Singing the Right Way

Orthodox Christians and Secular Enchantment in Estonia

Jeffers Engelhardt

First English-language ethnomusicological monograph on Estonian music
Previously undocumented perspective on musical and religious life in the post-Soviet world
Breaks new theoretical ground with interdisciplinary work on secularity and the secular

Singing the Right Way

Orthodox Christians and Secular Enchantment in Estonia

Jeffers Engelhardt

Description

Singing the Right Way enters the world of Orthodox Christianity in Estonia to explore the significance of musical style in worship, cultural identity, and social imagination. Through a series of ethnographic and historical chapters, author Jeffers Engelhardt focuses on how Orthodox Estonians give voice to the religious absolute in secular society to live Christ-like lives.

Approaching Orthodoxy through local understandings of correct practice and correct belief, Engelhardt shows how religious knowledge, national identity, and social transformation illuminate in the work of singing: how to "sing the right way" and thereby realize the fullness of their faith. In some parishes, this meant preserving a local, Protestant-influenced tradition of congregational singing from the 1920s and 30s. In others, it meant adapting Byzantine melodies and vocal styles encountered abroad. In still others, it meant continuing a bilingual, multi-ethnic Estonian-Russian oral tradition despite ecclesiastical and political struggle.

Based on a decade of fieldwork and singing in choirs, Singing the Right Way traces the sounds of Orthodoxy in Estonia through the Russian Empire, interwar national independence, the Soviet-era, and post-Soviet integration into the European Union to describe the dynamics of religion and secularity in singing style and repertoire — what Engelhardt calls secular enchantment. Ultimately, Singing the Right Way is an innovative model of how the musical poetics of contemporary religious forms are rooted in both sacred tradition and the contingent ways individuals inhabit the secular. This landmark study is sure to be an essential text for scholars studying the ethnomusicology of religion.

Singing the Right Way

Orthodox Christians and Secular Enchantment in Estonia

Jeffers Engelhardt

Table of Contents
About the Companion Website
Track Listing
Maps
Introduction
Part 1
Chapter 1 - Orthodoxy in Estonia, Estonian Orthodoxy
Chapter 2 - Right Singing: The Voice of Orthodoxy and Orthopraxy
Chapter 3 - "Today is an important day here, the birthday of our own religion": Festivity
and the Secular Enchantments of Right Singing
Part 2
Chapter 4 - "Every bird has its own song": Congregational Singing and the Making of
Estonian Orthodoxy
Chapter 5 - Songs of Commemoration and Continuity
Part 3
Chapter 6 - "Life is so simple to live when the corridor you are to walk down has already
been made": Byzantification and Conversion at the Cathedral of Saint Simeon and the Prophetess Hanna
Chapter 7 - "We are people of the country, but we worship and Russian-type God":
Singing the Right Way in Setomaa
Epilogue
Appendix
Bibliography

Singing the Right Way

Orthodox Christians and Secular Enchantment in Estonia

Jeffers Engelhardt

Author Information

Jeffers Engelhardt, Associate Professor Anthropology of Music, Amherst College

Jeffers Engelhardt is an Associate Professor of Music at Amherst College. A graduate of the University of Chicago and Oberlin College, his research deals broadly with music, religion, European identity, and media. His second book, a co-edited volume titled Resounding Transcendence: Transitions in Music, Religion, and Ritual, will also be published by Oxford University Press.

Singing the Right Way

Orthodox Christians and Secular Enchantment in Estonia

Jeffers Engelhardt

Reviews and Awards

"In this remarkable book, with its abundant musical scores, photographs and audio recordings on a companion website, ethnomusicologist Jeffers Engelhardt enables us to listen in to the wide diapason of sounds and styles which have come to be considered 'right singing' in Orthodox communities in Estonia... The book is intensely human and by the time we come to the end, many of the singers and choir leaders we encounter have almost become our friends, as they obviously have for the author." - Alison Ruth Kolosova, Sobornost/ Eastern Churches Review

"Engelhardt does excellent work in analysing the secular enchantment of Orthodoxy, effected by national ideologies and identities and political endeavours, and the reflexivity of identity and singing the right way at different historical and political moments." - Jooa Sotejeff-Wilson, Journal of the International Society for Orthodox Church Music

"Singing the Right Way is a cutting-edge ethnography opening new areas of research on the stylistics of music in Orthodox Estonia. This book will quickly assume pride of place on many bookshelves." - Gregory Barz, Alexander Heard Distinguished Professor, Vanderbilt University

"Engelhardt contributes a detailed ethnography of Estonian Orthodox singing to further our understanding of music and religion in a post-socialist European context. It highlights the importance of singing in liturgical experience and charts musical, religious and political transitions." - Tina K. Ramnarine, Professor of Music, Royal Holloway University of London

"The book is handsomely produced in all respects, filling a gap with enthusiasm about its subject." - Musical Times

"Engelhardt has studied Estonian Orthodox singing with the utmost care and dedication, including, significantly, the lived faith of Orthodox believers the everyday rituals that Orthodox Christians in Estonia practice. Magically, Engelhardt's work makes the transformations of congregations and singing in the Orthodox Church of Estonia visible and audible to readers, opening up the different worlds and ideologies of a small community under a microscope's lens." - Andreas Kalkun, Res Musica