Marching As To War

Protest Songs and Battle Cries

    More than 5000 years ago, the Chinese Book of Changes (I Ching) linked music to military power. In the classic translation by Wilhelm, an image of thunder rolling over the earth represents the quality of Enthusiasm: "Thus the ancient kings made music/ In order to honor merit/ And offered it with splendor." When this image or energy-moment is active, the I Ching  advises us "to install helpers/ And to set armies marching."
    The drums of war sound close these days, as do calls for musicians to contribute to coffeehouse teach-ins, street protests, and concerts benefitting one or another political position. Music organizes and reinforces the energy of civilians as well as armies, and influences our relationship to historical events in a growing variety of ways.
    Military rhythms have flavored songs as varied as Irving Berlin's humorous jab at the Reveille bugler in "Oh How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning"  and Phil Ochs's "I Ain't a-Marching Anymore." But as my father used to say (quoting, I believe, his teacher Charlie Seeger), " The music of a march only gets people moving. It's the lyrics that tell you which way to go."
    Watching the recent Rose Parade, even I could appreciate the stunning precision of the Marine Corps Band. That doesn't mean I agree with every campaign they'll serve.
    A long generation ago, the public movement against the Vietnam War coincided with a new burst of political songwriting, exemplified by Ochs, Bob Dylan, and Holly Near, among others. The 1950s Civil Rights movement had already transformed church hymns into anthems of political courage, and the century-old labor movement had drawn unity from  simple marching songs as well as spirit-lifting parodies by Joe Hill and others.
    The self-conscious artists of the 1960s and 70s made more personal statements, and expressed more complex experiences. And they demanded that the commercial music industry respond to current events, including war. Only a week after the National Guard turned its guns on college students at Ohio State (and in Mississippi), Crosby, Stills & Nash had a top-of-the-chart song about it.
    As the decades turned, harder rock music took over as a louder but sometimes confused vehicle for social protest and rebellion. Punk, hip-hop and dozens of alternative styles have continued this evolution with various combinations of rhythm and rhyme, sound and/or fury. A new generation of singer/songwriters, from Garth Brooks to Ani Di Franco, now dances to an individualistic tune while keeping one ear tuned to the common ground
    But traditional folk music continues to provide its own strong links to the tides of war and history. The Irish classic "Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye" reflects the timeless universality of families mourning their soldiers' wounds.  
    The Yiddish anguish of "S'Brent!" cries out against the destruction of a Jewish shtetl,  while echoing a thousand other civilian tragedies. "Tenting Tonight," written during the Civil War, expresses the resigned weariness of soldiers everywhere.
    The interaction of war and music has reached beyond marches and dirges, to shape the instruments of music themselves. Conquerors know that the very sounds of a culture can hinder the enslavement of its people. So the English rulers of Ireland banned harps as well as the color green, and African slaves in the New World were denied their powerful drums.
    Like the Taliban's repression of pop music, such acts have seeded bitterness more than loyalty. When the traditional instruments return —as in Latin America's potent and beautiful Nuevo Cancion movement — people regain a proud identity along with a rebound in political consciousness.
    Wartime songs also cover many moods. World War I gave us cheery reminders to "Smile, smile, smile," but the Gulf War of 1991 found a more ambivalent theme in the ballad "From  a Distance." In response to the tragedies of September 11, 2001, John Lennon's "Imagine..." seemed to touch as many hearts as Berlin's "God Bless America."
    Forty years ago, Dylan sang that "The Times They Are A-Changing," and as the Chinese knew 5000 years ago, changes never really stop. The coming months and years may well bring us new kinds of warfare and new dimensions of suffering.
    It's hard to know what anthems we'll be hearing a year from now. But whatever comes, there will be music—timeworn as well as modern— to help make sense of it. To everything (turn, turn, turn) there is a season.
    The I Ching's hexagram 49 shows us revolution, molting, and soldiers stripping off their armor. And hexagram 24, the symbolic opposite of Enthusiasm (music and war), presents thunder within the earth as The Turning Point, a renewal of energy after a difficult time.  May it come soon.