X-tian Music

for the most part, i do not listen to Christian music. i don't mean that i don't listen to Christian bands (or bands associated with Christianity -- another discussion in an of itself) like Switchfoot, Lifehouse, etc; i mean the stuff we normally sing in service.

i sometimes find myself asking, why is that? everyone else seems to be into it and aware of what songs are floating about on the airwaves, while i remain blissfully ignorant. the only answer i can come up with is that these songs just feel weird. it's like petting a cat (or shark) backwards; neither party really appreciates it.

i write this recently returned from summer retreat. the times of worship we had were quite awesome. except for the little niggling at the back of my mind, that weird feeling that sat there in the corner and looked at me funny. was it because the songs were too high for my range? was it because i took my socks off?

it wasn't the people playing the instruments, singing the songs. it wasn't the people swaying and dancing around me. it wasn't the hard and knotty carpet under my feet. it was something i could feel inherently in the music of some songs that was off-putting.

possible bug-a-boos:
Illogical Lyrics -

open up, you heavenly gates,
let the king of glory in;
open up your hearts to Him,
let the king of glory in

i first encountered this gem at Iawah. it bugged me then (for multiple reasons) and it continues to bug me now. isn't the king of glory already inside? was that line thrown in just for balancing the second half of the quatrain on a metaphorical level? and it's not just the chorus that bugs me; the rest of the song is all over the place in terms of range, direction and tone. this sort of thing really distracts me from worship.

Shoehorning - this is when a contemporary verse is written, or exerpted from another song and literally shoehorned into a rendition of an established hymn, e.g. Amazing Grace (My Chains are Gone). when it's done well, such as the aforementioned example, it augments the song and takes it to nifty places. when the verse that's shoehorned in does not work, it blows up the entire song like nobody's business. here's a good hymn: Fairest Lord Jesus. here it is, in my opinion, ruined: Fairest Lord Jesus + shoehorned verse.

i wish i had copies of both that you could listen to. the shoehorned verse is innocuous and unassuming and really dull in writing. musically it sticks out like a thumb that has fingers growing out of it. planting it into the hymn as a chorus only compounds the badness because it is refrained and repeated. the hymn is in C. the chorus is in F. F is the 4th note on the C scale. there aren't any hard and fast rules to songwriting nowadays, but there are things that sound good and things that don't. while F is one of the nice notes on the scale, it is not a standalone note; as such, it is not a standalone key. it's a leading note that is used to build expectation for musical resolution (returning to the home key C or the dominant note G). this verse rips the listener out of the hymn and takes him or her nowhere in particular. and that hurts.

Electric Rock Show Circus - not associated with any particular song; but more of an issue of taste. Christian praise songs have veered into rock concert territory. the songs are all about flashy electric guitar riffs, pounding bass, intricate drum solos and stratospheric vocals. rock is the cool, hip thing to do. it sure does get the crowd going. but when every song seems to be a huge eardrum-busting rock-out show-off fest, i will get up and go. the absolute worst is a balladic hymn song getting an Evanescence Bridge Buster -- you know, like the radio edit of My Immortal. it sort of works in that particular song, but not for praise and worship. the EBB is a commercial gimmick, a hook in the song to lure shallow listeners. P&W is not about glory hogging.

of course, this could all just be an issue of musical taste. i prefer acoustic music, when you can tell if the singers and instrumentalists are actually good at what they do. i like music the same way i like food: slow -- for the purposes of savouring what's in it. for the most part, contemporary Christian music just doesn't do it for me; it is lyrically and musically shallow. there is some really good stuff out there, i'm sure of it; i just can't be bothered to wade through the dross to get to the gold.

this world is small

i was umping a game last week and one of the players on one of the teams was someone i just met in my second last semester of school in Children's Literature. she'd not a church-goer but she was invited to play for "Anointed". the following day (sunday) "Anointed" umpired our game, and i got to chat a bit with their coach, Jo, again. one of the assisting umpires knew most of the players on our team because they all go to University of Waterloo. she didn't recognize me, even though i called her out for leading off at second base, until i reminded her.

the next day (monday), i went to Markville Mall to take a gander at some day packs, as my trusty red one (for skates and other miscellany, like Longlac and camping and high school) was beginning to deteriorate. as i began my quest, i spied out of the corner of my eye someone that looked like Jo in the distance, talking to a friend. as i returned my attention to my quest it looked like she saw me too, and seemed to have a moment of fuzzy recognition as well. i didn't turn back to confirm it on account of aforementioned quest (that did not bear fruit).

---

i took Cheryl to Pacific Mall today to see if we could (miraculously) find a USB data cable for her Sandisk Sansa C-140 MP3 player, since she left it back home in Longlac. we trawled the mall for about an hour, going past every store and talking to the people behind the counters of the techier stores. i did not play the usual Pacific Mall games of a) counting cellphone stores (tough) b) counting bubble tea stores (tougher) c) counting pirated DVD stores (toughest).

after sufficient boredom and not finding what we came for, i decided to take her over to Market Village to see if we could find soprano-melissa where she works. on the way over in the toaster oven heat, two girls walked past. one looked mildly familiar and i thought, hey, is that Mary from UHS where i taught grade 11 physics two summers ago? it wasn't. so we trundled into the slightly air conditioned older sister of Pacific Mall and quickly identified the place that soprano melissa worked. it was upstairs.

turning towards the place after getting off the escalator i make eye contact with Mary from UHS where i taught grade 11 physics two summers ago, who was with her mom and little sister. what a coinky-dink. we small-talked for a bit -- where she would be going for university, etc; i didn't tell her i was just thinking of her (not in THAT way) because that would sound three shades creepier than i normally try to project. anyways, this was actually the third time bumping into her. the first was at the entrance of T&T early last year; the second was at TJCAC during the program that followed Project T-dot last summer.

after that we found melissa fairly easily; she was standing at the reception desk. we then went back to Pacific Mall to get some bubble tea from Food Jungle (real fruit, not powder) because she had a discount card (10% off!). there we bumped into Kelvin and his parents who were just out for a summer afternoon something.

wakaa wakaa doo doo yeah!

like maybe 1 or 2 of my readers will be mildlyextremely excited about this.

and this:
[SPOILER ALERT - if the above link is important to you and you do not wish to have surprises become expectations, do not watch the following video]

my kids

since we left for Longlac almost immediately after school let out, i haven't really had a chance to process my experience at St. Florence. as i was going over some of the photos that i took, i realized that i missed my kids dearly. i still remember their names and faces and quirks and writing styles and hobbies and the shoes they wore and their hilarious questions and their ever present smiles.

me and the ladies


that's my normal photo face; theirs are better.


me with most of the girls and one boy. see if you can find him.


the pure joy of bubbles


LCG telling me a secret

carpe aestas

the past two weeks since our return from Longlac has been a bit of a rollercoaster ride. we came back with Cheryl, a native from the reserve, because she had a few things to take care of here. as a result, the (young half of the) team has stuck together to take care of her while she's here for the summer. this is not to say that we would've disbanded right away, but i highly doubt the group would've had the opportunity to hang out together so much without a focus.

we go out occasionally for movies, dinners, lunches, just plain sitting down and talking about nothing, or singing. last week we went to bakeries, the mall, Ratatouille, and several dinners. this past monday, we went rock climbing with Art and his rock climbing buddies. today, i went downtown with Dan, Cheryl and Lyris to visit some Native Canadian community centre. we trolled some of the trinket shops in the area as well. tonight we sang, as a team, for Light On A Hill a whole slew of cheesy old songs (the Beatles, Billy Joel, Stand By Me (a capella), etc) and it was like our Longlac jam sessions all over again -- except in public.

i'm glad i actively did not take up a summer job this year because it has given me the time to participate in all these things. i must say, however, that hanging out is quite expensive, especially without an income. but i've already committed my financial worries into God's hands, so it does not worry me that much.

for the last week of August, we will be heading back up to Longlac to take Cheryl home and to visit all the friends we made earlier this summer. the end of summer will bring me crashing back into the reality that is school and blahblahblahs.