Tag Archives: Music

Interests, Payette River Vineyard

Rock and Worship Roadshow Recap

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Last night a bunch of us from PRV went to the Rock and Worship Roadshow in the Boise. For those of you not in the know, the Roadshow is a collection of eight bands from a variety of musical genres:

  • Mercy Me
  • Tenth Avenue North
  • Lecrae
  • Hawk Nelson
  • Disciple
  • Sidewalk Prophets
  • Rend Collective Experiment
  • Moriah Peters

While the headliners of the show were Mercy Me and Tenth Avenue North (both contemporary rock bands), it was Lacrae (hip hop) and Disciple (metal) who really bought down the house! Disciple was exceptional with an energetic front man, Kevin Young, and a guitar player who did a back flip off a six or eight foot tall box while playing his guitar…  yeah, they were fun to watch!

The Hawk Nelson band had a rough night of it as their front man, Jason Dunn, as wasn’t feeling good with a sore throat and an injured hip. Not to mention that their bass player got delayed by US customs while trying to fly in from Canada…accordingly their bus driver filled in last night on the bass and did a great job (talk about a shift in duties!).

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Theology Thoughts

Form Us, Make Us, Mold Us, Shape Us

My heart fell in love with the song “Form Us” by Casey Corum/Anabeth Morgan back in May at the National Conference as I felt that it carried a prophetic message for our church as well as the Vineyard Movement as a whole:

Form us, make us
Mold us, shape us

To be like you, moved to action
Full of mercy and compassion

We want to love the things You love
We want to hate the things You hate
As Your heart is formed inside us
May we learn to walk in grace
And extern the hand of mercy
To set the captives free
Bringing freedom to the prisoner
Bringing hope the blind can see
Mercy triumphs over judgment
Mercy triumphs over judgment

(Lyrical excerpt – full lyrics can be found on the below video)

May we walk this message out and not merely sing of it….

Interests

Stonefield The Band

I recently stumbled upon an article about Stonefield and just had to share with you all. It is a triumphant tale of how the band has conquered the music world and are now working on their debut album.

Stonefield is an upcoming Australian rock band consisting of four sisters ages 13 to 21; Amy, Hannah, Holly, and Sarah. They started off under a different band name, Lotah in the small rural town of Darraweit Guim and renamed themselves Stonefield a few years later.

They started playing about six years ago when they talked their parents into buying them a drum kit to play with. Amy, the oldest sister, took to the drum the best and soon out began to play it each and every day. The family were even thinking of looking at drum wrap companies to customize the kit further but settled on expanding the number of instruments at home.

Hannah, the next in line, decided to try the guitar while Sarah fell in love with the keyboard. Just like their sister, they became dedicated to their music. The youngest sister, Holly, listened to her sisters practicing and realized that the band needed a bass guitarist… the rest, they say, is history. The article I linked is just a footnote in what these talented sisters have managed to achieve in so little time

Their story is an inspiration, that a single investment into a musical instrument can quickly grow into a budding band. Below is one of their music videos, if you like it, then keep an ear out for their debut album coming soon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPTVbWvW240

Video: “Through the Clover”

Current Events

Ain’t No Grave: Pentecostal Worship and Rock’n’Roll

Brother Claude Ely, pictured in 1953 in front of the Letcher County Courthouse in Whitesburg, Ky. (Courtesy of Macel Ely and NPR)

You all HAVE to listen to this!

NPR’s All Things Considered recently did a 12-minture segment on Brother Claude Ely, the Pentecostal preacher who wrote the song “There Ain’t No Grave (Gonna Hold My Body Down)” (the song being sung by Johnny Cash in this year’s Deadliest Catch trailer).  Brother Ely traveled up and down the Appalachian Mountains with his guitar and the Bible – signing and preaching to all who would listen.

As the years went by, King Records of Cincinnati heard about him and decided to record some of his songs. The result was the first recording of a Pentecostal rival as well as widespread influence on the development of rock’n’roll:

“[Tulane scholar] Fontenot says that it might be hard to tease out where different musical traditions come from. But he believes that Pentecostal music had an impact on rock ‘n’ roll. He says you can hear that impact in Brother Claude Ely’s music.

Many of the early rockers — Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash — all grew up in the Pentecostal church, according to Hensley.”

This post does not do this story justice – you really need to listen to the story as NPR plays some of Brother Ely’s old soundtracks along with recordings of folks who knew him before he died. In fact, the piece was originally designed to highlight a biography of Brother Claude Ely written by his great nephew, Dr. Macel Ely II.

Give it a listen – you’ll like it. 🙂

Note: Thanks to Jamie Smith for bring this piece to my attention.

Theology Thoughts, Vineyard Movement

Theology and Worship

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I just read an amazing and thought provoking article about worship and theology by Frank Emanuel, Freedom Vineyard (Ottawa, Canada).

In this article, Frank makes service important points as to why we must be careful what worship songs we sing:

a) People will remember the words of a worship song long after they have forgotten the points of a sermon.

“Worship leaders are often even more powerful teachers than even our best preachers”

b) If we are singing to God, we better make sure our words reflex the truth about Him – similar to how you would make sure a love song to your spouse included accurate information about them.

“When I hear comments like, ‘it’s just a song’, as if it doesn’t matter what we sing, I usually shudder inside. In worship it is never just a song – it is worship of the most high God, the Lord of Lords. Worship of such a God always deserves to be our best, our most passionate expressions of our best theology (that is talk about God).”

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General

Dancing The Night Away

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Surprisingly, Friday’s elementary/intermediate school dance turned out to be a lot of fun.

During the setup, I expressed my doubts as to the wisdom of such a dance – and received likewise comments from some of the other adults…yet, I also learned that it was the kids themselves who requested the dance after getting a taste during a winter auction/fundraiser a while back.

This taste was enhanced during the school year by a local lady who took it upon herself to each these children how to dance properly. No fast, bumping grinding here – just some basic swing moves, two step, foxtrot and other classic dances of years gone past.

"Artistic Sound Board Lights" (otherwise known as, "Josh Playing with a Camara"

I, for one, am slightly jealous of these kids has they are learning skills that will enrich their lives for many a moon. The rest of us…well, we had to learn such style the hard way – through many an embarrassing dance party (school, wedding, ect).

On the bright side, I did have the pleasure of cutting the rug gym floor with my lovely bride as well as my young son (it is amazing how much fun a three person two step can be!).  😀

Oh, and the music turned out good.

I was able to filter most of the not-so-good-for-young-ears songs without offending too many kids (it is bad when ten year olds are requesting by name song I won’t even listen too?!)

All and all, Friday evening was a wonderful time spend dancing under the lights to the rhythmic beats of Justin Bieber and Miley Cyrus. 😛

Interests

School Dances: Awkwardness or Coolness?

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I have been asked to DJ a school dance on Friday – an elementary/intermediate school dance… which makes me wonder if anyone will be on the dance floor?!

My intermediate years of 4th through 6th grade were marked by avoiding the horned beasts opposite gender as they eked cooties. The one exception to this rule was Jolene (aka the Purple Girl) who played trombone (the BEST instrument as you could bing folks in the back of the head without getting caught!) and had purple eyeglasses, purple braces, and a sweet purple dinosaur on her trombone (give me a break, this was pre-Barney!!).

Years later when I was a freshman (or was it eighth grade?) in high school, I attended my first school dance with my mother. Yep. I took my mom to a school dance…what I can I say, she had a drivers license and we lived a half hour from the school.

This dance marked a turning point in my life as it was the first time I really loosed up and begin to be myself at school. Prior to this dance, I was the outcast of the school (ok, that fact really didn’t change) – attracting unwanted attention by jocks and others in the ‘in’ crowd.  This made me retreat into myself (I could go through an entire day without saying 3 words – an act of God to anyone who knows me now) while outside of school I was talkative and friendly.

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General

JJ Heller – What Love Really Means

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Emily recently discovered a new songwriter/singer that is amazing! So amazing in fact, that I couldn’t help but share the knowledge with you all. 🙂

J.J. Heller has a great folksy sound and, best of all, some powerful words. Her songs do what songs are suppose to do – they resonate with one’s soul in a way that words by themselves can not.

I implore you to check out the music videos below.

Continue reading JJ Heller – What Love Really Means →