Dharma Goes Pop! Buddhist Music Lightens Up

At the recently-held Golden Melody Awards, the award for best album in the newly established Religious Music category went to the "Dabei Mantra," released by Primal Beat Creations. The throaty chanting of Tibetan lamas formed a stark contrast with the rest of the music at the glitzy annual pop fest. Holding up the award, Primal Beat's general manager Huang Min-nan said: "Chu Yueh-hsin thanked God when he picked up his prize a moment ago. Well now I think we can say that Avalokitesvara [the goddess of mercy] has won a prize too."

Amitabha

In addition to the Tibetan Buddhist "Dabei Mantra", another Primal Beat release was nominated in the category-a new age recording entitled "Lu Dumu." This too features authentic Buddhist chanting, but in other respects-the eye-catching cover girl, the album blurb and the tinkling tones of the music itself-it's a big departure from the conventional image of Buddhist music.

Huang Min-nan, who formerly headed pop music planning at Rock Records, says: "Buddhist music now changes several times a year." Not so long ago Chinese-style symphonic music, or chanting accompanied by a single instrument was popular, but at the moment it's all about "spiritual" music and dance tunes. The "Caishen Mantra," also released by Huang's company, pioneered a boppy beat that soon caught on throughout the Buddhist music business. The piece appealed to young consumers and was used in commercials and films. Huang, who found religion and began producing Buddhist music after surviving a car accident, says: "It's true that I've used my experience in pop marketing to promote Buddhist music, but this is simply a means to an end. What really matters is being rigorous about one's faith."

Soothing music

One of the main reasons for the innovative direction that Buddhist music is taking today is the surge, in recent years, in the number of followers of Buddhism. Ten years ago, several record companies began commissioning composers from Taiwan and the mainland to produce Buddhist music for performance by traditional Chinese orchestras, or on folk instruments, or to accompany chanting by lay Buddhists choirs. In contrast to the solemn chanting heard in temples and monasteries, this new melodic, orchestral form made for good background music at places of worship, where it enhanced the atmosphere of devotion. It also found favor with ordinary believers, who could play it at home while cooking, eating and doing their chores, confident that Buddha wouldn't be offended.

The success of classical-Chinese-style Buddhist music paved the way for more populist forms, and the industry began to woo a mass audience with the chanting of sutras and mantras set to folk, opera and even pop music. But this approach has generated controversy among Buddhists.

At a symposium on Buddhist music held earlier this year at Fokuangshan, a center for Buddhist studies and worship, several Buddhist academics voiced concern about the popularization and commercialization of the form, and its loss of sacramental character. As they pointed out: take away the title and the chanting, and you're left with pure pop.

But the monks and nuns who formed the majority at the symposium opted for tolerance: "The dharma is part of the world that we inhabit. Seeking the truth in isolation from the world is as daft as looking for horns on a rabbit." According to Master Chueh Hua, who has been on overseas tours with Buddhist choirs, some people devote their lives to Buddha because they prefer vegetarian food and some are prompted to do so by the influence of Buddhist music. If the idea is to attract ordinary people, then you need a populist approach. "Music is a most effective way of winning people's hearts," says Fokuangshan abbot Hsin Ting. "Perhaps the more innovative, secular forms of music are not best for inspiring profound religious sentiments. But as a means of entertainment, music can at least soften the forbidding impression that many people have of Buddhism. It is a convenient way of guiding people towards salvation."

Fokuangshan, in collaboration with an external partner, operates a recording company that recently spent over NT$1 million producing "Music of the Everlasting River," a new age album by renowned composer Chen Yang. The project was overseen by Master Yung Chun, who says: "Buddhist music has to be alive if it is to make any headway. It can't stick solely to traditional 'Amitabha' chanting if a wider public is to be reached." He adds that in addition to arranging and releasing recordings of the traditional forms of Buddhist incantation, the company is working on lighter, less overtly religious music, to make people "feel happier," and will also look at producing dance tunes, soft music and vocal numbers.

All creatures great and small

In fact, the use of popular music in Buddhism dates back at least a thousand years. A lyric melody of the Song dynasty entitled "The Butterfly in Love with the Flower" was adapted as a Buddhist refrain, and monks compiled a 50-volume collection of Buddhist songs that drew on both contemporary and traditional compositions, so incorporating the music of the era into the religious canon.

Music is one of Mahayana Buddhism's main means of encouraging salvation. Images of music-playing spirits and bodhisattvas, flying through the air, abound in the Buddhist cave paintings at Dunhuang, while the classic texts of Buddhism describe paradise as filled with the sound of heavenly music. Buddhist scripture records that Sakyamuni, after attaining Buddhahood, decided not to evangelize directly because he felt the dharma was too abstruse for ordinary people to comprehend. But Indra, wanting to ensure maximum exposure for the dharma, had the disciple responsible for music give a special performance for the Buddha, as a way of appealing for his compassion. Buddha was duly moved, and thus commenced his 49 years of preaching.

In the fifth century AD, around five centuries after Sakyamuni's demise, the monk Ma Ming started using music to accompany his sermons, bringing about the conversion on one occasion of 500 princelings.

In the Buddhist work Dazhi Dulun ("To Dharma Through Great Wisdom"), it is written: "The bodhisattvas sought out fine music in order to purify the world. They wanted people to hear fine music and feel gentle, so that their hearts would be more open to the message of Buddhism. So music became a form of offering to the Buddha." Believers were thus allowed to make offerings of music to aid their relief from suffering. Music became one of Buddhism's ten official forms of offering, and one of the five types of activity prescribed for promoting salvation.

The author Yu Chiu-yu has written of an incident from his own life that testifies to the redemptive powers of Buddhist music. As an infant he was once kidnapped by a local gang. The kidnappers fled with him to a temple, but the deep, undulating sound of chanting made them change their minds. They took baby Yu home, gave him a lollipop and put him back in his cot.

Musical conversion

"It was due to music that I became a nun in the first place," smiles Master Tsu Hui, executive director of the Fokuangshan Foundation for Buddhist Culture & Education. Master Tsu Hui grew up in a pious Buddhist family. Her father wanted her to spend more time studying Buddhism, but like most young people she wasn't terribly interested. This was around 40 years ago, and it was at that time that Master Hsing Yun established the Hongfa Choir, attracting the participation of a number of keen singers. Among them were several youths who subsequently became leading members of the Buddhist clergy, such as Tsu Hui, Tsu Chuang and Tsu Jung. The choir recorded six albums in the ensuing years, and generated plenty of controversy in Buddhist circles.

From 1979 onwards Master Hsing Yun began integrating elements of Western music and dance into temple chanting, and organized shows at the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall and the National Concert Hall in Taipei. Groups from other organizations, such as the Yuankuang Buddhist Academy and the Tzu Chi Foundation, have also presented public performances of Buddhist singing.

Fokuangshan has made active use of music in recent years as a means of promoting Buddhist teachings, sending groups to give performances in Japan and Hong Kong, and last year organizing a European tour for a 120-member choral group. A further tour to Australia and Southeast Asia is planned for this November.

Pentatonic scale

In the early days of Buddhism, when Sakyamuni and his disciples were still active, music was considered inappropriate for the clergy due to its effect on the emotions. This was called the "no music" principle. Scripture includes an account of Buddha telling a nearby monk to stop reciting his texts in a singsong fashion. Sutras had to be intoned, not sung, and there was none of the melodic, rhythmic type of incantation that is heard in temples today. Members of the clergy were not allowed to take part in the music that worshippers presented by way of devotional offering, and the religious code prohibited monks and nuns from watching musical performances.

Master Chao Hui, who was a big fan of vocal music before becoming a nun, believes that Buddhist restrictions-such as the ban on music for the clergy-must be strictly observed, no matter how trivial they may seem.

Novice monks and nuns are still susceptible to the emotive, sometimes spellbinding power of music, and are particularly at risk from the decadent excesses of pop music, which can contaminate their minds with worldly thoughts and lure them away from Buddha. Music also interferes with the contemplative process of liberating oneself from worldly concerns, and even Mahakasyapa, who always accompanied the Buddha, was unable to calm down when preaching to the lovely sound of a zither-while the other 500 divine beings present simply lost their heads and started dancing. When former music students take monastic vows they renounce forever their beloved pianos and violins, because everything makes way for the overriding priority of breaking the cycle of rebirth. Ceremonial chanting is fine, but involvement with secular music, be it classical or pop, is discouraged.

But the Buddha knows all there is to know about human nature, and while "abandoning desire" is the way to transcend worldly concerns, it is not to be imposed on everyone. Only those who are ready to do so of their own accord, are expected to overcome desire and renounce music. After Buddha attained nirvana the "no music" ideal for the clergy began to be modified, as Buddhism separated along two major paths: Hinayana, which focuses on individual deliverance, and Mahayana, which aims for the salvation of all living beings.

In Mahayana Buddhism, transcending worldly troubles does not imply cutting one's links to the world. True enlightenment comes from inhabiting the mortal realm, but without being seduced by worldly objects. According to Paris-based ethno-musicologist Gao Ya-li, who specializes in Buddhist music, the classic texts of Mahayana Buddhism repeatedly emphasize the virtue of music as a form of offering-"Better to actively channel it than passively avoid it." It was this positive attitude regarding music that came to prevail in Chinese Buddhism-a branch of Mahayana-and music thus came to form an intimate part of daily life for the clergy, from the ritual incantation of sutras, to the reciting of texts morning and evening, and the singing of chants at temple events.

Drum and bell

4:30 a.m. at the monastery, and the first glimmers of dawn are showing in the East. The monks awake to the steady beat of a wooden clapper. They dress, go to the washroom, and prepare for another day-all without speaking. The clapper stops and is succeeded by the chiming of a bell, which can be heard for miles around. Then comes the pounding of a drum, and the monks briskly head to the hall for their first class of the day. They won't exchange a single word until after breakfast, so as not to disturb their spiritual concentration. Clapper, bell, drum: simple percussive instruments that provide the music to which the monks begin their daily devotional routine. As Hsin Ting explains: "For living beings, hearing is the sharpest of the senses. Sound is the most effective means in Buddhism for probing the hidden recesses of the mind."

At daybreak, the first rays of sunlight penetrate the main prayer-hall. Monks and masters file into the hall and take up their positions. Master Wei Na raises his voice to begin chanting, and the others join in while a rhythm is tapped out on the wooden block. Their chanting follows the traditional Chinese pentatonic scale, rising and falling like the sound of surf at the seashore. No wonder the Lotus Sutra describes Buddhist music as "the sound of the tides, superior to secular music."

Buddhist chanting, simple and solemn in tone, can be heard throughout the day at the monastery: at class time, during meals, and as part of sutra-reading rituals. Master Yung Pen, vice executive director of the Fokuangshan Foundation for Buddhist Culture & Education, says: "For monks, chanting scripture is not a matter of artistic expression, but is rather a manifestation of the Truth."

Musical preaching

Music is indeed a kind of "Truth" in Buddhism, with chanting having a religious rather than artistic function. The instruments used during chanting are themselves sacred, helping to summon otherwise intangible forces, and monks have to be careful not to inadvertently call up these forces when they are learning how to play the instruments. By the same token, monasteries do not sell recordings of the special music used to help hungry ghosts cross the threshold from hell during Ghost Month, the seventh month of the Chinese lunar calendar. Playing such music at random could well result in hungry ghosts emerging from hell only to find that no food and alms await them-thus defeating the charitable object of the exercise and pointlessly bothering the ghosts.

A clue to the different religious character of Christianity and Buddhism can be found in the contrast between the beautiful church singing of the West, and deep, wave-like chanting of Buddhist temples.

Buddhist music is traditionally bleak and mournful in tone, due to the notion that life is a dream from which we wake into a void. But in its creative new guise, Buddhist music is lighter and more harmonious than before, with the goal of making people feel happy and more at ease. As for the music used in Buddhist rites, the object is to prevent disaster, erase bad karma, and promote enlightenment. Ethno-musicologist Lin Ku-fang explains that in Buddhism, music is essentially "a means of seeing through suffering and impermanence, and expressing compassion for all sentient beings."

Hui Kuan, a lay believer who converted to Buddhism over a decade ago, describes how her conversion came about. She had recently graduated from college and was getting over an emotional trauma at the time. She had no direct experience of Buddhism, but on the recommendation of a classmate she went on retreat to a temple in Puli. The temple was ringed by mountains, and the only sound at night was the calling of insects and frogs. One evening, as a bell chimed, the monks chanted a Buddhist poem that told of the urge to break free of emotional bonds and cut away one's troubles-and of the individual's incapacity to do so. "I felt enveloped by a feeling of care and sympathy, even warmer than a mother's hug," she recalls, "and I could sense the transcendent realm of Buddhism. I knew this was something I would need to know for the rest of my days." First thing the following morning, she converted to Buddhism.

Pack up your troubles

At a brightly lit party young people are grooving to a Buddhist beat. New Buddhist music is indeed a "means" of attracting interest, but as Gao Ya-li asks: "Catchy, secular music can draw people in, but does it make them want to follow the Buddhist way of life and pursue ultimate salvation?"

Master Hsin Tao of Lingjiou Mountain Monastery divides Buddhist music into two levels. Music that is designed to be recorded and played needs to have a good pop melody, and be able to attract listeners to the dharma. But for the actual practice of Buddhism, you need chants that can penetrate people's feelings. He adds that hearing is the first of the senses to develop in humans, and the last to go. Through our ears we gain insight and knowledge, and through them we can also purify the mind. Therefore both secular Buddhist music and traditional chanting have their role to play.

In the still of the night, the beating of a drum marks the end of another day at the temple. It also tells of the impermanence of everything and the speed at which time passes-a reminder to the monks that they should cherish every moment and be devoted to their Buddhist studies. The drum stops and a bell takes over. The inhabitants of the temple are thinking with compassion of the people of the world, hoping that the sound of the bell will help ease their sufferings and bring them joy. As the bell rings out through the night, it reaches the ears of everyone around, young and old, before passing on out into the void.

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Just before dawn the monks and their masters congregate in the prayer hall for class. The surf-like sound of their chanting conveys the depth of their devotion.

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There are great commercial prospects for Buddhist music, which can now be sampled at record shops and stalls alongside new age music and "spiritual" music.

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Hands pressed together in prayer, these devotees pay their respects to Buddha. There has been steady growth in the numbers of followers of Buddhism in the last few years, and creative new forms of Buddhist music have begun to hit the market.

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Music has long been regarded as the best way of guiding people towards salvation. The Buddhist murals of Tang dynasty China depicted music-playing spirits (left), while nowadays, Fokuangshan arranges large-scale musical events (right).

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They rise to the sound of the wooden clapper, and perform their morning ablutions to the accompaniment of the bell and the drum. Throughout the day, whether eating, walking, resting or attending class, the monks are never far from music in one form or another.

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Hearing is the earliest of the senses to develop, and the last to go. When someone sets out on their final journey, the sound of chanting is supposed to help the soul on its way to paradise.

With its aquiline nose, curly hair, and muscular physique, this boddhisatva from Gandhara speaks volumes about the influence of Hellenic culture in northern India, which had once been part of the Greek empire.

Just before dawn the monks and their masters congregate in the prayer hall for class. The surf-like sound of their chanting conveys the depth of their devotion.

There are great commercial prospects for Buddhist music, which can now be sampled at record shops and stalls alongside new age music and "spiritual" music.

Hands pressed together in prayer, these devotees pay their respects to Buddha. There has been steady growth in the numbers of followers of Buddhism in the last few years, and creative new forms of Buddhist music have begun to hit the market.

Music has long been regarded as the best way of guiding people towards salvation. The Buddhist murals of Tang dynasty China depicted music-playing spirits （left）, while nowadays, Fokuangshan arranges large-scale musical events （right）.

Music has long been regarded as the best way of guiding people towards salvation. The Buddhist murals of Tang dynasty China depicted music-playing spirits （left）, while nowadays, Fokuangshan arranges large-scale musical events （right）.

They rise to the sound of the wooden clapper, and perform their morning ablutions to the accompaniment of the bell and the drum. Throughout the day, whether eating, walking, resting or attending class, the monks are never far from music in one form or another.

They rise to the sound of the wooden clapper, and perform their morning ablutions to the accompaniment of the bell and the drum. Throughout the day, whether eating, walking, resting or attending class, the monks are never far from music in one form or another.

They rise to the sound of the wooden clapper, and perform their morning ablutions to the accompaniment of the bell and the drum. Throughout the day, whether eating, walking, resting or attending class, the monks are never far from music in one form or another.

They rise to the sound of the wooden clapper, and perform their morning ablutions to the accompaniment of the bell and the drum. Throughout the day, whether eating, walking, resting or attending class, the monks are never far from music in one form or another.

They rise to the sound of the wooden clapper, and perform their morning ablutions to the accompaniment of the bell and the drum. Throughout the day, whether eating, walking, resting or attending class, the monks are never far from music in one form or another.