Interview:

In “Thresholds: Rethinking Spirituality Through Music” [Ashgate Publishing, 2008], I introduce an a-topological, non-discursive spirituality that is no longer connected to transcendentalism and otherworldliness. Through a close “reading” of the music of John Coltrane, Robert Schumann, the mythical Sirens, Arvo Pärt, and The Eagles, to mention a few, spirituality is presented as a (non)concept that escapes categorization, classification, and linguistic descriptions. Spirituality as a manifestation of radical “otherness”; spirituality as a void, an abyss instead of a transcendental signified. Connecting spirituality and music implies a wandering, an erring, and a roving in a space between. Spirituality is a Deleuzian intermezzo.

This also entails that spirituality cannot be regarded as a musical quality; spirituality is not a simple adjective providing extra information about or used to categorize certain types of music. No music is intrinsically spiritual. Spirituality happens. It happens in relation, for example, in a relation between a musical event and a listener. This relationship in which spirituality happens might be characterized as susceptible instead of controlling, open instead of excluding, free instead of rigid. Spirituality is a deterritorializing effect of a certain attitude and experiencing music can be helpful in achieving this attitude.

As a consequence of this line of thought, no music can be excluded from the possibility of being a (f)actor in the space where spirituality occurs. This enriches the ways of approaching and talking about music.

“No music is intrinsically spiritual. Spirituality happens… This enriches the ways of approaching and talking about music.”
– Dr. Marcel Cobussen, author of “Thresholds: Rethinking Spirituality Through Music”