Regina this is a really smart piece and something I have thought of on a smaller level for sometime. Thank you for bringing the historical into this conversation. I feel Christian Music to have all sorts of benefits in my life as a Catholic- reiterating what you mentioned :scripture based, fun & uplifting, I would rather have my kids listening to this and they prefer it to Classic rock or oldies. And as a bonus our local CCM station is donor supported so even their advertisments are not offensive in any form because it is local businesses owned by Christians supporting the station.
Thanks, Lisa! These are all great points, and my teens have enjoyed that local station you refer to as well. I know for a fact it has helped some of my teens struggle through their stages of moodiness and seasons of depression, and I'm grateful for that too.
Loved reading this! Thank you for sharing! Unfortunately, I am one such person who does not particularly enjoy Christian pop music. 😅 I don’t really enjoy contemporary pop music to begin with. I have a personality quirk that leads me to automatically dislike anything I perceive as popular, which I know is silly and juvenile, but I haven’t figured out how to kick it yet. 😂 case in point: I only have one song on my playlists from this year, and it’s a theme piece from the Barbie movie by Lizzo that I found really musically interesting and fun. But I’m probably going to delete it because it got stuck in my head way too easily.
That said, your piece has got me thinking about how I enjoy the music I listen to. Admittedly it’s mostly secular music. But I think there’s a significance to that. I think I enjoy secular music more specifically because secular artists often provide a unique insight into ordinary human experiences. Jim Croce’s music is some of my absolute favorite for this reason. He doesn’t really write about anything directly profound, but he is a profoundly talented lyricist and composer. His songs evoke a sense of wonder and gratitude for simply being human and alive. Whether he’s singing about making a phone call to a long lost sweetheart (Operator) or relating an entertaining narrative about caricatures he’s invented based on his life (Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown), I always always enjoy his work, and find myself returning to his music again and again.
I think the reason I have a hard time enjoying Christian pop music is that the songs tend to be simple. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but it’s harder for me to enjoy the simplicity of their messages, and the simple melody that corresponds to them. The simplicity can sound like an oversimplification of something deep and rich with complexity. At the risk of sounding immature, something in me bristles at many Christian songs because I feel like they are telling me how I should or shouldn’t feel in my relationship with God. For me, that’s something so personal and so intimate that it’s uncomfortable and irritating to hear someone else telling me how it should be, or worse, acting like they know exactly what I’m going through. That’s what I’ve found with Christian pop music anyway.
What I want out of Christian music is space to explore my relationship with God at a deeper level. I want melodies and lyrics that evoke a sense of wonder at the gift of faith, while also leaving room for me to acknowledge the reality that being a faithful person is not easy.
I don’t think this is a good thing about me, by the way. I don’t think it’s better to have this perspective. But all the same, I don’t think I can make myself like Christian pop music.
However, your insights here have left me with the impression that there is something I can do differently. I need to do some work to find Christian artists that make music in genres that I naturally gravitate towards, which would be more likely to convey the kind of truths I resonate with. I like alternative and acoustic music, and some folk sounding artists. Reading this has helped me realize that I would probably benefit a lot from investing attention into finding Christian music and artists to add to my music library!
Thanks MR! CCM is a very broad field, and there's much to explore when it comes to genres of Christian and Catholic music. The Hillbilly Thomists come immediately to mind. Non-Catholic bands like Celtic Worship's version of standard hymns are also great. And if you don't mind songs in foreign languages, there's a wealth to choose from. My teens love Simon Khorolskiy, for example. I think the key thing for me was that I wanted to listen to modern music that had lyrics that kept God on my mind, especially using the words of Scripture. As nice and harmonious as the best secular or folk music is, it doesn't do that for me-- usually. Some Music Monday I'll elaborate on that point.
Feel free to post anything you find here for others to check out. I would love Music Mondays to be a bit of a music-sharing place for readers, so post what you find!
You've struck a chord with me, Regina. Several chords actually. I'm not used to commenting, and don't know how much space the commenting system will afford me. I'll just start right in and find out.
First, you've reminded me of our wedding, Lyda's and mine. Gussie R. led the singing. She was as powerful and gifted and warm-hearted a gospel singer as I have ever heard, and of course we asked her to sing for us, beinst as how she had prayed me straight into our marriage. As Lyda walked up the aisle, Gussie sang "our song" - Amazing Grace - all six verses. The choir, all friends, was a talented folk group. Their singing lit up the Mass.
Then Gussie and the choir began to improvise a jazzy version of Amazing Grace as we left the church. All six verses. Completely unrehearsed. Everyone was singing, swaying, clapping to the beat; and when they got to the end, they just kept on going - all six verses all over again. Lyda and I stood waiting in a foyer wondering, "Where're them other kids?"
Another thing about "contemporary Christian music." It makes a natural bridge for someone who has lost his faith and is hesitating back. Prayer groups are great. Serious discussion groups as well, and important for exploring possibilities of faith. But singing CCM at the end - ah, that really knits the evening to a connecting close.
I've gone on to other Christian musics since then and moved from evangelical circles to Catholic ones, and I particularly like what the "trads" like, particularly the Latin. But I have not lost at all my love for gospel and praise singing.
Many thoughts floating to mind. I'll end with just two.
A couple weeks ago, I finished a slow passage through Anthony Esolen's "Real Music: A Guide to the Timeless Hymns of the Church." Good book! The hymns are mostly Protestant, and Esolen's erudition and gift for words brings alive the common ground of our faiths, and the weight. Along the way, he does put forward choice criticisms of the occasional weightlessness of some CCM. But surely, those are not the songs you like. :-)
And this. My mother was dying. She was Czech and we both had a heart for Dvorak. And somehow along the way of her decline, I discovered that someone had put words to the largo, the slow movement, of The New World Symphony. Writing it, Dvorak had in mind Negro spirituals, and the words later put to it begin, "Goin' home, goin' home, I'm just goin' home."
It's about dying. It was Chloe Agnew whom I first heard singing it. When I saw my mother next day, I told her about it and tried to sing a bit of it to her. And to my astonishment, she began singing it with me. The song was older than I knew, and she had loved and learned it in the 1920s or 30s. A little blonde Czech girl in Iowa, Dvorak, a Negro spiritual that still makes me weep. Here's a link to Chloe Agnew's version. Staged, but listen to the words and the tune. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oc8KzsPBME
Hm. I see that there's a check box labeled "Also share to Notes." Wonder what that means. I'm gonna check it.
And now - or soon - on to your next entry!
Didn't you say somewhere that this began as a diary? I read my sister's diary back when. This feels a little like that.
Thanks Robert! I freely admit to enjoying the most "weightless" of Christian music, just as I enjoy balloons and bubbles and Valentines and other epherma (I will write a CRJ post on this soon, I promise!). Not all music is "music for the ages," and there's nothing intrinsically wrong with a happy little tune. We all tend to hum them to ourselves at times, and that's certainly not a sin, or even bad culture. In my mind, if that happy little tune praises our Savior, even better.
Speaking of weightless little tunes, remember "Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport"? My Dad hated it, back when. Specifically for its unseriousness, he just couldn't stand it. And one afternoon running errands with me, he could NOT get the tune out of his head. It was hilarious. They kept playing it on the radio, I kept tapping the beat, he kept griping, and his inner DJ kept repeating it. If I could time-travel, I'd compose a praise version for him.
Regina this is a really smart piece and something I have thought of on a smaller level for sometime. Thank you for bringing the historical into this conversation. I feel Christian Music to have all sorts of benefits in my life as a Catholic- reiterating what you mentioned :scripture based, fun & uplifting, I would rather have my kids listening to this and they prefer it to Classic rock or oldies. And as a bonus our local CCM station is donor supported so even their advertisments are not offensive in any form because it is local businesses owned by Christians supporting the station.
Thanks, Lisa! These are all great points, and my teens have enjoyed that local station you refer to as well. I know for a fact it has helped some of my teens struggle through their stages of moodiness and seasons of depression, and I'm grateful for that too.
Loved reading this! Thank you for sharing! Unfortunately, I am one such person who does not particularly enjoy Christian pop music. 😅 I don’t really enjoy contemporary pop music to begin with. I have a personality quirk that leads me to automatically dislike anything I perceive as popular, which I know is silly and juvenile, but I haven’t figured out how to kick it yet. 😂 case in point: I only have one song on my playlists from this year, and it’s a theme piece from the Barbie movie by Lizzo that I found really musically interesting and fun. But I’m probably going to delete it because it got stuck in my head way too easily.
That said, your piece has got me thinking about how I enjoy the music I listen to. Admittedly it’s mostly secular music. But I think there’s a significance to that. I think I enjoy secular music more specifically because secular artists often provide a unique insight into ordinary human experiences. Jim Croce’s music is some of my absolute favorite for this reason. He doesn’t really write about anything directly profound, but he is a profoundly talented lyricist and composer. His songs evoke a sense of wonder and gratitude for simply being human and alive. Whether he’s singing about making a phone call to a long lost sweetheart (Operator) or relating an entertaining narrative about caricatures he’s invented based on his life (Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown), I always always enjoy his work, and find myself returning to his music again and again.
I think the reason I have a hard time enjoying Christian pop music is that the songs tend to be simple. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but it’s harder for me to enjoy the simplicity of their messages, and the simple melody that corresponds to them. The simplicity can sound like an oversimplification of something deep and rich with complexity. At the risk of sounding immature, something in me bristles at many Christian songs because I feel like they are telling me how I should or shouldn’t feel in my relationship with God. For me, that’s something so personal and so intimate that it’s uncomfortable and irritating to hear someone else telling me how it should be, or worse, acting like they know exactly what I’m going through. That’s what I’ve found with Christian pop music anyway.
What I want out of Christian music is space to explore my relationship with God at a deeper level. I want melodies and lyrics that evoke a sense of wonder at the gift of faith, while also leaving room for me to acknowledge the reality that being a faithful person is not easy.
I don’t think this is a good thing about me, by the way. I don’t think it’s better to have this perspective. But all the same, I don’t think I can make myself like Christian pop music.
However, your insights here have left me with the impression that there is something I can do differently. I need to do some work to find Christian artists that make music in genres that I naturally gravitate towards, which would be more likely to convey the kind of truths I resonate with. I like alternative and acoustic music, and some folk sounding artists. Reading this has helped me realize that I would probably benefit a lot from investing attention into finding Christian music and artists to add to my music library!
Thanks MR! CCM is a very broad field, and there's much to explore when it comes to genres of Christian and Catholic music. The Hillbilly Thomists come immediately to mind. Non-Catholic bands like Celtic Worship's version of standard hymns are also great. And if you don't mind songs in foreign languages, there's a wealth to choose from. My teens love Simon Khorolskiy, for example. I think the key thing for me was that I wanted to listen to modern music that had lyrics that kept God on my mind, especially using the words of Scripture. As nice and harmonious as the best secular or folk music is, it doesn't do that for me-- usually. Some Music Monday I'll elaborate on that point.
Feel free to post anything you find here for others to check out. I would love Music Mondays to be a bit of a music-sharing place for readers, so post what you find!
You've struck a chord with me, Regina. Several chords actually. I'm not used to commenting, and don't know how much space the commenting system will afford me. I'll just start right in and find out.
First, you've reminded me of our wedding, Lyda's and mine. Gussie R. led the singing. She was as powerful and gifted and warm-hearted a gospel singer as I have ever heard, and of course we asked her to sing for us, beinst as how she had prayed me straight into our marriage. As Lyda walked up the aisle, Gussie sang "our song" - Amazing Grace - all six verses. The choir, all friends, was a talented folk group. Their singing lit up the Mass.
Then Gussie and the choir began to improvise a jazzy version of Amazing Grace as we left the church. All six verses. Completely unrehearsed. Everyone was singing, swaying, clapping to the beat; and when they got to the end, they just kept on going - all six verses all over again. Lyda and I stood waiting in a foyer wondering, "Where're them other kids?"
Another thing about "contemporary Christian music." It makes a natural bridge for someone who has lost his faith and is hesitating back. Prayer groups are great. Serious discussion groups as well, and important for exploring possibilities of faith. But singing CCM at the end - ah, that really knits the evening to a connecting close.
I've gone on to other Christian musics since then and moved from evangelical circles to Catholic ones, and I particularly like what the "trads" like, particularly the Latin. But I have not lost at all my love for gospel and praise singing.
Many thoughts floating to mind. I'll end with just two.
A couple weeks ago, I finished a slow passage through Anthony Esolen's "Real Music: A Guide to the Timeless Hymns of the Church." Good book! The hymns are mostly Protestant, and Esolen's erudition and gift for words brings alive the common ground of our faiths, and the weight. Along the way, he does put forward choice criticisms of the occasional weightlessness of some CCM. But surely, those are not the songs you like. :-)
And this. My mother was dying. She was Czech and we both had a heart for Dvorak. And somehow along the way of her decline, I discovered that someone had put words to the largo, the slow movement, of The New World Symphony. Writing it, Dvorak had in mind Negro spirituals, and the words later put to it begin, "Goin' home, goin' home, I'm just goin' home."
It's about dying. It was Chloe Agnew whom I first heard singing it. When I saw my mother next day, I told her about it and tried to sing a bit of it to her. And to my astonishment, she began singing it with me. The song was older than I knew, and she had loved and learned it in the 1920s or 30s. A little blonde Czech girl in Iowa, Dvorak, a Negro spiritual that still makes me weep. Here's a link to Chloe Agnew's version. Staged, but listen to the words and the tune. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oc8KzsPBME
Hm. I see that there's a check box labeled "Also share to Notes." Wonder what that means. I'm gonna check it.
And now - or soon - on to your next entry!
Didn't you say somewhere that this began as a diary? I read my sister's diary back when. This feels a little like that.
Thanks Robert! I freely admit to enjoying the most "weightless" of Christian music, just as I enjoy balloons and bubbles and Valentines and other epherma (I will write a CRJ post on this soon, I promise!). Not all music is "music for the ages," and there's nothing intrinsically wrong with a happy little tune. We all tend to hum them to ourselves at times, and that's certainly not a sin, or even bad culture. In my mind, if that happy little tune praises our Savior, even better.
:-)
Speaking of weightless little tunes, remember "Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport"? My Dad hated it, back when. Specifically for its unseriousness, he just couldn't stand it. And one afternoon running errands with me, he could NOT get the tune out of his head. It was hilarious. They kept playing it on the radio, I kept tapping the beat, he kept griping, and his inner DJ kept repeating it. If I could time-travel, I'd compose a praise version for him.
He-he.