So I was doing a bit of research for new tunes for The Forefront to play and I ended up listening to “Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me,” the old Batman Forever Theme song. Now I know that for most U2 aficionados, this is not the pinnacle of U2 greatness. However from a musical standpoint, I absolutely love the melody and the development of the song. It has a hook and killin’ chorus. That being said I started watching it and I notice one seen where the animate U2 band is walking down the street while Batman is chasing some villains. The rest of the band gets out of the way but Bono does not make it as he is reading a book. The Villains’ car hits him and he lands on a pile of rubble with the book next to him with the title showing. I couldn’t quite read it so I I thought I would freeze the video to see. Watch the video first and see if you can catch it, then scroll down!

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THE VIDEO

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And the book was…

C. S. Lewis’ “The Screwtape Letters.”
Floored me! Now how many of you U2 elitists will reconsider the song?

The Forefront will be returning to perform at the Canvas 5 Art Show at The Element Church in Tampa on Friday October 16th.

The event begins at 8:00pm and will feature various artists from Florida. The Forefront will be performing from 10:30pm to midnight. The group has been working on a recording to be released in late 2009 and will be feature some of the music from this recording as well as various new original pieces as well as some new arrangements of songs by artists such as Britney Spears, Sufjan Stevens, Passion Pit, and Deftones.

Canvas is in their sthird year and exists as a annual art premier. This is an excerpt of their purpose statement: “Canvas exists simply to promote a community of inspiration. Our idea, our dream, was born to provide a springboard for up and coming artists, in such a way that would benefit both their craft and career.”

Click here for directions!

So one of my best mates from college (always wanted to say that. I need to move to London.) and fellow “Composer in Arms” has built a ukulele out of Legos from a youtube video of coarse. The thing is that Ben’s is much more aesthetically pleasing and thus I post! Plus check out his new site! One of his pieces, which sadly I have not heard yet, entitled “Fractal Genesis” yielded this cross medium art. Ben’s a great composer and you can count on him to push the boundaries of sonic painting. Look for some great music coming from this guy! Also, dig his comments in some of the posts on this site.

For all intents and purposes I have decided to post a very, very brief history of worship in the Western church in order to place our discussion into context. I am no expert (yet), so this seeks to server the purpose of merely setting a basis for our conversations on Worship in the current church.

Worship is most often defined as giving glory and honor to God, and stands as the central act of the Christian faith.The majority of Christian worship is based in the liturgy, a pattern or layout for Christian worship services, which dates back to the early church. This liturgy and the prayers and texts within also follow a progression defined by the Christian Church Calendar, also known as the Liturgical Year. In the early church, worship consisted of prayers and texts, as Christianity was still making its initial spread at this point, many cultures mixed in their own traditions and cultural influences. Around 215 C.E. a church order arose called The Apostolic Tradition, usually attributed to Roman Priest Hippolytus, that prescribed the texts for prayers, ordinations, baptisms,and the Eucharist which eventually gave birth to the Liturgy (White 43). This compounded by the Institutionalization of Christianity following the reign of Constantine I (306-337 C.E.) as well as it being made the offical religion of the empire in 380 C.E.

Vatican Midnight Christmas Mass

In the Roman Catholic tradition, the word Liturgy was synonymous with the Celebration of the Eucharist, which is also referred to as Holy Communion, the commemoration of the Last Supper. Traditionally,  liturgy consists of prayer, hymns, scripture reading, and sacramental worship through communion. This is a blog post, so Wiki says: ” …liturgy is a communal response to the sacred through activity reflecting praise, thanksgiving, supplication, or repentance. Ritualization may be associated with life events such as birth, coming of age, marriage, and death. It thus forms the basis for establishing a relationship with a divine agency, as well as with other participants in the liturgy. Methods of dress, preparation of food, application of cosmetics or other hygienic practices are all considered liturgical activities. Repetitive formal rites, in some ways similar to liturgies, are natural and common in all human activities such as organized sports venues.”

During the Middle Ages, worship was mainly shaped by the Monastic tradition. During this vast expanse of time, roughly 600-1600 C.E., life was rather tumultuous. Life was frequently cut short due to civil turmoil, such as the crusades, Norse invasions, plagues, and other warring factions. Monks basically created a safe haven for the documents, writings, traditions, and beer recipes of the Christian faith. The life of the Monk was to worship and most liturgical changes came from the monastic tradition during this time period. Monks also made great contributions to the universities, worship music (chant), and were also responsible for establishing heavy theological decisions many of which concerned sacramental theology (White 76-79). Unfortunately, and you may not have suspected this because nobody does, these theological decisions led way to things like Spanish Inquisition.

During the Reformation period (1500-1700) Protestantism arose and Christianity spread on a global scale due to colonization, commerce, developing urban areas, and most importantly, the printing press. Enter The Book of Common Prayer! During this time, preaching was elevated to the prominent focus of the worship service. Polyphony exploded this time and skilled composers began writing 4-part harmony since the end of the twelfth century. Martin Luther exalted music and referred to it as one of God’s greatest gifts (White 137). During this time, composers established much of the basis for the entirety of what we know as western music to this day. Much of the mass proper was also established during this time (White).

Since the enlightenment and up to present day has seen the onset of Denominationalism. There are currently 27,647 Protestant divisions recognized by the IRS for tax-exempt purposes in just the United States alone. Though the fundamentals are in place in most cases, there some very distinct differences concerning style, content, and expression. Regular corporate worship is also complemented by other forms of worship, such as individual meditation, prayer and bible study, small group prayer groups and bible studies, and formal ceremonies on special occasions, including weddings, funerals, baptisms, etc. With this also came a movement away from liturgical worship order and with this came variations in style. With the rise of the charismatic movement in the 1960’s came the fusion of popular culture and modern worship within the church; one might even say the fusion of the secular and the sacred to create more culturally digestible musical based worship experience.

Over the course of this discussion we will be exploring what all of this means, how it applies to our current worship traditions, preferences and experiences, and more importantly where christian worship is headed the future. (The Great Emergence?) It is our hope to grow to a greater understanding of Jesus’ words saying that “a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth” (John 4:23).

"The Trinity" Makoto Fujimura 1994

Sources
White, James. F, “A Brief History of Christian Worship,” Abingdon Press; Nashville TN, 1993

www.futonreformer.blogspot.com

www.wikipedia.com

The Institute for Woship Studies

The Calvin Institute of Christian Worship

Courtesy of Matt Wengerd. I don’t usually repost, but holy crap I just had to.

I was reading one of my favorite blogs today, PostClassic and found this video interesting. Could tracking some music to a Sarah Palin interview have an effect on the actual message of the film? At first hearing that question, most would say “of coarse!” We as composers and musicians seek to elicit emotional responses by portraying our experiences, thoughts, and emotions through sound. So when I first saw this video, I thought, “Oh Joy, somebody put some sappy Disney music to the Palin/Couric her interview.” Then when it got to Palin’s response it got a bit more interesting. The music at that point did not resemble the same film style emotional music that I had expected. Instead it is rhythmically derived from her diction and thus does not elicit the same type of emotional response that a more culturally predictable type of music would accomplish. So, does this effect your view of this in a positive or negative way or do we just say…”gimmick!” I took the time to post about it so…comments?

Here’s a gallery of some stuff that TBT Photographer Leigh Armstrong took at the Canvas 4 Show.

This weekend, I will be performing with Bassist Matthew Wengerd at Lakeland’s annual Mayfaire Art Festival. This will be a Duo gig which is one of the most intimate orchestrations for a group. I liken it to listening to a concert of Jazz Two Part Inventions.

Click here to read more.