Jul 31
Crossroads is offering, for this week only, a free download of the Inspirations’ “So Simple, So Profound,” from their new album It’s in the Savior’s Hands. As I noted in my review of the album, this is one of the strongest cuts, and also a unique song for the Inspirations. Every southern gospel fan should take a listen to this song, especially when you’re getting it for free!
Click here to go to Crossroads’ download page for the single.
Jul 30
When building these Essential Playlists (an 80-minute limit of songs to introduce someone to a group), there was not a more difficult task than coming up with a playlist for the Cathedral Quartet. With 35 years of legendary music to choose from, I did a lot of adding, deleting, and shuffling to come up with a playlist that I still don’t have a great deal of confidence in.
I’ll be the first to admit that my depth of knowledge about gospel music is greatly diminished when going back prior to the 1980s. Most of the music I have from those earlier eras was obtained much more recently than the newer stuff, and I still haven’t gotten a handle on a lot of it. That’s where you folks come in.
I encourage you to rip this playlist apart as much as you want. From the 1980s on, I think I did fairly well. But I probably don’t have enough music from the Cathedrals’ first two decades, and I probably picked the wrong songs in some cases.
This playlist has one feature each from Ernie Haase, Scott Fowler, Mark Trammell, Gerald Wolfe, Danny Funderburk, Kirk Talley, and George Amon Webster. By my count there are seven George Younce features and only three for Glen Payne, which seems a little unbalanced.
If you wanted to introduce someone to the Cathedrals and only had one mix CD with which to do it, what would yours look like? Here’s mine.
Jul 23
Should the Lord tarry His coming for another 100 years, our great-grandchildren may look back on the era of gospel music in which we live, and they will probably consider Bill Gaither to be the era’s most influential figure. Through his “bright idea” for the Homecoming series, he helped spark interest in gospel music for a new generation. With the Gaither Vocal Band and other outlets, he produced some of the best music of this era. But I believe his most enduring legacy will be the songs. While not discounting the contributions of Mosie Lister, Dottie Rambo, and others, I think it’s safe to say that Bill Gaither is the most influential Christian songwriter of the last 50 years. Fifty years from now we may remember him (and his wife Gloria) the way we now remember Fanny Crosby and others from around the turn of the 20th century.
Bill and Gloria co-wrote a majority of the most enduring Gaither songs. In these co-writes, I believe Gloria tends to be the primary lyricist, while Bill puts the notes on the page. Both lyric and melody are usually exquisite. A typical Gaither lyric is marked by creative imagery and emotional depth. Think of the imagery of the first verse of “He Touched Me”: your mind pictures the shackles, and the touch of Jesus’ hand. The hope that the Resurrection of Christ gives has never been stated better than in “Because He Lives,” arguably Gaither’s most celebrated work. Musically, a Gaither song is lush, dramatic, and imaginative. You’re not going to find many three-chord Gaither songs. “I’ve Just Seen Jesus,” even without any key changes, has as dramatic a musical progression as you will find.
The influence of Bill Gaither is evident when taking a look at my personal music collection. He has written or co-written more songs in my library, with duplicates included, than any other single person. For most people with a wide-ranging gospel music collection, this is probably the case. See below for a breakdown of Gaither songs in my collection. Because so many Gaither songs stand on their own, without being defined by a particular artist, the “personal favorites” list reflects how I rank the songs themselves, not the individual performances necessarily. My favorite recording is given alongside the song.
Unique songs in my collection: 170
Total songs (including duplicates): 463
Most common artists:
Songs with 10 or more versions:
Oldest recording: “Praise for the Lord”, Imperials, Jake Hess and the Imperials (1964)
Newest recording: “Just Because of You”, Legacy Five, A Wonderful Life (2011)
Personal favorites:
How about you? Do you agree about the sphere of Gaither’s influence, or am I off? What are your favorite Bill and/or Gloria Gaither songs?
Jul 16
Steve Eaton over at the Back Row does great album rankings for southern gospel’s biggest groups. Daniel Mount at Southern Gospel Blog tells us the four (or less) essential albums one would use to introduce an artist to a new fan. I’d like to piggyback on their ideas and put a twist on it. I will combine the “essential” concept with my love for playlists and come up with a mix CD of songs you might use to introduce someone to a group. The Essential Playlists will have an 80-minute limit to tell the story of a southern gospel artist.
(Of course, in the interest of copyright law, I do not encourage you to give someone this hypothetical mix CD unless you have two copies of all the albums the songs came from, and also give all the albums to your friend. It would probably be better to use a long car ride to play the CD for them.)
In the first entry of this series, I’ll start with a big-time quartet for whose music I think I have a relatively firm grasp. Gold City has had a plethora of big hits over the last 30-plus years, but only 80 minutes of music are allowed on our Essentials CD. With this playlist, I included most of the quartet’s biggest hits, and also got at least one song in from almost every lineup. Tim Riley, Brian Free, Ivan Parker, Mike LeFevre, Steve Lacey, David Hill, Jonathan Wilburn, Jay Parrack, Mark Trammell, Daniel Riley, and Steve Ladd all have features on this playlist.
What did I leave off? Which songs from this playlist would you replace?
Jul 11
Christians love to sing about heaven, and for good reason. Heaven is the location of God’s throne, our eternal home, and the great reward of those who believe on Jesus Christ. And you know so many things about heaven lend themselves to being in song lyrics: the beauty, the splendor, the joy. Here’s a playlist I made of some of my favorite songs about heaven. As always, this is a real playlist I generated with a random order and put on a CD for listening in my car.
Which of these songs also speak to you? What are some of your favorite heaven songs?
Jul 09
The Ruppes, whose recording career spanned three decades, were a trio consisting of mother Brenda and sundry combinations of daughters Heather, Kim, and Valerie. They were never one of the very top-tier groups in a quartet-dominated industry, but they achieved greatest notoriety in the mid-90s with hits like “Under His Wings” and “Angels in the Room”. The three sisters, of course, now travel as Sisters. The most recognizable trait of both Sisters and the Ruppes is and was the intricate family harmony that has very few, if any, rivals. Perhaps a less celebrated but just as impressive aspect of the Ruppes’ music was the lyrical depth their songs so often displayed.
My favorite example of this is the title track to their 1986 album, “Put That on My Account”. Written, as many of their songs were, by evangelist Tom Hayes, it tells the beautiful story of a rather obscure Biblical figure, and makes the stirring application to the life of a Christian.
The opening lines of the song introduce the subject character:
Like Onesimus I ran away / I guess I thought I’d never pay / For all my sin…
I love a lyric that gets someone flipping and searching through their Bible, and this is definitely one. To find this Onesimus, you have to go to the little book of Philemon. This is a letter from the imprisoned Paul to a fellow Christian named Philemon who seems to have had a church assembly in his home. After some introductory encouraging words, Paul, under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, gets to the main purpose of the letter in verse 10:
I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds.
Here is what we know about Onesimus, according to this passage: Paul led him to the Lord while in prison (v. 10); he was a servant or slave belonging to Philemon (v. 16); he had run away from his master after some wrongdoing, probably thievery (v. 11, 15). We cannot be sure just how it is Onesimus ended up with Paul; perhaps he found himself imprisoned as well. What we do know is that while with Paul, he got gloriously saved. Paul, seeing the change in Onesimus, writes to Philemon, encouraging him to take his servant back, and to forgive him, as “a brother beloved” (v. 16). The payoff line, and source of the lyrical hook of our song, is in verse 18:
If he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee ought, put that on mine account.
Paul so loved Onesimus and so wanted him to be restored, that he promised to himself repay any debt that the servant may have owed his master through his sin. To the world, this may seem like a nice humanitarian story. But God put it in his Word for a reason, and that’s because, to Christians, it is a picture of what Christ has done for us.
In this allegory, we were Onesimus, hopelessly in debt from our sin, ever running from our Master. That Master, symbolized here by Philemon, is God. The Master requires retribution; Philemon is not told to totally forget about the debt. Paul is a type of Christ, who did for us what we could never do for ourselves. He paid the debt of our sin on the cross of Calvary. He lived a perfect life and had no sin to account for. But He willingly took the sins of the entire world and put them on His own account, taking the punishment for us. The chorus of the song rings out these words of victory:
“Put that on my account” is what the Savior said
“Put that on my account and cancel all the debt”
My sins where oh, so bad
And great was their amount
But now I’m free and glad
For they’re all on Christ’s account
The entire fifth chapter of Romans deals with the nature of Christ’s sacrifice for us; here’s most relevant portion to this discussion:
8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
9 Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.
10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.
11 And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.
The second verse of the song deepens the spiritual application, including this wonderful line:
But that’s not all there’s even more than this
He’s given to me His righteousness
The gettin’ is good here, folks. Paul didn’t just tell Philemon he would pay Onesimus’s debt. He instructed Philemon to accept and treat his former slave just as he would Paul himself. In verse 17 of Paul’ letter:
If thou count me therefore a partner, receive him as myself.
Earlier in verse 16, we see the new relationship between Philemon and Onesimus:
Not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved…
Through his death and resurrection, Christ didn’t just take away our sin debt. He totally changed our position with the God the Father. Once nothing more than runaway slaves, we are now children of God. From Romans 8:
15 For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:
17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.
When God sees us now, He sees us through the lens of Jesus Christ his Son. Instead of seeing our sin, He sees Christ’s righteousness. From 2 Corinthians 5:
19 To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
20 Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.
21 For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
Have you thought lately about all that Christ has done for you, though you didn’t deserve it? Pull out your Bible, turn to Philemon, and take five minutes to read through the letter. Not too long ago, the Ruppes’ version of “Put That on My Account” was released digitally. Use 99 cents to download it if you don’t have it. Rejoice that your sins are no longer on your account!
Jul 02
Going to the National Quartet Convention has been a long-term goal of mine ever since I first started listening to southern gospel music. Going this year, however, was not even on my radar screen until about a week ago. Spontaneity is not a quality I display very often, but my wife and I decided that if we keep waiting until we think we’re “ready” to go, we might never go. So we’re loading up and heading to Louisville in September!
We will be making the 8-hour drive to Louisville in time for the Wednesday evening concert and staying through the Lari Goss tribute showcase on Saturday afternoon. Ideally, we would have decided to do this a long time ago and gotten great seats. We were able to get seats on the floor section for Wednesday night, but Thursday and Friday were a different story. The closest seats we could get together were in the upper level, only a few rows from the top. Since I have never gone, I have no frame of reference, but it encouraged me in a way to see all those seats booked up, at least for Thursday and Friday.
I plan to use my Twitter feed, @sogobravo, to post live updates throughout my stay at NQC. Give me a follow if you haven’t already done so and want to share in the NQC experience with me. I’ll also make good use of the blog here to tell of my adventures, and of course, the great music.
Finally, I want to open up the floor for you. What’s something in particular you might like to hear about from a live NQC correspondent? Will I see any of you there? What about you other bloggers? Let me know in the comments.
National Quartet Convention 2012, here I come!
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