheism, his inability to hold a high-level occupation and eventual financial ruining and in the end "having become an alcoholic, died poverty-stricken and alone". The implied correlation between these composers' lack of faith in a higher power and their moral decadence with the deterioration of music in general is not only scientifically unsound but also ethically reprehensible.
Yet in the end it is his book and I guess he can take whatever normative point he wants to take. But hating popular music or the "materialist revolutions" in classical music is one thing and insinuating a link between people's "decadent" personal experiences and their music's overall corrupting effect on music's evolution is totally another. Perhaps I edit this review when I am finished with it but as of now I am highly concerned about what will follow next. If Tchaikovsky get this much negative commentary, I am sincerely afraid to read anything about Freddie Mercury or David Bowie.
Edit: I have decided not to wait until I have finished the book because I am afraid I will never get to see the end of this incoherent ramblings of a puritan elitist - his scorn of anything other than 19th century music is just so much to take. What is surprising about this book is that, at the time of it's publishing the author was only 31 years old! So I can't help but imagine him, cooped up in his room with anger and frustration while his contemporaries having fun and partying, listening to rock music while he is summoning the ghost of Beethoven to have some company. Even his passive-aggressive remarks and his holier-than-thou attitude can't conceal the fact that deep-down this guy is really angry because he was born in the wrong century.
This book should not be taken seriously by any scholar worth of his salt. Perhaps other religious education students who also likes to sniff their own farts and hate everything that does not suit their personal tastes may like it. But other than that, this is pretty much the literary equivalent of Bill O'Reilly ranting about Democrats. Did you know that Debussy was a "feline Frenchman"??? Oh, also Stravinsky used to consume a lot of whisky, and this is very relevant because music patterns are influenced by personal life patterns of conductors and then they can also influence patterns of civilization. And everything wrong with the modern Western world is the doings of these avant-garde musicians and expressionists! Sorry for constantly trashing this book but, honestly, he was one argument away from blaming World War I on Schoenberg's atonality! In the later of the book, he even goes further to suggest that there is an objectively good music and objectively bad music simply because some scientist with nothing better to do found out that plants that have been subjected to Led Zeppelin and Vanilla Fudge died after weeks and plants who "listened" devotional music (whatever that means) prospered! To which he concludes that only a "misguided segment of society" can "like" (his quotation marks) this objectively bad music - which is apparently anything other than classical idealist music of 18th and 19th century.
I don't know how to wrap up this Comedy Central Roast of David Tame. Eventually I will give this book two stars just for the sake of his investigation of ancient music. But chapter 2 might be one of the worst things I have ever read in a book that shamelessly feigning to be scientific. There are some serious flaws in the whole rationale of this book simply because the author can't help to insert his own personal beliefs and parade them as objective truths. One of the most credential sources he relies on is even a guy who apparently, according to Wikipedia, is an anti-rock music television evangelist and exorcist! So no wonder he concludes that the uninformed segments of society who "likes" to listens to rock music for some perverted reason will either die because their heart rhythms are out of their natural order, have digestion problems, or go permanently deaf and condemned to feel an emptiness all of their lives - just because they prefer Rolling Stones over Beethoven. At one point he even humbly asserts that "although no research has yet been conducted on the subject [...] it also seems likely that the heart-rate of such people [rock music listeners] is faster than that of other people even throughout the day, while they are not listening to the music itself" (p. 139) For some reason he found it plausible to emphasis his argument in italics although admittedly he has no knowledge of any scientific research.
I am still halfway through this books and if there are any prospective readers of it I highly recommend them to avoid this book at all costs. This is nothing but a conservative, evangelical uptake on sociology of music parading itself to be scientific and objective truth. I guess, as of all religions parade themselves to be.
March 2, 2018
I do not recommend anyone read this book. It was given to me as a gift because I am in the process of becoming a music therapist. I haven’t finished reading yet, but most of what I have read is from a very narrow viewpoint, and is often bigoted as well as tilted against popular music. Not to mention the conclusions the author came to are you unsubstantiated. There are some historical sections that may be accurate, but I am hesitant to believe them based on the other sections and would recommend finding alternative sources for accurate information on those topics. I am going to finish reading the book out of spite, but don’t think anyone should ever read it.
October 16, 2020
Holy crap, what's wrong with 90 % of the reviewers?
First off, David Tame NEVER said he was a Christian. He said that he is spiritual, not religious, and deeply into mysticism and esotericism. His other books proof that.
Also, here he describes the AFFECTS of music. He never said he hated jazz, blues, rock etc. as a whole. Later, when the genre was born, he started to endorse trance music since this music indeed is a medicine. But that was in the NINETIES and this book was released in the mid EIGHTIES! Duh!
Also, this shows the narrow mindness of rock music fans. They refuse to tolerate electronic music and they'll instead headbang out their last remaining brain cells.
Sorry, but from my experience, 90 % of this book is true. Of course there is good melodic jazz too, mostly out of brazil. After the 50's, music has not only become worse. There also have been good filmscores and instrumental jazz/blues/dub, but again, this book is 36 years old.
I will admit I still have a love for the wrong music. Tastes are genetical indeed, but mine seem to be destructive.
If you wanna relax and feel God, listen to medieval, baroque, classical or romantic music. If you wanna be hypnotized and have a small journey into the occult, listen to blues rock, soft rock, psychedelic trance, drum & bass, western swing, bluegrass or melodic jazz. I have both types of moments in my life, but sadly the latter rather than the former ones, and I don't think that's a good idea. Of course it can differ from person to persons. Some people are more immune than others. But only a moron would think music and hypnosis weren't good friends. See the Pied Piper of Hamelin.
First off, David Tame NEVER said he was a Christian. He said that he is spiritual, not religious, and deeply into mysticism and esotericism. His other books proof that.
Also, here he describes the AFFECTS of music. He never said he hated jazz, blues, rock etc. as a whole. Later, when the genre was born, he started to endorse trance music since this music indeed is a medicine. But that was in the NINETIES and this book was released in the mid EIGHTIES! Duh!
Also, this shows the narrow mindness of rock music fans. They refuse to tolerate electronic music and they'll instead headbang out their last remaining brain cells.
Sorry, but from my experience, 90 % of this book is true. Of course there is good melodic jazz too, mostly out of brazil. After the 50's, music has not only become worse. There also have been good filmscores and instrumental jazz/blues/dub, but again, this book is 36 years old.
I will admit I still have a love for the wrong music. Tastes are genetical indeed, but mine seem to be destructive.
If you wanna relax and feel God, listen to medieval, baroque, classical or romantic music. If you wanna be hypnotized and have a small journey into the occult, listen to blues rock, soft rock, psychedelic trance, drum & bass, western swing, bluegrass or melodic jazz. I have both types of moments in my life, but sadly the latter rather than the former ones, and I don't think that's a good idea. Of course it can differ from person to persons. Some people are more immune than others. But only a moron would think music and hypnosis weren't good friends. See the Pied Piper of Hamelin.
August 18, 2013
I read this quite a few years ago, and I remember thinking that some of the theories were pretty 'out there' and definitely biased against modern music, particularly pop and music of African origin. It's an extremely peculiar and strictured view, and one that is not really substantiated in the text, other than what the author says. I found some interesting pieces of information - the word 'jazz' is derived from an African word for sex apparently, although I have no other corroboration for this statement, so that may be completely wrong! I remember stuff about sacred vibrations, and white lords, or some such, which could be quite interesting, but are just a bit strange. I wouldn't be in a hurry to read this again, other than curiosity as to my previous reading habits.
October 8, 2020
David Tame is not a fan of modern music. That's putting it lightly. He especially hates jazz and rock.
Similarly, he doesn't like modern religion. He's "openly Christian" (as George Carlin would have put it) and doesn't care for other beliefs, although he does admit that the Chinese and Indian spiritual beliefs had some merit to them.
I thought that this book was going to provide information about Chinese and Indian music, as linked to spiritual practice. There are several tables in the book that have information like this, but not enough for me.
The best thing that I can say about this is that he devotes a paragraph to my favorite prog group, Curved Air (semi-obscure), describing "Whose Shoulder Are You Looking Over Anyway?", which was composed by audio processing of spoken poem.
Similarly, he doesn't like modern religion. He's "openly Christian" (as George Carlin would have put it) and doesn't care for other beliefs, although he does admit that the Chinese and Indian spiritual beliefs had some merit to them.
I thought that this book was going to provide information about Chinese and Indian music, as linked to spiritual practice. There are several tables in the book that have information like this, but not enough for me.
The best thing that I can say about this is that he devotes a paragraph to my favorite prog group, Curved Air (semi-obscure), describing "Whose Shoulder Are You Looking Over Anyway?", which was composed by audio processing of spoken poem.
January 13, 2012
Music is such a huge part of our lives that most of take for granted the effect it poses upon our being. I liked the subject matter and approach of the topic, really it is nothing I have ever contemplated in any depth before now, but Mr. Tame gave a great angle to the presentation of the book.
It covers many facets and history of different cultural aspects of music. If you are at all interested in music, environmental effect upon the human state or this facet of the history of the societies of the world this is a good read!
It covers many facets and history of different cultural aspects of music. If you are at all interested in music, environmental effect upon the human state or this facet of the history of the societies of the world this is a good read!
September 20, 2012
Awesome! In the first few chapters, you can really see his bias towards different types of music and this (to me) accounts for some misrepresentation of the effects of certain genres on ones morals but it's still very interesting. The amazing part of the book starts at the chapter on The Physics of Om; absolutely fascinating and thought-provoking. I adore this book!
September 21, 2012
An absolutely wonderful book on mucic and society. One chapter "The physics of the OM" is a scientific look at vibration (meaning ALL of creation) that helps the reader see the unity in creation. Written in layman's language it reveals much.
May 2, 2019
Very mixed reviews here. I think it is a great book, though perhaps it is not for those whose minds are not open to ideas beyond the everyday thoughts.
May 18, 2020
Racist book
August 2, 2020
It's a heavy book in places, but if you're an audiophile, or interested in the magic of sound without words, here's your yarn. Too many takeaways to list here, but I found what I was looking for.
Read
August 24, 2025Super interesting. There is some food for thought in this book. Music affects society in very tangible ways.
September 18, 2014
Mr Tame does his research and gives a history lesson on the views of music from the ancients from Asian and European perspectives. He discusses how music effects listeners and the society at large and delves into the implications that changes in music preferences lead to.
The historical and cultural chapters of this book are very much worth reading, while the others are filled with New Age/mysticism pseudo-science that damages the credibility of the book as a whole. Mr Tame attempts to write a comprehensive book about the effects of music and partially succeeds. His failure lies in his use of unsubstantiated 'science' and some leaps in logic that beg for more explanation and proof.
The historical and cultural chapters of this book are very much worth reading, while the others are filled with New Age/mysticism pseudo-science that damages the credibility of the book as a whole. Mr Tame attempts to write a comprehensive book about the effects of music and partially succeeds. His failure lies in his use of unsubstantiated 'science' and some leaps in logic that beg for more explanation and proof.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews