AHC: Musicracy

Artists and poets were probably respected but perhaps not before radio would musicians reach "stardom" with that level of influence as today. Also in our culture we allow teenagers to rebel, not as true in the ancient world.

But suppose a religious cult, kind of like Pythagoras who started a sect of philosophers around mathematics, believing it was holy knowledge, would feel the same about music. They study music for decades, inventing and developing until they reach the level of Mozart.

Then every greek and roman would hum and whistle the tunes and sing the words of whatever the priests of this cult would like to say. Especially the young for they would listen and dance to whatever is the new shit.

But would conservative priests allow that?
 
Artists and poets were probably respected but perhaps not before radio would musicians reach "stardom" with that level of influence as today. Also in our culture we allow teenagers to rebel, not as true in the ancient world.
It's for this reason that I think the only way you get to a "musicracy" is with a culture that has a very different relationship with music than Western civilization.

If you have a society where music is the primary means of conveying information, then music will play a larger role in political power. Of course, we might ask: Why would music become important in communication? The main reason is that music is a powerful mnemonic device. It is considerably easier to remember a song than it is to remember a piece of information with the same number of words that has no rhyming or meter.

Think about all the nursery rhymes you can remember even though they are completely nonsensical!

If we look at 19th century political campaigns, debates and stump speeches were important components, but so were slogans and campaign songs. If we have a language or communication style that lends itself to candidates debating in verse and rhyme, then you've got yourself the beginnings of music playing a major role in political selection. The fact that music can get stuck in our heads can make a catchy tune particularly useful in political life. A skilled political lyricist could have his argument on the lips of every person in the country.

Now, this might suggest that a musicracy needs to have democratic elections, but not necessarily.

As I said earlier, the Inca had a festival where boys would engage in feats of strength to determine their military rank. Suppose for a moment that instead of feats of strength, they had to participate in some kind of verbal challenge. In particular, I'm think about something like the dozens or the rap battle from African-American culture or the Norse tradition of flyting. In the case of the dozens, the winner is decided by whoever loses their cool and breaks the formula for the game. In the case of the rap battle or flyting, it is usually dependent on the reaction of the crowd.

The competitor with the highly-valued verbal/musical skills and cool temperament gets the higher rank while the hotheaded one is made a lowly grunt. The career paths of those two people will be extremely different, and you will end up with a musically talented elite. You will also get an educational system skewed towards preparing students for this decisive musical contest. I doubt a society would pick a ruler based on this method, but they might use it as some kind of an entry-level test.

Taunting songs have also been present in Inuit culture and Arabic poetry. The Japanese poetry form haikai is another form of competitive vulgar verse. We can also look at the fact that early Zulu warfare also involved ritualized taunting as a means to delay and provoke battle.

I don't really have a society or a POD to actually make this happen though, so this is a bit more of a fantasy culture than an alternative history culture. Still, it's certainly possible.

And in closing, just because I can't help myself...
 
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