One of the websites off the beaten track that I regularly check is The Imaginative Conservative. This recently-provided essay by philosopher Roger Scruton, “Music and the Transcendental” is an example of why–scroll around for an abundance of thoughtful conservative commentary, usually of a scholarly bent and upon cultural topics.
Scruton has an entire book on music, but I can’t say I’ve fully engaged with his musical thought. I sense that I’d have a few issues with his theory were I to get fully up to speed with it, but however that may be, I’ve always found his various internet writings on music beneficial, and this offering is no exception. It was apparently a keynote address he first did for The Future Symphony Institute back in September, a group conservatives concerned with the fine arts ought to keep tabs on.
Another recent musical offering from The Imaginative Conservative is an essay by Carson Holloway, “Popping Leisure Out of Civilization,” which was originally published in 2009 by The Witherspoon Institute site Public Discourse, and as the sequel to an essay called “The Pop-Culture Wars.” Holloway deserves to be more widely known–he’s published 1) an excellent edited volume, Magnanimity and Statesmanship, featuring our Peter Lawler on “Tocqueville and Justice” and best of all, Holloway’s own “Aristotle’s Magnanimous Man,” which is the most judicious treatment of that difficult topic I’ve yet read, 2) his own book on the thought of Pope John Paul II, and 3) what we ought to focus on here, his case for the classical conservative critique of music, All Shook Up: Music, Passion, and Politics, a book which in a sense picks up where Allan Bloom’s critique of rock and pop left off, but in a much more comprehensive and less flashy mode. Holloway shows you what the case against most of our pop music is, from a classical Aristotelian and Platonic perspective–the two essays I’ve linked here give you the core of his argument.
In my own writing on music, I’ve tried to defend the common-sense contained in that case, while indicating the kind of reservations we ought to have against too crudely applying it. My September piece here “Common Sense for Conservatives about Popular Music”, does just this. Among other virtues, it shows you how to move beyond critics like Holloway and Bloom without losing what’s correct in their argument. This piece is part of my broader music project Carl’s Rock Songbook, which I hope to be resuming fairly soon. (For the unfamiliar, you might try No. 72, The Beatles, “It’s Only Love” for a general sense of what my Songbook does, and for Valentine’s Day ruminations.)
The Imaginative Conservative annoys me sometimes with the way they don’t list the original publication dates–I had to discover for myself, for example, that Holloway piece was several years old, and paired with another essay. They should ditch that bad practice. But it is true that some blog-essays, such as I hope my own Rock Songbook pieces, are not so time-bound.