Religious Hymns Research Articles

Love and Emotions in Pietist Hymnography—From the Past to Us: Musical Examples

This study aims to analyze, through religious hymns in the German-speaking area from the early 18th century, the influence that the Pietist theological movement, starting from Philipp Jacob Spener’s Pia Desideria, had on the centralization of the self in the Protestant religious world, through the introduction of personal feelings of love towards God. On the one hand, the origins of Pietism can already be traced back to the late 16th century in areas affected by the radical reforms of the Anabaptists. On the other hand, it is from the late 17th century and throughout the 18th century that this theological and spiritual movement destabilized orthodox Lutheranism in some symbolic cities of Protestant Germany, such as Frankfurt am Main, Halle, and the Duchy of Westphalia, up to Moravia. The extensive publication of hymnals and musical compendia for the use of individuals, lay groups (collegia pietatis), faith communities, and churches denotes a fervor and a desire to preach their way of “practicing” spirituality, which greatly contrasts with both orthodox Lutheranism and the prevailing rationalism in the religious and philosophical sphere in Germany of the mid-18th century. For the first time since the Reformation, Lutheranism saw the use, in the theology of the preached and sung Word, of personal feelings and emotions that connect the individual with God, who is made an object of individual as well as collective worship. This was one of the most significant accusations that came from the University of Wittenberg against Pietism, namely the shift of theological and spiritual focus from the centrality of God to the centrality of the self, which manifests its faith through the most intimate emotions and feelings. Through the analysis of some examples taken from hymnographic and theological production, centered on the individual feelings of the believer, this article focuses on how this influenced the religious revival movements that would pervade England and the United States of America for more than two centuries (from the First Great Awakening in the late 18th century to the Pentecostal movements of the 20th century), with a spotlight on Italian hymnody during the Risorgimento.

Study of Musicality in the Recitation of Religious Hymns

Religious traditions across the globe have their unique ways of reciting sacred hymns based on different melodic structures. Whether it is the chanting of Veda mantras in Hinduism or the recitation of Salaah in Islam or the singing of psalms in Christianity, there is a melodic flow in these hymns. Hymns have their own melodic appeal that makes them stand out among various melodic compositions, regardless of their language. The objective of this paper is to study the musicality of different religious hymns by selecting a few hymns from different traditions. This paper limits its study to the musical aspects of the oral traditions of reciting sacred hymns of different religions and it attempts to explore the unique musical elements in these hymns and also offers an insight into the artistic expressions across different religious cultures, through their musical recitations. Audio samples of the hymns are collected from various sources including field recordings, online resources and interviews. The collected data is subject to musical analysis by giving notations to the selected audio samples using musical notes of the Indian system of music, analyzing tonal variations and vocal techniques, and comparing the musical features to study the similarities and distinctions. The results of the analysis include finding the musical phrases from the chanting of different hymns, listing the observed commonalities and differences, and realizing the limited scope of melody. Eventually, the study accentuates the power of the musical notes, even with limited combinations, in building an effective auditory impact. These findings have significant implications on understanding the role of music in diverse religious traditions. This in turn results in establishing the fact that music has been an integral part of religious practices which takes it beyond the level of entertainment.

Եզդիական թաղման ծեսի որոշ առանձնահատկությունների շուրջ

In science, the interest in rituals and customs is growing, because their study provides an opportunity not only to reveal the stages and nature of the historical development of this cultural phenomenon, but also to penetrate the most diverse spheres of the people's socionormative culture by referring to its unique ways of living, to highlight many unique features of the ethnic tradition. Therefore, there is a need to comprehensively study the ethno-cultural heritage of the past, also in the sense that all the positive and original folk, so that all the positive and genuine people that have withstood the test of time and reached us, can be used for the fulfillment of today's problems, seasoned with the researches we have carried out. The funeral rite is one of the most closed and least modified ceremonies. The most important components of the funeral rite are offering a sacrifice, giving a sacrifice, reciting appropriate religious hymns by the clergyman. Among the Yazidis, the funeral ceremony is based on the belief in the strong bond between the dead and the living.

Межтекстовые связи в национальной гимнодии

The article is devoted to the study of the specifics of the secondary texts creation by studying the phenomena of intertextuality and precedence on the material of the national hymnody. It is established that intertextuality and precedence in a certain interval of abstraction are almost completely synonymous, and translations marked by the integrity of similarity, coded texts, and plagiarism also fall into the number of secondary texts. The semantic content of the national anthem is presented in the form of linguistic and cultural meanings (concepts). Among such semantic formations, in addition to the basic concepts of the patriotic discourse of the motherland and freedom, there are cultural meanings associated with the previous genres of hymnody and lyric poetry and acting as precedent ones: God, which came from a religious hymn; the struggle that came from the battle songs; power is the basic concept of the monarchical anthem, the people is the basic concept of the republican anthem, love (for the motherland), which came from lyrical poetry. According to the coefficient of intertextual similarity, national anthems are divided into works of integral precedence, partial precedence and fragmentary precedence. Relationships of holistic precedence are observed in the case of interdiscursive and inter-genre transposition of a poetic work, when a lyric verse or civil lyrics turn into a national anthem; and also in the case of interlingual transposition – an adequate translation from one language to another. Relations of partial precedence take place in the case of modifications of the original text, the creation of its variants, its free translations, analogues based on it, paraphrasing, imitation and citation. Fragmentary precedence in the national hymnody mainly concerns the history and culture of the native country, present here in the form of names of nationally or universally known characters, significant events and dates, reproduction of precedent phrases and verbalization of patriotic concepts.

The Amatory Hejnał (Bugle Call). An Old Polish Genre of a Morning Love Song

The article presents the genre of the Polish amatory hejnał, defined in C. Hernas’ Hejnał polski. Studium z historii poezji melicznej (1961). This original genre, as well as other Polish poems which could be classified as aubade, was not included in A.T. Hatto’s collection Eos: An Enquiry into the Theme of Lovers’ Meetings and Partings at Dawn in Poetry (1965). The author of this article, focusing much of her research on medieval and early modern morning love poems, enumerates the features of amatory hejnał, showing its literary sources, in particular the scheme taken from Ovid’s Amores i 13. Although the amatory hejnał derived from a parody of M. Rej’s religious hymn (drunken, rural, or a political variation, among others), it then combined the features of aubade, serenade and Latin elegy and entered the group of European songs of lovers meeting at dawn. The main authors discussed here are the 17th-century poets, Hieronim and Zbigniew Morsztyn.

Translating the Symbols of Triduum

The aim of this paper is to apply tools of cognitive poetics for exploring poetics of religious hymns in the mentality of contemporary Polish, Ukrainian and English speakers. The texts under study are hymns from Triduum which is a very special time within Roman Catholic Passiontide. The Latin originals as well as Polish, Ukrainian and English translations are used to show how conceptual imagery transforms in the perceptive process, which is located between the ancient text and today’s views. The process is even more complicated when these texts are interpreted by Orthodox and Greek Catholic believers. Although the biblical prototexts remain the same, the rite has elaborated their own theological hermeneutics which mostly coincide with the primary sacred language, i.e. Latin. It is also interesting to testify if a language, whose nation has mostly belonged to a different Christian – liturgical and theological – tradition, can recode all semantic features and values.

On the two genetically related jātakastavas from Lalitavistara and Rāṣṭrapālaparipṛcchā-sūtra

This paper examines two poetic fragments from two Buddhist texts: one – from Lalitavistara and another – from Rāṣṭrapālaparipṛcchā-sūtra. As the study reveals, both passages demonstrate certain genre characteristics that allow considering them as samples of jātakastava (lit. “jātaka-praise”). This genre is represented by only two extant separate poems. However, one can also find poetic passages with similar characteristics in several voluminous Buddhist monuments. Jātakastava is a type of poem consisting of the frame and the main part. The frame has much in common with standard frames of ancient and medieval Indian religious hymns – in it, the author of the poem tells us that he is not talented enough to describe the deeds of the Buddha himself, and informs us about the benefits that one can get by reading and distributing the work. The main part of the poem describes the deeds of the Buddha performed by him in his previous births. Both of the passages under consideration demonstrate a number of similarities in the content as well as in the form. This allows us to make an assumption about a common source of origin for them. Having determined the genetic relationship of the two texts, we proceed to analyze the composition of large poetic fragments, which include the verses in question. It appears that individual stanzas of the poems, getting inside a large Buddhist text, could scatter, find a new place for themselves, obeying the structure that underlies the corresponding passages of newly created or expanded monuments.

The Ethics of Unmeaning: Noise and the Non-inscribable Slave Voice

The Ethics of Unmeaning: Noise and the Non-inscribable Slave Voice Edward Piñuelas In the nexus of literature from within chattel slavery, music has provided scholars of various slave traditions a potent material for reading the influences of enslavement on everyday life in bondage, as well as the remnants of that life in contemporary culture. It was slave music that caused W. E. B. Du Bois to “set a phrase, a haunting echo of these weird old songs in which the soul of the black slave spoke to men” (536), and provided Frederick Douglass “[his] first glimmering conception of the dehumanizing character of slavery” (51). In short, the music of the enslaved and their immediate descendants has provided a window into aspects of the experiences of enslaved people not easily communicated through written testimony, as well as a medium for expressing Black subjectivities in ways denied by the mechanisms of racial slavery. This is especially true in the United States, where the work song and the spiritual have come to form their own genre of literature, offering expressive traditions that exceeded and often resisted those of the master class. These traditions have served as the fundamental building blocks of culture and civil society throughout the United States and have been essential to freedom struggles and political organization since slavery’s abolition. Shana L. Redmond’s recent work on Black music in social and political movements within the Diaspora provides a poignant example of how the spiritual provided postbellum movements with the rhythmic and thematic material to mobilize African American laborers and community organizations (Anthem 146–47). This turn to Black music as a political object began in the antebellum period, when abolitionists pointed to the music and songs of enslaved communities, particularly western religious hymns and spirituals, as evidence of slaveholders’ failing attempts to dehumanize their captives. [End Page 161] Ironically, the very music used by abolitionists to condemn the peculiar institution provided the slaveholding class evidence of its uplifting, indeed humanizing, effects. Many supporters of slavery heard in work songs signs of contentment and in religious songs signs of salvation. As Roger D. Abrahams explains in his historical account of slave music in the antebellum South, “[s]inging and dancing were regarded as signs of happiness, in spite of the fact that many whites could understand that the songs were often about the agonies of separation and alienation” (xix). These interpretations were more than mere misreadings of the often veiled expressions of sadness and resentment among enslaved singers, more than mere selective understandings that sought to confirm biases and assumptions already in place. They resulted from a mode of listening that sought to make meaning of a foreign, though familiar, phenomenon by relating it to assumptions common among members of the master class. In seeking to abstract from the material elements of slave music—the ephemeral, physical, and spatial phenomena of sounding and hearing—slavery’s advocates resorted to discursive practices contingent upon a disembodied, interchangeable, exchangeable enslaved body, a body that does not mark its domain with sound, but communicates only as sign. This reliance on exchangeability and reified value echoes what Saidiya V. Hartman notably identifies as the “fungibility” of the enslaved, the “joy made possible by virtue of the replaceability and interchangeability endemic to the commodity” (21). Faced with a material form of which they were neither the catalyst nor the prescribers, slaveowners and slavery’s supporters often described the music of the enslaved according to narrative frameworks based on this fungibility, not unlike those used for interpreting slave value, productivity, and soundness. These frameworks fundamentally disembodied enslaved voices so as to provide members of the master class a grammar of slave sound. In the process of figuring African American voices through the mechanics of fungibility, these proslavery depictions of Black voices likewise figured an antebellum southern soundscape loaded with numerous cultural and social values meant to buttress the moral argument in favor of the peculiar institution. While opponents of slavery sought to correct the misreadings produced by this body of proslavery literature, I argue here that even in seeking to assign enslaved voices alternative meanings, meanings that [End Page 162] were themselves salvos...

Parodies of Religious Hymns in Žemaitijan Carnival: Social Interaction and Cultural Expression: Everyday Life, Festivities and Ritual Forms

On costumed processions in Žemaitija on Shrove Tuesday, the ‘beggars’ were and are among the main characters, as attested by the mask’s distribution area, the name ‘Shrovetide beggars’ being given to the whole band of masked people, and the relative abundance of the costumed “beggars”’ songs. This study examines some examples from the repertoire of Shrove Tuesday carnival songs in Žemaitija, parodies of religious hymns and folk songs, which the performers called hymns and which were performed in imitation of sacred singing. The present analysis identifies their features, origins and function at the Shrove Tuesday carnival.

Deciphering the Shi Jun Sarcophagus Using Sogdian Religious Beliefs, Tales, and Hymns

The discovery of the Northern Zhou (557–581AD) tomb of Shi Jun (494–579 CE) presents us with spectacular visual information about the Sogdians in medieval China, which was previously available to us only through written sources. The iconography-heavy sarcophagus in the tomb is an important vehicle for understanding the practices of religious (and everyday) life in the Sino-Sogdian community. The imagery on the Shi Jun sarcophagus reveals a mix of religious beliefs that existed among migrants in the premodern Eurasian world. Due to the absence of a dominant religion associated with Sino-Sogdian funerals, the iconography of the sarcophagus cannot be interpreted within an orthodox theological framework. Instead, it is possible that more syncretistic, indigenous, and regionally based folklore, tales, and hymns, in combination with a diversity of religious beliefs, might explain the sarcophagus’s enigmatic imagery, since the social order and religious order are often mutually reinforcing.

UM CANTO PARA SER MAIS: MÚSICA E RESISTÊNCIA NO VALE DO JEQUITINHONHA

The research in this paper, aimed to analyze educational processes triggered by the Trovadores do Vale choir, located in Jequitinhonha Valley, MG. The choir has been active for 50 years, with a repertoire that consists of folk songs, such as labor songs, religious hymns, among other songs and dances. Originally, our research question was stimulated from the practices and experiences from both the colonial and modern legacies and we understand that through popular culture, subjects form resistance, building and telling their story. The methodology and the methodological path were built in dialogue with the research subjects, from the participant research perspective. As data collection instruments, were used, field diaries, semistructured interviews, and documents for analysis. Through the triangulation of the data obtained, three thematic categories emerged. The educational processes that we will address in this article, came from two of them, namely, “songs and verses in the Trovadores do Vale community” and “history, resistance and fecundity”. We have spoken with authors like Enrique Dussel, Paulo Freire and Anibal Quijano, and finally, we pointed out how the choir contributes to the reality of life transformation, in which they are inserted.

Kārlis Hūgenbergers 19. gadsimta sākumā latviešu literārās kultūras vēsturē

In the article, the literary works of Baltic German writer Carl Hugenberger have been explored. Anthology of his poetry translations, “Derrigs laika kaweklis” (Useful Pastime, I–II, 1826–1827), has been analysed. The anthology was significant in the emancipation of Latvian literary culture and liberation from moral didacticism as well as the development of the self-sufficient aesthetic value of literature. Thus, the anthology prepared the way for the formation of Latvian national literature in the mid-19th century. Special attention has been turned towards Hugenberger’s translations of poems by Johann Wolfgang Goethe and Friedrich Schiller. Besides, the evaluation and reception of Hugenberger’s works have been explored. The article concludes that despite the innovative role and poetic achievements of Hugenberger’s poetry, it did not gain popularity among wider circles of the Latvian reading public and met criticism regarding the shortcomings in the translation techniques that can be explained by the limits of the underdeveloped Latvian language at the time. The most important episodes in Hugenberger’s biography have been outlined as well as his religious hymns and works of popular enlightenment, including translations of “Schillings-Bücher des Rauhen Hauses”, a book series of German Inner mission, works by Jeremias Gotthelf, August Kotzebue, Gottfried August Bürger et al. Special attention has been paid to previously unidentified originals of Hugenberger’s translations – works by Matthias Claudius, Johann Hinrich Wichern, Heinrich Alexander Seidel, and Adolph Krüger as well as previously underexamined partial translation of Johann Peter Hebel’s “Allemanische Gedichte”. The literary works of Hugenberger have been interpreted within the context of the literary praxis of the late popular enlightenment in the Baltics.

Образ жаворонка в мифологических представлениях бурят

Purpose. The purpose of this work is to highlight the complex of Buryats’ traditional ideas about the lark tales. Results. The first section of the work gives a general description of the image of the lark in Buryat culture. The Buryat names of larks contain certain information about these birds (about their habitat, nesting sites, size, ability to sing). The lark, from the point of view of the Buryats, was a harmless bird. Buryats paid attention to some morphological features of the lark, especially its acoustic capabilities (the ability of a male bird to sing for a long time). The second section of the article deals with traditional mythological representations of the Buryats about the lark. This bird had a high semiotic status, in particular, it was recognized as a winged preacher of Buddhist prayer. It was believed that it served the good heavenly forces. Buryats attached importance to the symbolism of the color of the bird’s plumage. It is revealed that they associated the idea of werewolves with the lark. In the mythological representations of the Buryats, this feathered animal reflected the natural rhythms (the arrival of early spring) and the time of day (morning) and was likely associated with the concept of time. In the epic of the Buryats, the interchangeability of images of birds personifying the arrival of spring was characteristic, and it was associated with birds of the order of passerines. The ambiguity of the lark’s characteristics in traditional mythological representations of the Buryats is noted. Conclusion. In traditional mythological representations of the Buryats, the lark had a predominantly positive characteristic. It is attributed to the revered birds, supposedly servants of the good heavenly forces: in Buryat shamans’ epics they assist the mother of gods, while the Buryat-Buddhists recognize the lark as a bird that prays and sanctifies the water. The symbolism of color, highlighted in the image of this bird, primarily reflected gender division: the white color indicated the male principle, while the gray – female. The idea of shapeshifting is associated with the lark among the Buryats. It was associated with the onset of spring and the time of day (morning). In the image of this feathered bird, the negative connotation in its connection with demonic forces and in the chthonic beginning of the bird is weakly manifested. Some traditional ideas of the Buryats about the lark (for example, as a winged singer of religious hymns) have analogies in the worldview of other peoples, which is explained by their universal character.

The Hymn of P’īr Dāwid (Qawlē P’īr Dāwid)

The article publishes and analyzes a Yezidi sacred hymn The Hymn of Pīr Dāwid (Qawlē Pīr Dāwid) in Kurmanji with a translation into Russian, which was carried out for the first time. Pīr Dāwid is one of the companions of the main Yezidi saint Sheikh ˈAdī. The authors verify their version of the hymn (Qawl) with previously published in Kurmanji and English, correct existing errors and clarify the terminology. They also point out the historical data found in this religious hymn.

Pode um deus dar à luz? Msj nos hinos religiosos do império novo egípcio (c. 1539-1077 a.C.): para uma (re)avaliação da “androginia” da divindade criadora

A divindade criadora egípcia, predominantemente masculina, tem sido interpretada como andrógina com base, entre outros motivos, no facto de esta executar acções-msj, habitualmente projectadas na esfera feminina. O presente artigo pretende auscultar as diferentes atestações de msj enquanto expressão de um acto cosmogónico nos hinos religiosos do Império Novo egípcio (c. 1539-1077 a.C.). Este exercício exploratório estrutura-se em dois eixos fundamentais: por um lado, a constatação de que nem todas as atestações de msj remetem para um acto biológico e/ou reprodutivo; por outro, a compreensão de que a capacidade (pro)criadora da divindade não a coloca forçosamente no espectro da não-binariedade de género. Para tal, atentar-se-á à distribuição dos determinativos nas diferentes grafias do vocábulo, mas também aos contextos fraseológicos em que o mesmo figura, a partir de uma selecção das fontes que constituem este corpus. Pretende-se assim encetar um entendimento mais matizado do vocábulo e, por extensão, questionar a pertinência do epíteto “andrógino” na caracterização do deus criador.

Health Status of Elderly People Living in Old Aged Homes in Pokhara

Background: Health is serious matter for the elderly people especially living in old aged homes. In this context, this study has tried to explore the health status of elderly people living in old aged homes.
 Methods: Information were collected from fifty seven elderly people living in purposively selected three major old aged homes of Pokhara by using structured questionnaire through interview techniques. The elderly people, who were unable to speak, hear, complete the interview process, have severe psychiatric disorder, did not have verbal consent to participate were excluded from the study. Descriptive analysis was carried out for this research.
 Results: Majority (87.7%) of the respondents had chronic physical health problem like back pain problem as major followed by other musculoskeletal problems, gastrointestinal disease, hypertension, respiratory problem, diabetes mellitus, heart disease, eyes and ears problem. The proportion of female was higher than male regarding their chronic physical health problem. Majority went to hospital when they were sick. Half of the respondents were worried about economic insecurity followed by lack of social relation, lack of treatment during illness, fear of future, lack of recreational activities, food management of old age homes, environment of elderly official, sitting and sleeping environment of elderly home and others respectively. All the respondents prayed god to cope with these stress followed by listening to religious hymns, go to religious places, solitary living, crying alone, and take cigarettes/alcohols.
 Conclusions: Health status of elderly people living in old aged home was not good since most of the elderly were suffered from chronic physical health problem. Females are more vulnerable.

A School on a Mission. 140 Years of CBC On Wakefield St by Lingard Goulding (review)

will take great thinkers, generous pragmatists, principled planners, with formidable powers of sensitivity capable of developing a credible model of real inclusion and true equality. There are existing wells of thinking to draw from and one of them was dug by Arthur Griffith. Is he truly ‘the father of us all’? That is a debate well worth having, but only after reading the book! Dr Mary McAleese was President of Ireland, 1997–2011. A School on a Mission. 140 Years of CBC On Wakefield St, Lingard Goulding (Adelaide: Christian Brothers College, 2018), xiv+338 pages. In the foreword to A School on a Mission, Giles Fitzherbert comments that ‘thereismoretothisbookthanisatfirsthandapparent.Readers,payattention’. What at first appears as a volume to celebrate the life and achievements of CBC on Wakefield Street – a Catholic school in the Christian Brother tradition – becomes in part a story of Catholic Ireland in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and an account of the extraordinary missionary activity of a band of brothers in faraway Australia. The story, told with great affection and good humour by Lingard Goulding, is all the more interesting in that it is by an ‘outsider’(‘I am not a practitioner of the Roman Catholic faith’), but who, as a distinguished educator himself, has a great understanding of school life and of the challenges that founding and sustaining a school over a period of 140 years presents. His story, therefore, is of Ireland and its missionary zeal in education, of resourceful and determined religious men who, against all the odds, gave an education to the sons ‘of labourers, squatters or small time farmers’in the young state of South Australia, and about the remarkable development of a school from humble beginnings to being an inclusive and innovative centre of learning in the heart of Adelaide. Lingard begins his account by looking at the life of Edmund Rice, the founder of the Christian Brothers, whose contribution to Irish education is unparalleled, if (currently) somewhat under-appreciated. He then looks at the life and work of Br Ambrose Treacy, by any assessment a remarkable person. A man of deep faith, true entrepreneurial spirit and steely determination, he led the first wave of Brothers to Australia and established ten schools in as many years, the last of which was CBC on Wakefield. Studies • volume 109 • number 434 240 Summer 2020: Book Reviews This feat is not to be casually passed over. Enjoying neither the financial support of the bishop for even a residence – ‘I have not a rap for you. Throw yourselves on the people and they will provide for you’ – and determined to cater for the poor (as Rice had done in Ireland) without any support from the State, the brothers literally had to beg not only for their subsistence but for the means to teach the children in their care. All the buildings, facilities, resources that we take so readily for granted had to be fund-raised for from a community of Catholics who were relatively poor and on the lower rungs of Australian society. The achievement is staggering and Lingard recites the various initiatives and developments taken by the different headmasters over the decades of the school’s life. The picture is one of a school moving into a place of educational prominence, whilst remaining faithful to its founding mission and of an emerging Catholic population that stands proudly with the other Christian traditions. The added appeal of the book lies in its humour and in the personality of its author, who cannot help but reveal himself. Two examples will illustrate. There is an amusing account of a faux pas by Br Hughes, who refused to allow the boys sing the national anthem on the occasion of a visit by the Governor of the Colony. Having listened to some of Moore’s melodies and religious hymns ‘sweetly sung by the school choir’, the Governor asked for a rendition of ‘God Save the Queen’. Br Hughes sullenly replied, ‘The boys are not taught to sing that anthem’. The issue reflected the latent anti-English feeling of the (predominantly Irish) community of Brothers. A related issue reared its head when it came to the order of toasts...

Gauging the effectiveness of music and yoga for reducing stress among engineering students: An investigation based on Galvanic Skin Response

The purpose of this research is to examine the influence of music and yogic breathing for the management and control of stress. To discover the most effective stimuli to handle stress by measuring the effect of types of musical drills and yogic breathing on engineering students using the Galvanic Skin Response Sensor Meter (GSRSM). The present study attempts to study the effectiveness of music and yoga drills for relieving and managing stress. The study used a stratified random sampling method selecting engineering students from four streams. The GSRSM was used as a tool to record the responses after 300 seconds for the experimental and the control groups of 200 students each. Each group was comprised of 52 females (26%) and 148 males (74%). The experimental group reported reduction in mean value in Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) when they underwent deep yogic breathing, listened to religious hymns and listened to flute music. On the basis of the results, the researchers suggest that all three techniques i.e practicing yogic breathing, listening to religious hymns and listening to flute music were effective in reducing the stress level of engineering students. Listening to flute music emerged from these three drills, as the most effective stimulus for stress management.

Solo piano compositions by Hsiao Tyzen in the aspect of performing problems

Background. The article is dedicated to the piano work of Hsiao Tyzen (1938–2015) – one of Taiwan’s most famous composers. The solo piano compositions of the musician are considered, which make up a significant part of his compositional heritage: three cycles, united under the general name “Poetic Response” – op. 37 (1974), op. 38 (1975) and op. 40 (1977); “The Amazing Grace” (1984), cycle “Memories of Home” op. 49 (1987), consisting of six plays – “Prelude”, “Memory”, “Playground”, “Ancient Taiwanese Melody”, “Elegy”, “Frolicking”; “Farewell Etude”, Op. 55 (1993), “Toccata”, op. 57 (1995), “Dragon Boat Festival”, op. 58 (1996), “Spirit of Taiwan” (1998), “Nana Oh’s Meditation” (1999), “The Angel from Formosa” (1999). This huge layer of music is not sufficiently studied in the performing aspect. The characteristic of the pianistic level of complexity of the compositions under consideration is given, technical and artistic difficulties are revealed. Objectives. The purpose of the study is to identify the main performing tasks in the solo piano compositions of Hsiao Tyzen. Methods of research are based on a set of scientific approaches necessary for the disclosure of its theme. The complex approach, combining the principle of musical-theoretical, musical-historical and performing analysis, is taken as the basis of the methodology. Results. Piano works of Hsiao Tyzen of an early period of art op. 37, 38 and 40, united in the general cycle “Poetic Response”, are devoted to religious themes and include melodies of religious hymns. Combining three diverse piano cycles, the composer builds a kind of complex form of cycles in the cycle. The influence of romanticism in the music of Hsiao Tyzen is felt in his interpretation of melody, harmony, rhythm, tempo and texture. Composers of the twentieth century, especially C. Debussy, influenced the piano compositions of the late period. Since the works created by Hsiao Tyzen have varying degrees of pianistic complexity, it seems important to determine the pedagogical significance of the uncomplicated piano repertoire and the performing tasks that the interpreter of concert compositions faces. The cycle “Memories of Home” op. 49, consisting of six miniatures, is dedicated to the composer’s childhood memories. The main tasks of the pianist in the “Ancient Taiwanese melody” from the cycle “Memories of Home”, op. 49 will be the auditory implementation and development of a touch of legato, the performance of melismatics, the observance of sound balance between hands, the ability to draw a long melodic line, cleverly using a finger swap and moving from one position to another. In the Prelude, the tasks of the performer’s main technical and artistic problems are to accurately reflect dynamic contrasts, the agility of transitions in various textured combinations, the sound realization of polyphony, precise articulation and coordination of small notes in passages. “Memory” requires the performer of the highly professional possession of legato, manifested in the combination of the upper voice of the chord musical fabric, flexible movement skills and an accurate sense of polyrhythmia. In the “Playground” you need to show imaginative imagination, while reflecting the variety of strokes and dynamics specified by the author. “Elegy” requires a deep soulful feeling from a performer, high-quality sounding of a melody, and the formation of long phrases. “Farewell Etude” op. 55 and “Toccata” op. 57 – detailed compositions saturated with romantic technique and imagery. The intonational filling of the plays reflects the national Taiwanese flavor. “Farewell sketch” was the last work of Hsiao Tyzen, written in the tradition of romanticism. The piece is based on the famous Taiwanese folk song “Four Seasons”. The composer places the melody in the middle register, framing on both sides with a luxurious romantic texture. “Toccata” is full of numerous techniques that are difficult enough not only to execute, but even to remember. Frequent change of textured formulas is especially difficult for a pianist, because in addition to the clever execution of a virtuoso texture, you need to keep an accurate rhythmic pulsation. This repertoire is intended for concert performance and requires a pianist of a high professional pianistic level and bright artistry. It requires scale of performance, absolute technical and sound knowledge of the texture, knowledge and auditory presentation of the characteristics of Taiwanese musical culture, and mastery of pedalization. Conclusions. Hsiao Tyzen’s solo piano compositions provide a better understanding of the work of contemporary Taiwanese composers. They are rightfully one of the most striking pages of Taiwanese musical culture and deserve further introduction into a wide international music audience. These works, in our opinion, have high artistic merits and are intended for a different contingent of performers. Their value as a pedagogical and concert repertoire is a vivid imagery, a reflection of the national principle, interesting compositional and sound solutions.

Encoding syriac letters in partition theory using extended Vigenere cipher

Since the topic of e-Abacus diagram appeared in 1978 through its application within the partition theory, where this representation was one of the ideas of cryptography, many researchers study this subject from a purely theoretical perspective without practical application to it. Many researchers have shown interest in it by starting to apply purely mathematically, but starting in the past few years they have been searching for ideas that serve the topic. This research deals with the Vigenere Cipher, which is one of the multi­alphabet ciphers and in the past it was one of the most popular ciphers. For its simplicity and resistance to frequency analysis tests for messages encoded with simple ciphers such as Caesar’s Cipher through. Its application to the Syriac letters, which is one of the oldest ancient languages, used exclusively when reading religious hymns, for Christians in some regions of the world and in other regions as a trading language. In 2017 it was carefully studied through the above diagram and made the application more confidential among its users in terms of trying to find a suitable agreement between the English language letters and Syriac. Special signs and symbols were used in the Syriac language to be able to address the problem of the difference in the number of letters between the two languages. As well as the possibility of using the Cipher between the letters of the Syriac language