Pixelpraxis

“Reissue” of old Green Lake 2003 Christmas EP

It’s been “out of print” for a number of years, and I’ve had several requests for it here and there.  We only did small batches back in 2003-2004, and only sold them locally.

What is it?  5 songs, mostly re-written hymn lyrics, that were written or arragned specifcally for Advent.  It has much to do with longing for Jesus and the tension of living in the Already-Not-Yet.

• New tune for  ‘Come Thou Long Expected Jesus”  – text by Charles Wesley
• A new hymn by Nathan Partain based on Isaiah 9
• New tune for “All Praise to Thee Eternal Lord”, text by Martin Luther
• New tune for “Jesus Came, the Heavn’s Adoring” – text by Godfrey Thring
• New tune for “Come Lord, and Tarry Not” – text by Horatius Bonar

Some of the recordings are rough – it was done live in a one-day retreat in 2003. We setup in an old house on the Green Lake campus, stayed up too late on Friday night and then came in Saturday to roll tape (yeah, it was actually tape too – we used a couple of old 8-track ADAT decks!).

After seeing the bandcamp experience with Bruce, he encouraged me to put it up there for everyone.

Here it is

If anyone is interested in charts, I can get them to you  – drop me an e-mail or comment.

I suppose the next thing is putting up the old Green Lake double-CD from 2001, which has apparently dropped out of the world on CD Baby. THat might need to wait until after December!

More Hymn Revival music

Wow, there’s just a ton of this out there now.  I’m excited to see all of this.  Check out this group from Provo, recorded 15 songs

http://thelowerlights.bandcamp.com/album/the-lower-lights-a-hymn-revival

An organic, vibrant collection of hymns that brings out both the reverence and celebration of the hymns. Part vigil. Part revival.

The Lower Lights convened in fall 2009 for five days of recording. The goal was to dive into the hymns– familiar hymns, overlooked hymns, Hank Williams hymns, and more– and connect with them on a deeper level. Drawing equal parts reverence and celebration from the rich well of hymns, we ended up with 30-plus songs that felt part-revival, part-vigil. And we ended up with more than just an album. We ended up with an experience.

 

New project – Hymns of Faith

I was able to be a part of a project recently where we re-wrote several hymn texts based on the Apostle’s Creed.  It was put together by Bruce Benedict and released for free on bandcamp. IT even includes artwork for each tune, based on the texts.  A really nice job b Bruce!

It was great participating, really fun seeing what everyone did, gave me the opportunity to write something new AND record it with Nathan Partain (well, OK we weren’t in the same room at the time – I sent him the files and he zipped them back to me with a banjo and harmonica!).

Check out the full download here (it’s free!)

Check Out Bruce’s site here, where he put together a full songbook with chord charts and lead sheets.

Thanks Bruce!

Scripture Songs

You know those scripture songs people write, to help memorize scripture?  Take a passage, make a tune, sing along and there you go.

Well our kids are part of a home-school group that does that, and this year they are doing Ephesians 6.  There’s a song they have the can use, but after listening to it they declared it unfit for consumption, and they (and my wife) begging – nay commanding – that I write something else.

Which is much harder than I ever thought

I’d done things to scripture before , but always bent the words to fit a meter – a psalter-like approach – or simply used phrases and re-wrote the ideas in a way that fit the song.  But this, we had to take the exact text and make it singable. And Paul, while possibly a good writer in Greek, just doesn’t translate well to verse after it’s been translated into English.

Ahh well.  For what it’s worth, here it is.  It was fun in the end

Ephesians 6:1-9

1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord,
for this is right. 2 “Honor your father and mother”
(it’s the first commandment with a promise),
3 “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”
4 Fathers, don’t provoke your children to anger,
but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

5 Servants, obey your earthly masters
with fear and trembling, and with a sincere heart,
as  you would Christ, 6 not when their eye is on you,
not as people-pleasers,  but as servants of Christ,
doing the will of God from the heart,

7 rendering service with a good will
as to the Lord and not to man,
8 knowing that what ever good any one does,
this he will receive back from the Lord,
whether he is a servant or free.

9 Masters, do the same to them,
and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is
both their Master and yours is in heaven,
and that there is no partiality with him.
there is no partiality with him.

Hold on

I Found this lyric in my journal, I think I wrote it after one of our kids had a nightmare. It’s something I need to remember on a daily basis.

Listen here

Hold On (the Father’s Hands)

Rick Jensen, 2009

Hey there’s no reason to shout now
and nothing here to fear
A little wind and a little leaf and a
little noise to hear

So hold on, you’ve been caught
Strong hands now hold you close
Hold on, you’ve been caught
Sleep sweet, the father’s hands hold on

Wind twisted and falling free
is only fun in daydream seas
Left alone to tumble turn leaves no place for rest and peace

But hold on, you’ve been caught
Strong hands now hold you close
Hold on, you’ve been caught
Sleep sweet, the father’s hands hold on

I watch my restless soul walk round all my
sunny blue sky days
My worries cloud and fears rain down and I
often lose my way

So hold on, you’ve been caught
Strong hands now hold you close
Hold on, you’ve been caught
Sleep sweet, the father’s hands hold on

My Life in Coffeehouses, Part 4

The Gelateria

Mix a fantastic old storefront, dark hardwood and brick, music, traffic, delicious hand-made pastries and gelato, solid wireless, and good coffee and you’ve got the Gelateria.  Right on South Grand and Wyoming, close enough to walk to and easy enough to drive if you need as well.

I really don’t know why I’m not down there more often.  Maybe it’s just not in a direction I usually go, but it’s got a lot of stuff going for it – it’s even quiet enough to have a phone call in without freaking everyone out (either on the phone or around you); but not so quiet that you can’t work. I spent a number of days there this past winter – something about looking out the storefront window while it’s snowing out was comforting.

The Coffee is good, not the best in the world but very much worth it.  It’s also great because the Americano refills are only $.80 and did I mention the pastries?  Really nice.

During the evening however, it’s quite different – most people are coming in for desert and whatnot, so certainly not a place to work after about 6:00 pm – but who wants to work then anyway?  Bring on the gelato!

Song of Songs

Ever try to rhyme with Gazelle?

Some good friends of ours asked me to write something from Song of Songs for their wedding – specifically 2.9-13.  Never tried writing from there before, so I thought, why not?  Very flattering as well, since this is a memory they’ll carry with them for a long time.

They’re getting married on the 20th, so if you know Daniel Henry or Emily Christensen, wish them well!

Below are the lyrics.  Listen here.

Arise, My Love

Rick Jensen, 2010

Gazing quietly out by the wall

Through the windows he smiles

My lover waits catching my eye

Through the lattice he hides

Strength and grace a gazelle on the heights

A young stag as he runs

“See the winter is gone, my beloved”

He sings to me in the Sun

Arise My Love, my only beautiful one

Arise, come away with me

Arise My Love, my only beautiful one

Arise, come away with me

Flowers full come and cover the land

Spring has finally begun

Turtledoves gently call o’er the earth

The time of Singing has come

Now The vine it will blossom and bloom

Fragrance floats us along

Trees fruit-filled with early delights

The scent of lovers in song

Arise My Love, my only beautiful one

Arise, come away with me

Arise My Love, my only beautiful one

Arise, come away with me

Arise, come away with me

Arise, come away with me

My Life in Coffeehouses, part 3

Local harvest

Man, now here’s a place I thought I could really hang.  Run by some great local hippies, cool organic food, decent music, about 3 blocks away at the corner of Hartford and Morgan Ford, and initially the coffee was OK, but…. they have no way of getting reliable internet there.  I’ve been in there about once a month since we’ve moved, and each time I try it’s either up but spotty, or the wireless signal is gone.  They’re not in too much of a hurry to fix it, which is a bummer, cause it’s a neat place.

What’s that, you say?  What does Internet have to do with Coffee?  Why, everything!  At least for me, since I need to (usually) work. Besides, what if you have a nice caffeine buzz going and you’ve just GOT to look up that random thought about the pop song from 1987 that just popped into your head? RIGHT NOW??

Moving on…

The other thing about the place is, as the café has gotten more popular (and it IS popular, try getting in there on a Saturday morning), the coffee quality has suffered; GREAT food (and a great place for a date night at a reasonable price), great atmosphere, sometimes a bit too busy to work at, but not bad.  However, I can’t work there at all.

So if you need a place to have a good meal, a decent (not great) latte, want to eat local and support the granola hippie types (I can say that, I’m married to one), this is your place.  You’ll probably see me meeting someone there, but then leaving to spend the afternoon somewhere else. Then again, given how busy the place is, they may prefer it that way!

O yay, I’m a vapid, hipster Christian!

O yay, I’m a vapid, hipster Christian!

Well.

According to Brett McCracken, I am anyway.

At least I think so.

I’m not really sure what his point is here, nor here, nor in his new book.  Is being a Hipster Christian a bad thing?  Reading his blog, it sure seems like he is one, so I’m not sure.

In reading what he says, it seems that as a believing Christian, if I’m just trying to be myself, enjoying the music I like or the things I read, I’m obviously trying to be cool and thus (I think) not a “real” Christian.

OK, maybe not.  I know he’s got a point – the church has struggled for quite some time with growth, and there are various churches recently that have tried to be hip and cool and ‘relevant’ to bring ‘them young hipster folk’ in the door.  This usually falls flat, bringing in those who are already Christian and want to be seen as young, hipster folk. I’ve seen it myself, and I’m turned off.

It didn’t start with this generation, it goes back a while – the ‘seeker friendly’ services, the Jesus movement churches, and we can go back into the tent revival days when a certain preacher decided he had it all down to a science, how to bring people in.  As long as you followed his rules, he says, you’ll be filled up every Sunday! [Sorry, no link, can't find my notes...]

But here’s the thing – we should be talking about how the Church shouldn’t be chasing the world.  But we should also be talking about how the church should be in the world, making culture, working and playing and crying with the world. And a church should be who it is – made up of the people God has called to it.  Certainly it needs to stretch and grow and change and “always reforming”, but it should also be aware that God has called it into being and called the people that are there, and wrestle with what that means. Very few churches need a “reboot”.  I think he and I can agree on that (and as an aside, I recently saw a young church implode because it was trying to be too hip and cool and not thinking enough about holiness; all in all, I’m glad to be going to an older ‘un-hip’ church right now).

At the church I’m attending, we’ve been having some discussions regarding art, music, worship and the like.  I think some people might be asking,  what we need to do to ” get the younger, hip  folk in”.  But the ‘younger’ folk, if you ask them, fully appreciate the older style of worship – the organ, the choir, and the like. Why? Because the people who are doing it own it. They like it, they think it’s beautiful, they enter into it fully.  They are making culture as beautifully and strongly as they know how to worship and praise God with. Most people I know in their 20’s and 30’s (Christian or non) will appreciate that and see it for what it is.  If (when) that same group tries to make culture they don’t believe in or own to try to ‘draw in’ others, well, everyone sees through that.

I had some very wise pastors and elders in our church in Seattle.  When they brought me on staff in ’99, they said “If you just found Christ, and started making music for the church just as you are and had no idea what the history of the Church was (recent or ancient), what would you do?  Go and do that.”

My response was, “you really don’t want what you’re asking. No church would”

But, surprisingly, they did.  So we all, pastors and writers and musicians, started writing music that we would write normally. We came across old hymn texts and wrote new music to it.  We re-arranged old hymns, heard things if we visited another church and tore it apart and put it back together, we wrote our own words expressing this glorious Gospel in our own way for the people around us we loved so they could sing to this God. We used “high church” liturgies because we found them beautiful and meaningful, we wrote new ones because we wanted to express this Gospel in our words, and we did it in Ties and Suits, and bare feet and tee shirts, because… well, that’s what we wore.  That’s what we were comfortable in.

Were we just being ‘hipster Christians’?  Were we concerned about being “cool”? Yeah, I bet we were on a lot of levels because we’re sinners. But we also confronted each other about it on a frequent basis. And we repented. And we sang thanksgiving.

Another example:

McCracken writes about what pastors talk about, and how they’re just trying to be hip.  Apparently if a pastor references Steven Colbert he’s just trying to be cool.  If you read or talk about books such as Lauren Winner’s “Real Sex” then you’re just trying to be hip.

But – well, what if you really enjoy Steven Colbert and know everyone you’re preaching to watches him as well? What if you DO have a church of 20- and 30-somethings who are asking honest questions about sex, masturbation, adultery, and the like?  What if your church is full of mostly successful 30- and 40- somethings and you know that a lot of them will fall victim to (or at least temptation of) an affair? I can think of no better book right now that talks about such things in an honest and open way as Winner’s book.  In McCracken’s mind, should we not talk about these things?

When I am leading worship, I want to own it.  If It’s a hymn, if it’s something I’ve written, if it’s some contemporary thing that I might not ever listen to in my car, I want to find some way to find what is beautiful and right and godly, and show it to the people that are there, so they can make culture as worship to our God. It may be we do a hymn with an organ.  It may be that we don’t do my song. It may be that we take that contemporary tune and rip it apart until we can put our authentic stamp on it, so we can own it and sing it honestly (and if it sounds like Sufjan Stevens, or Cat Stevens for that matter, well, that’s what it is).  I’m still not sure, reading Brett’s writings, how he would feel about such things.

Perhaps Brett’s article was the written version of the “Sunday’s Coming” video that made the rounds earlier this year.  However that had the flavor of people making fun of themselves (I could laugh at that, I saw myself in some of it).

Perhaps that’s what he’s trying to get across – don’t reach for the image, Christianity is not an image. I can dig that, but I’m afraid it will turn out more like post-modern naval-gazing than Gospel-centered vision for the Church in 21st Century America. I don’t think I’ll get to reading his book, partly ’cause I’m broke but mostly ’cause I’ll soon be busy reading several others for classes (I think at seminary I’ve moved from “Monied Yuppie” to “Bookish intellectual”).  But I do hope it gives churches who are looking to a ‘hipster makeover’ for growth or relevance pause.

Analogue

I was listening to Ryan Adams Heartbreaker disc the other day.  It was on earbuds, and up a bit loud, and I was struck by the texture of it.  Not the songs, or the sound of the production – although that had a lot to commend itself – but the texture of the silence.  It was when the songs settled down, there in between the notes, or before it started; and especially at the end. It floats down into a comforting lull, an easy transition into space.  It’s not empty, it’s filled-up space, filled with the sound of the world muted and calm but alive. If you notice, the tracks on such discs don’t end until the sound is gone.

I miss it sometimes, the float down into the foam of magnetic tape, that is really only noticeable by its absence.

I can see the reels spinning when I listen to things like that. The bright rush of a 2-inch reel to reel running at 30 inches per second, a smooth moving canvas for sonic colors, each one a cheap condo bleeding into one another through thin walls so you can hear the kick drum thumping from a few tracks away in the acoustic guitar. I’ve heard others talk about the warmth that magnetic tape gives sound, the roundness, a bit of fuzziness that makes it seem more human.  Listening now I realize what I miss most about it is the kind of silence it gives. When a song ends, it doesn’t end – it still feels there, just around the corner, like a friend who’s popped over for a bit and then gone home leaving the scent of laughter and emotion and could come back again any second.  The silence on tape is not silent, it is just life turned way down.

So many things I don’t miss about working with it.  It’s heavy, slow and cumbersome.  It does not always give you exactly what you expect.  When you’ve got something you need to do, it can get in the way, wanting you to tweak it gently and pay attention to its signals and bias. For working, I like digital.  I like the convenience of it, the fact that it takes what would have been an 8hour job and makes it two, Yes, it’s fun sometimes doing things like physically cutting a tape, patching a line or watching your reel jerk to a stop and stretch a section of tape because once again that old transport is acting up.  For work nothing beats the digital realm, and I could never go back (entirely).

But digital silence is the absence of sound – when a song is gone, it’s not replaced by something else, it’s just gone.  Sometimes that’s nice – a bright, punchy pop sound may need to be replaced by nothing.

But sometimes you want to hear the world breathe, and know the musicians, and their notes, are not gone – just hiding beneath that foam, listening themselves.