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STLT#354, We Laugh, We Cry
This is a very long song. I suppose it has to be, given that it’s about life, death, and the whole schmear. But it is a long song, made longer by accompanists who drag it out – and lordy, there seems to be a compulsion amongst some of our accompanists to draaaaag thiiiiiis ooooone ouuuuuut… Continue reading
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Hymn by Hymn Extra: Spirituals in White Spaces
I’m sorry to say I didn’t know this video from May existed until today, but in this amazing piece, First Portland’s music director, DeReau Farrar offers powerful testimony about what it means to sing spirituals in white spaces. There is no embed code, so please click on this link to watch this video. We have… Continue reading
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STLT#353, Golden Breaks the Dawn
I wasn’t expecting to have a moment with this hymn. I don’t know what I was expecting – perhaps a morning of wading through information, or trying to ignore my personal exhaustion with nature metaphors (a product of this practice, to be sure – they don’t come barreling down in normal time), or a struggle… Continue reading
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STLT#352, Find a Stillness
I love this prayer. Seriously, this meditative, prayerful hymn – lyrics by Carl Seaburg, set to a Transylvanian folk tune – is absolutely in my top ten list. I love the haunting, minor key of the tune as well as the phrasing. Some might say the third phrase is too high, but that’s what transposition… Continue reading
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STLT#351, A Long, Long Way the Sea-Winds Blow
So… yesterday I kinda made fun of the whole “time cliché” thing. And this morning I realized we’re in the Here and Now section, so of COURSE we are singing songs about time and being present. I don’t regret yesterday’s post – it did feel a little cliché to me. This one feels less so,… Continue reading
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STLT#350, The Ceaseless Flow of Endless Time
Carpe diem. Que sera, sera. There’s no time like the present. You can’t turn back time. Learn from yesterday, live today, hope for tomorrow. Time marches on. All the lyrics to this hymn. Welcome, my friends, to the Henry Blake Cliché Festival (A M*A*S*H reference? Joe Cleveland’s right – I am old) … er, I mean,… Continue reading
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STLT#349, We Gather Together
On December 9th, this tune first appeared, and I suggested that “later in the hymnal, we sing the usual words.” Well, that ‘later’ is today, and while the first three words are the same as the usual words, that is where ‘usual’ ends. And so I stand here in my wrongness being wrong. And thank… Continue reading
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STLT#348, Guide My Feet
Today, gentle readers, I offer you A Tale of Two Liturgical Moments. Because indeed, as our man Charles Dickens wrote, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” The best of times was when I learned an arrangement of this African American spiritual in my seminary gospel choir; the harmonies were… Continue reading
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STLT#347, Gather the Spirit
This hymn almost got ruined for me in 2009. That spring, Saratoga Springs’ minister, Linda Hoddy, went on sabbatical, leaving a congregation well prepared to hold the fort down. As chair of the worship committee, I was also on the sabbatical team, and after a fall spent ensuring we had all our ducks in a… Continue reading
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STLT#346, Come, Sing a Song with Me
I’m finding things a little hard this morning (9/11, Irma, the memories this song stirs), so I’ll let Michael Tino introduce today’s post: “We confront the complex reality that something can be both insipid and profound simultaneously.” You see, this song by Carolyn McDade can be awfully sticky-sweet, with its rolling 3/4 time often played… Continue reading
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links
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