Christmas Lyrics and Hard Drive Space
So much of my mind’s storage space got taken up with lyrics. But it’s interesting which ones made it and which ones didn’t.
For the most part, the songs I sang in church growing up are still there. They may be in files that haven’t been accessed for a while, but they’re safely there. We maybe sing “To Canaan’s Land” once a year, but those lyrics are downloaded and can’t be erased (nor would I want them to be).
I wonder this: why do I know the lyrics to so many older hymns but always need words to the ones we sing most often now? Is it just because I learned them while young and my mind was still “sticky”? Are our children learning all the words to “In Christ Alone” just as I did to “Each Day I’ll Do”?
Another category that got downloaded: silly songs. My mom was a wonderful singer of silly songs (“Little Willy fell down the elevator, there they found him six months later; they held their nose and they said, ‘Gee whiz. What a spoiled child our Willy is.’ On the Dummy Line, on the Dummy Line, rain or shine I’ll pay my fine, rain or shine I’ll pay my fine, a ridin’, ridin’, ridin’ on the Dummy, Dummy Line”) as we traveled. I’ve passed them along to her grandchildren.
But for some reason most Christmas songs never got downloaded. Is it because I grew up in a tradition that was nervous (at best) about Christmas?
I realize that I can’t go Christmas caroling without lyrics. This year for our staff Christmas party someone provided words, and I enjoyed it so much more. Normally, I can only sing, “We three kings of Orient are . . . .” That’s it. Well, yes, I know the OTHER version: “. . . trying to smoke a rubber cigar.” But that doesn’t fit Matthew 2 as well.
Hey Mike — I actually wrote about this very thing, with your metaphor of “downloading,” just last week (here: http://resident-theology.blogspot.com/2008/12/formational-questions-for-worship.html). The culprit I found? PowerPoint.
(Also, speaking as a young person who grew up CoC, modern songs seem to be weaker overall compared to older hymns, musically and lyrically.)
I learned “Dummy Line” as “Sunny Line” when I was in the 2nd grade; it was in this old songbook our teacher used.
I got on the train and didn’t have the fare
The conductor said, “Whatcha doin’ there?”
He grabbed me by the collar and shoved me out the door
And he hit me on the head with a 2×4!
Couldn’t get away with that lyric in the public schools today!
Back when I was a child we went up to Jerusalem three times per year for the feasts. On the way there we sang the Songs of Ascent from the Psalms which our parents led us in as we walked. We ended up memorizing a lot of scripture without it ever being intentional
God bless.
Speaking about Christmas and the CoC and coming at this from the Weird ACU angle, the editors have noted that ACU doesn’t put up Christmas lights during the holidays. By contrast, Hardin-Simmons looks lovely.
We find that weird.
Older songs have a rhythm and cadance to both words and music that many new songs do not have…and the music follows the rules of music theory, which makes the music easier to learn. Years ago at Peak a young man decided to teach a new song…the audience learned the melody…then he said, “OK, now let’s sing it in parts…everyone just jump in and add your part however you want.” The chair of the music department was sitting in front of me…he cringed…and later I told him that must have been one of his music theory students! Many new songs do not follow the pattern of music theory harmony, because the parts have been added in a random manner…and I think that is why it is harder for me to remember them.
By the way, Harding is once again glowing with beautiful lights during December…we started decorating the campus more way back when I was a student (early 60s); the current lighting is spectacular.
Keith and I recently had a “singing” at home. We found an old “Sacred Songs of the Church” book and we had a ball singing those old songs. I love the new stuff – I really do but sometimes, those old hymns are the only things that will do!
Wait until your 75! If I want to quote Scripture spontaneously, it is always KJV (when have I read or heard that in the last ? years?). In our church we have a beautiful woman my age with Alzheimers whose memory is going but she is an inspiration to watch singing in church.
I’m 58 and I love some of the old songs, but I love the new songs too. How can you complain when so many of them are straight out of the Bible? When our song leader leads the Days of Elijah, the church suddenly perks up in a beautiful way. I think the teenagers are memorizing the new songs, I don’t see them with song sheets when they are singing them for devos, etc.
Eileen – I hope you’re right. I’m hoping that our teenagers are memorizing these songs — just as I did when I was a teenager (without even intending to). I certainly am not writing to discount newer songs. I love them. I just am frustrated that they aren’t getting downloaded into my skull. Perhaps the synapses aren’t firing as regularly?
Marla – Good to hear a worship minister say that rich lyrics are always running through her mind! I happen to know that you’ve got a lot of other stuff downloaded in there, too.
Brad – Great minds think alike. Just read your comments on your blog. Thanks for what you wrote.
Weird ACU – Who ARE you clandestine people?
Yes, I must admit that the old songs are downloaded up there but not so much with the new songs. Why?? Too much Sweet N Low in my tea???
Hey ACU, get with it and get some lights out there!!
Mike — I didn’t say it was always “rich” lyrics running . . .
Sorry Mike, but we can’t tell you who we are. Our movement needs protection. From who? We are not sure, but we are paranoid.
Needless to say, there are many of us.
When the Crimson sun is set
Low behind the wintry sea
On the bright & cold midnight
Bursts a sound of Heavenly glee
Shepherds watching by their fold
On the crisp & hoary plain
In the sky bright hosts espy
Singing in a gladsome strain
Gloris in excelsis Deo #576 Great Songs of The Church
Not sung overly much anymore, but I’ll forever remember singing
it back in the day. Went & ate fish at Willie’s fish house at sunset last Fri. night near Pangburn recently with Mom & Dad. It was so cold. I drove with Daddy in the front & Mom in the back. We stared out the car window to our left, & this song instantly came to our minds, & we sang! Lovely moment…..
Um, that would be GLORIA! from the song “When The Crimson Sun is Set
A dear, sweet lady I know, in her eighties and deep into dementia, doesn’t know her family, but if you sing an old hymn, she’ll smilingly join right in. She knows every word. At my church the other night, the 20ish song leader said he wanted to lead a new song he had just heard for the first time. It was “Savior Like a Shepherd Lead Us”. The young crowd….30 and down, grabbed their songbooks. We oldies closed our books and sang every word.
Mike,
I think that you have difficulty downloading the new songs because they are never sang the same way twice. The musical notes might be the same but the order of verses and repetition of choruses varies widely from time to time.
Also as stated earlier they are not as musically or spiritually deep even though from scripture. How deep is my God reigns, my God reigns as compared to “When I Survey the Cross” for instance.
I like many of the new songs but dislike the fact that the old hymns or rarely used. In our worship–we have never had an “invitation song in the 3 years I have been here and only 5 or less traditional communion hymns.
We too exhibit a perk up with “Days of Elijah”–but I don’t appreciate or understand the song–in fact not quite sure of some of its theology.
Then we have the song “There’s a Stirring” which we use with a totally different meaning than the author had and is in the song. Note the query I made to Annie Herring and the response from Buck Herring: Annie, To you as you wrote “There’s a Stirring” what is it referring to: Meeting the Lord in death or Meeting the Lord where He comes again or Neither?
Thank you!
It refers to the revelation of meeting the Lord in eternity, when we will “forever” be with the Lord.
Blessings,
Buck Herring
Dee,
To the contrary, they do follow the rules of music theory. Even when people just “make up the parts,” the made up parts are consistent with the vast majority of rules followed since the days of Mr. Bach. Why? Because that’s what is ingrained in our brains. The biggest difference in songs of today from songs of yesterday is the ryhthm. And for my money they are far more consistent with the “cadence” of the words than from the 1880′s. Love the old songs, but got to have the new!
Mike, remembering things recently put into your head does get harder as you get older. We were classmates at Harding, and now I’ve gone back to law school after all these years. It’s a little different than when I was 19 years old.
Annie, I heard the wedding was wonderful. Heard some neat things about Swiss Avenue from Nick and Rachel.
Also, for Sagebrush, I’m quite sure that most of us in the CoC don’t agree with what I hear in the theology of Days of Elijah. I love it, anyway. It perks me up.
don
For those that think some of the newer songs don’t have good theology… you are right, and wrong.
If you’re talking new songs from the 80s and 90s, then yes. Lots of vertical praise (which is good occasionally) but too much of it misses the point of worship, imho.
However, there are plenty of new new songs (written in the last two years) that are very rich with theology. Thinking just from the new zoe cd, these lines come to mind:
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like you have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks yours
Everything I am for your Kingdom’s cause
As I walk from earth into eternity
Or another
When I see the beauty of a sunset’s glory
amazing artistry across the evening sky
When I feel the mystery of a distant galaxy
it awes and humbles me to be loved by a God so high
What can I do but praise you?
And then my favorite from that same song
When I hear the story of a God of mercy
who shared humanity and suffered by our side
Of the cross they nailed you to, that could not hold you
NOW YOU’RE MAKING ALL THINGS NEW BY THE POWER OF YOUR RISEN LIFE
Or Randy Gill’s song Fearless
We are not afraid to follow where you lead
leaving what we’ve known for what we cannot see
We are not afraid for we are not alone
and so we’ll go with you into the unknown
Unfortunately, most of today’s hymns have no animals like “Glad Lee, the Cross-Eyed Bear” or “Vile Eye II, the Fountain Fly.”
Weird ACU, I, too, ponder the weirdness of no Christmas lights! As I walk around ACU I wonder why in the world this wonderful pathway is not filled with Christmas lights! Surely some generous benefactor could designate that their legacy be displayed in lights for the Christmas season.
this made me smile and thats all i care about….