Secular Music And National Development

Music is described as the soul of life. This statement reveals the significance of music to the development of mankind. Music is categorized under the following, secular and gospel. The former is a kind musical that basically deals with social issues.

The latter is Christian music that adores God and uses the Bible to communicate. Music in itself plays a crucial role in religion or the worship of God. Through music worshippers adore their object of worship and communicate their feelings, emotions and requests to their creator.

Music indeed serves as a medium of sustaining the soul. It relieves people of tension, consoles them in time of grief and provides entertainment as well.

Beyond that, music also plays an important role in national development. Through it, citizens are admonished to be patriotic and the ills of society are preached against. The character and morals of people are shaped through music and has and continues to provide employment for many citizens.

As a result of the crucial role music plays in the direction, it is significant that we pay attention to the development of music, especially the secular type. The reason is that the lyrics and make up of some  this kind of music seems to be detrimental to society/national development. The literally and virtually promote and glorify illicit sex. Musicians do this cunningly by using figurative words to cover up such profane or sex-related songs.

These indications send strong messages to its listeners and drive many, especially the youth, into sexual immorality thereby potentially increasing the HIV/AIDS prevalent rate.

The video clips of some such kind of music demonstrate romance and sexual scenes. I was therefore glad when a woman advocacy group came out recently to condemn the former and called on musicians to desist from using the nudity of women to promote their songs. They added that by so doing they portray women as sex objects.

Unfortunately and surprisingly, these are the songs that are very popular, the fastest selling and win most of the awards. The criteria for determining such award winning songs are basically the rhythms, melody and arrangements. Others are the popularity of the song and number of times they are played on air without necessary giving cognition
and importance to the lyrics.

It is my candid opinion that we revise these criteria of determining music awards looking at the negative effect of such secular music on national development. Since man is a spiritual and social being, the emphasis should rather be placed on the lyrics and how it promotes the spiritual and social-economic development of the society. In that sense, committees that select such award winning songs should basically include religious leaders, senior and morally
upright people.

Again, since the main medium of contracting HIV/AIDS is through sex and music influences people in that direction, all attempts should be made to bring sanity into the music industry, thereby ridding it sexually-related songs. The law that forbids the playing and showing of such songs in the media should be enforced.

Unfortunately and surprisingly, some gospel musicians who should know better are also guilty of this offence. Their video clips show them wearing sexually provocative dresses and their style of dancing having some sex appeal. These things, whether we agree or not, contribute largely to the moral decadence of society and the spread of HIV/AIDS. It is time we purged our music industry of profane and promiscuous songs. 

Citizens should not patronize songs just because4 the rhythms and melody are very exciting. We must place emphasis on the lyrics and promote morally and socially upright songs, which contribute to human and societal development.