Seeking the Drone Note

One final reflection about my time at Taizé that I couldn't squeeze into my prior posts.

I've described how music is, perhaps, the singular charism of the Taizé community. As I've shared, the simple, repetitive songs of Taizé, often sung in Latin, bring the experience of ancient chant into the modern world. 

Another example of this is how some Taizé songs employ drone notes. Drone notes, vocal or instrumental, were a feature of ancient Christian chant. 

An example of this at Taizé occurred each day when prayer requests were offered with the singing of "Kyrie Eleison, Christe Eleison" ("Lord, have mercy, Christ, have mercy."). After singing the words "Kyrie Eleison, Christe Eleison" a drone note would be held while a petition was chanted by one of the brothers. You can listen to an example of this here. Notice how the drone notes are held between the chanted petitions. 

Holding this drone note was new to me. And experiencing a drone note with hundreds of voices in the room was a physical experience. You could feel the drone in your chest, like your body was a cave being filled with a vibration. With drone notes your body becomes incorporated into the harmony. 

I don't have the best musical ear, so I often would have to "find" the drone notes after each singing of "Kyrie Eleison, Christe Eleison." And this seeking and finding of the drone note became a sort of parable for me during the week.

Specifically, as I said, as the harmony droned you could feel it in your chest. Feeling as much as listening, I would hum to myself to find the harmony, musically locating the resonance. Eventually, sometimes sooner sometimes not, I would find the note and settle into it. The experience of "finding" the drone note was like stepping into the flow of a moving river. The drone was a both location and momentum. You "found" the note, like a wayward prodigal returning home, and were picked up and carried along, like a raft slipping into the current of a river. 

This experience became for me a metaphor for the spiritual life. God is a drone note, ever-present, location and momentum, running through all of life. A harmony holding all things. Everyday I search for that drone note. Some days I find it sooner, some days not. All my spiritual practices are about finding and dropping into that resonance. And when I find it, it is like pushing off from the shore to join the gentle flow of the river. It is like a wayward prodigal returning home.