The time is now

Here's the sermon that I shared at St Catherine's Wickford this evening:

The famous passage from Ecclesiastes that we have just heard read (Ecclesiastes 3. 1 - 15) is often understood as meaning that God orders our time and allots particular events to particular times and seasons. However, it can also be understood in terms of one of those phrases like ‘stuff happens’, ‘life happens’ which mean simply that what happens happens. The reality it says is that all our lives will contain enough time for births and deaths, tears and laughter, mourning and dancing, conflict and peace to occur. There is time enough in each of our lifetimes for all these things and it is inevitable that we will experience them.

While it is inevitable that the highs and lows of life will occur over the course of our lives, we don’t know when these things will occur or how long our lives themselves will be, and so inevitability is combined with uncertainty. We often respond to this by trying to impose order either by detailed planning on our own part or by asking that God will order our days. When we do so, we can end up preoccupied with the future, instead of experiencing the present.

As we don’t know how much time we have, it is imperative that we must use the time we currently have wisely. We do so by savouring and appreciating the time we have whether that is: time at home - growing together as a family; time at work – completing tasks and supporting colleagues; time at church - in worship, fellowship and prayer; or time alone with God - praying and reading the Bible.

Van Morrison sings that ‘These are the days, the time is now … There's only here, there's only now.’ Similarly, Simon Small has written, ‘There is always only now. It is the only place that God can be found.’ Each moment we are alive is unique and unrepeatable. As singer-songwriter, Victoria Williams, has put it, ‘This moment will never come again / I know it because it has never been before.’ We live in the present and can only encounter God in this moment, in the here and now, today.

We can only live in the here and now. In Deuteronomy 30. 11 - 20 we read of Moses saying to the Israelites, “today … I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses” and exhorting them to “choose life.” Similarly, in Hebrews 3. 7 - 19, the writer of that letter says, ‘Today, if you hear his [God’s] voice, do not harden your hearts …’ The emphasis of these passages is that now is the moment to encounter God, now is the moment to live.

Ecclesiastes 3.1-11 tells us that there is time, if we use the time that is available to us. All too often we do not take the time we have to be with those that are important to us. All too often we distract ourselves with unimportant tasks and fail to do the things that are truly of importance to us. Ecclesiastes 3.1-11 encourages us to use the time that we have. So, as we often pray during funerals, grant us, Lord, the wisdom and the grace to use aright the time that is left to us on earth. Let us use that time to know others more completely, appreciate them more fully, love them more deeply, and, in that knowing, know ourselves more intimately. For to know and appreciate and love and enjoy each other in that way is heaven.

How much time have we got? We don’t know, so we must use it all wisely. The past is behind us, the future is yet to come, so now is the only moment in which we can live and move and have our being. This means that now is always the moment in which to encounter God, now is always the moment in which to truly come alive and truly live, now is always the moment in which we can give of ourselves in thanks for all that God has given to us. There's only here, there's only now. This moment is unique and unrepeatable. It will never come again because it has never been before. So, these are the days for encounter, for living and loving and for giving. The time is now.

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Van Morrison - These Are The Days.

Van Morrison, Bob Dylan, and the Brand New Day

The New Year brings new opportunities, in this case new opportunities to write. I've recently started writing on faith and music for Deus Ex Musica, with my first piece being a reflection on Taylor Swift's hymnlike lockdown song 'Epiphany'.

In my second piece, which has just been published, I share two songs that explore spiritual and redemptive themes by being songs of immense joy and hope. For Van Morrison in ‘Brand New Day’, joy and hope are found in the transition from living under dark clouds while feeling ‘lost and double crossed’ to the sun beginning to shine so that freedom can be seen, and life is lit with love. In ‘New Morning’, Bob Dylan is to be found fully in that moment where life and love bring happiness.

If you are looking for encouragement, inspiration, joy, and hope now that 2021 has transitioned into 2022, you can’t do better than these two songs with their shared hopeful themes and vibe. To pray that in 2022 the dark clouds roll away, the sun begins to shine, and, in its light, we might be happy just to be alive seems to me to be a great New Year prayer and one that many of us – whether in or out of church - might be willing to pray.

For more on faith and music, see the Rock of Ages website where Delvyn Case of Deus Ex Musica shares his research into Jesus and Popular songs. Additionally, I am co-author of ‘The Secret Chord’, which has been described as an impassioned study of the role of music in cultural life written through the prism of Christian belief.

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Bob Dylan - New Morning.

May the dark clouds roll away

Here's the Newsletter front cover that I've written for St Martin-in-the-Fields this week:

At the beginning of this New Year, I’ve been writing and talking about the ways faith is expressed in and through pop music in all its many guises. I’ve started writing for Deus ex Musica (https://www.deus-ex-musica.com/blog) and in a HeartEdge series have been in conversation with the composer Delvyn Case to share rock and pop music for Lent, Easter, and Christmas.

For over 50 years, pop musicians in all genres have explored aspects of spirituality and the meaning and significance of Jesus in their music. The result is a rich collection of songs that consider important spiritual questions like faith, doubt, and prayer in unique and often provocative ways.

In my second piece for Deus ex Musica, I share two songs that explore spiritual and redemptive themes by being songs of immense joy and hope. For Van Morrison in ‘Brand New Day’, joy and hope are found in the transition from living under dark clouds while feeling ‘lost and double crossed’ to the sun beginning to shine so that freedom can be seen, and life is lit with love. In ‘New Morning’, Bob Dylan is to be found fully in that moment where life and love bring happiness.

If you are looking for encouragement, inspiration, joy, and hope now that 2021 has transitioned into 2022, you can’t do better than these two songs with their shared hopeful themes and vibe. To pray that in 2022 the dark clouds roll away, the sun begins to shine, and, in its light, we might be happy just to be alive seems to me to be a great New Year prayer and one that many of us – whether in or out of church - might be willing to pray.

(Delvyn Case has set up Rock of Ages, a website where he shares his research into Jesus and Popular songs. I am co-author of ‘The Secret Chord’, which has been described as an impassioned study of the role of music in cultural life written through the prism of Christian belief)

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Van Morrison - Brand New Day / Bob Dylan - New Morning

On Taylor Swift's hymnlike lockdown song ‘Epiphany’

The New Year brings new opportunities, in this case new opportunities to write. I've just started writing on faith and music for deus ex musica, with my first piece being a reflection on Taylor Swift's hymnlike lockdown song 'Epiphany':

"In ‘Epiphany’ Swift shows us examples of being with others that are Christ-like in their nature. Whether soldier or medic, both sing ‘With you, I serve / With you, I fall down’. That is the essence of incarnate mission, of being with. The epiphany that soldier and medic seek is, on the one hand, ‘Just one single glimpse of relief’ and, on the other, ‘To make some sense of what you've seen’."

I have a second piece for deus ex musica appearing later this month reflecting on New Year through songs by Bob Dylan and Van Morrison. You'll note that these are posts exploring music and faith through the Church calendar.

I'm currently also sharing music for the Church calendar through HeartEdge together with Delvyn Case of deus ex musica. For over 50 years, pop musicians in all genres have explored the meaning and significance of Jesus in their music. The result is a rich collection of songs that consider important spiritual questions like faith, doubt, and prayer in unique and often provocative ways.

Delvyn and I are, in conversation, mining this rich resource to share rock and pop music for Lent (4 January), Easter (10 January) and Christmas (18 January). Click here to register for these sessions. 

Delvyn Case is a composer, conductor, scholar, performer, concert producer, and educator based in the Boston area who has set up Rock of Ages (https://www.delvyncase.com/jesus), a website where he shares his research into Jesus and Popular songs.

More of my reflection on faith and music can be found in ‘The Secret Chord’ (https://shop.smitf.org/collections/books/products/the-secret-chord), an impassioned study of the role of music in cultural life written through the prism of Christian belief.

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Taylor Swift - Epiphany.

Open to the flow of the Spirit

Here's the reflection I shared in today's Choral Eucharist at St Martin-in-the-Fields:

Some years ago I read a book called ‘Written In My Soul’, a series of interviews with some of the most well-known singer-songwriters from the 1950s onward, and was struck by the extent to which these great artists – Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Van Morrison and others - felt that their songs were given to them in moments of revelation, that their songs were already written and ‘came through them as though radio receivers – without much conscious effort or direction.’

As example, Neil Young said, ‘My best work just comes through me. A lot of times what comes through me is coming from somewhere else.’ Similarly, Dylan has spoken of songs coming through the writer and cited Van Morrison’s ‘Tupelo Honey’ as a song that had always existed and Morrison the vehicle through which it came. In his interview Morrison confirmed that that was the only way he wrote songs; the only way he could write.

This happens to artists too, not just to musicians. I recently reviewed the retrospective of sculptures by Isamu Noguchi which is currently at the Barbican and was fascinated to discover that Noguchi viewed spirituality as a flow and artists as those who ‘come with less obstruction’ to this flow. He viewed inspiration as something flowing from a spiritual source and thought that the way to create great art was to open oneself more and more fully to that flow.

To my mind, these are experiences of the Holy Spirit coming, although it is not always recognised as such. The Spirit comes and makes connections, bringing clarity, making sense. That is not just something for artists, or even for preachers, it is something that can happen for us all and not just in major life-changing moments of revelation but also in minor everyday epiphanies.

It is also an example of what Jesus spoke about in today’s Gospel reading (Luke 21. 12 -19) when he said that his disciples would be called to testify but should make up their minds not to prepare a defence in advance; for he would give words and a wisdom that no opponents would be able to withstand or contradict. Just as the musicians and artists mentioned experienced, we too can open our lives, hearts, minds and spirits to receive inspiration and ideas from the Holy Spirit.

How can we experience a similar openness to the flow of the Holy Spirit in our own lives? Jesus makes two suggestions in the block of teaching to his disciples of which today’s Gospel reading is an extract. First, he says be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life. The cares and trials of life can distract us from a focus on God and his coming kingdom. When they weigh us down by clouding our view, they prevent us from looking to God and receiving from God. Similarly, Isamu Noguchi wrote that to be open to flow, artists try to ‘overcome barriers’ such as ‘habit and convenience and fear and accommodation’ or ‘barriers of the self and what everyone thinks about art’.

It is not that Jesus wants us to ignore the trials and tribulations of life, however. In this block of teaching, he is clear that his disciples will encounter all sorts of troubles in the near future. What he wants for them, however, is that they look for signs of the coming kingdom of God and contemplate those prayerfully because, as they focus their hearts and minds and spirits on those things, they will become attuned to what the Spirit is saying to them in the midst of the troubles they face.

What Jesus was commending to his disciples in unprecedented times where there was no script or instruction manual that could be followed was improvisation. He knew that he was going to leave them (as happened at the Ascension) and that he would then send the Holy Spirit to them (as happened on the Day of Pentecost). The Spirit will teach them everything and remind them of all that Jesus had said to them and the result will be that they will do greater things than him.

To understand this more fully, it’s helpful to reflect further on the artistic practice of improvisation. When actors improvise, it is in the context of a wider story within which they create a new story that fits within the wider story. When jazz musicians improvise, they begin with a musical theme that they develop in new directions before returning to the original theme in order to conclude. In both examples, those improvising need to be immersed in the wider theme or story in order to be able to improvise in ways that make sense within that wider theme or story.

 
As Christians we have become part of the story of how God relates to human beings and his creation by bringing into being the kingdom of God, with the story of Jesus’ life, death, resurrection and ascension being the best expression of that wider story. It is as we immerse ourselves in that story through prayerful contemplation of it, that we allow it to begin shaping our thoughts, ideas, reactions and responses to life and in this way become open to the prompting, movement and flow of the Holy Spirit within.

This is what prayer, bible reading, and other spiritual disciplines are seeking to achieve in and through us. That we begin to inculcate in our lives the life of the kingdom by acting in ways that mirror the activity, attitudes and ethos of that kingdom. In this way we open ourselves to the spirit of that kingdom, the Holy Spirit which animates all those who seek to follow Jesus.

We need to turn away from our natural human inclination to focus on ourselves and our issues and ills, in order to focus primarily on Jesus and the kingdom he brings. As we do so, not only do we increasingly allow the attitudes and actions of the kingdom of God to fill our heart, mind and spirit so that they begin to come readily to mind amongst the opportunities and challenges of daily life, but we also attune ourselves to hearing and responding to the promptings of God’s Spirit as it helps us improvise on the kingdom of God within our lives. In these ways, we too can experience what Jesus taught in today’s Gospel reading, what his disciples experienced in their lives and ministries following the Day of Pentecost when the Spirit first came to them, and what artists of all kinds also experience in terms of inspiration, through an often unconscious but nonetheless spiritual openness to what is beyond them.

Jesus calls us to prayerfully contemplate the signs of his kingdom that we might receive words and a wisdom that no opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. May it be so for each one of us. Amen.

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Van Morrison - Haunts of Ancient Peace.

Top Ten 2019

This is the music, in no particular order, that I've most enjoyed listening to in 2019:

Kiwanuka by Michael Kiwanuka - 'Kiwanuka is a contemplative song cycle intended to be listened to in one extended sitting ... At the core is Kiwanuka’s inner battle between anxiety, self-doubt, spirituality and wisdom, which is then set against racism and rueful glances at the state of the world ... for all its melancholy, Kiwanuka is never downbeat. There are moments – such as the “Time is the healer” gospel choir in I’ve Been Dazed, or hopeful closer Light – when positivity bursts through with such dazzling effect you want to cheer. Kiwanuka is a bold, expansive, heartfelt, sublime album. He’s snuck in at the final whistle, but surely this is among the decade’s best.'

Ghosteen by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - 'Ghosteen drips melody like the permanent rain. It oozes emotion from a heavy heart. It embraces the frailty of the human soul. It’s full of poetry and images that switch sometimes from the time honoured embrace of Elvis and Jesus and the icons and articles of faith whether they are god or rock n roll to a yearning deeply soulful of a very personal heartbreak with a powerful honesty and lyrical nakedness reflecting a genuine darkness and intimate honesty that is a step deeper into the personal and the intimate that is compelling and hypnotic and with an almost ambient atmospheric music to match.'

Thanks for the Dance by Leonard Cohen - Thanks for the Dance 'Opener Happens to the Heart reflects on [Leonard Cohen's] career with trademark humility: “I was always working steady, I never called it art. I got my shit together, meeting Christ and reading Marx” ... Like those of Marvin Gaye and Prince, Cohen’s oeuvre sought to reconcile the spiritual and the sensual, which both feature heavily again ... As the pace slows to a transcendent crawl and backing vocals form a heavenly choir, The Hills mocks his ageing body (“The system is shot / I’m living on pills”) and the stunning The Goal finds him “almost alive” and “settling accounts of the soul”. The last poem he recorded, Listen to the Hummingbird, implores us to find beauty in God and butterflies: “Don’t listen to me.” And, finally, there is a vast, empty silence, and he is gone.'

We Get By by Mavis Staples - 'Over half a century after her voice was at the forefront of America’s civil rights era, Mavis Staples is still crying out for Change. The bluesy backbeat opening track of her 12th studio album confronts recent shootings in the US before she concludes, brilliantly, “What good is freedom if we haven’t learned to be free?”... It’s not hard to guess the subject of such pointed lines such as “Trouble in the land. We can’t trust that man.” Elsewhere, there are songs of loss, need, faith and devotion.'

Hotel Last Resort by Violent Femmes - 'More than three decades on from their 1983 debut, Violent Femmes have dished up another audio delight of front-porch folk ... The band’s juvenile charisma imbues every lyric, from a biblical satire in Adam Was a Man to humble love song Everlasting You, but Paris to Sleep is the heartbreaking hero: “Losing lost love is not worth losing for.” Deeply intuitive with a sprinkle of absurdity, the Violent Femmes’ new recipe is pure joy.'

Jaimie by Brittany Howard - 'Jaime is named after Howard’s sister, who taught her to play piano and died of cancer when she was eight years old – but “the record is not about her”, she said in a recent interview. “It’s about me.” A platter of psychy soul, gospel and funk, with melodies that tap and jitter like Morse code or pour out like silky caramel, Jaime is about tragedy, sexuality, religion, racism and poverty – all things with which Howard is uncomfortably familiar.'

Love & Revelation by Over The Rhine - 'Love & Revelation, an album of loping ballads and probing lyricism that addresses grief, loss and what it means to be an American in a conflicted country. “Let You Down” is a devastating promise to never abandon someone, with the understanding that inevitably they will do just that. “Betting on the Muse,” inspired by the writer Charles Bukowski, wrestles with finding a life’s second act after a person peaks. And “Los Lunas” is a haunting poem about a tearful drive to reckon with saying goodbye ... “The very first words you hear on the project are ‘I cried,'” says Detweiler, citing the opening lyric. “When I told my 87-year-old mother about it, she said that sounds like the Psalms.” But Love & Revelation, and the band itself, is ultimately about restoration and perseverance.'

High as Hope by Florence + the Machine - 'Welch reinforces her magnificent emoting with contemplative, intimate lyrics; the musician beckons people into her interior world with no hesitation and no cushion. “The show was ending, and I had started to crack,” Welch trills to open the album, her voice dominant above barely perceptible chords. “Woke up in Chicago and the sky turned black.” Despite that initial ominous note, High As Hope soon evolves into a treatise on what it means to embrace second chances, while trusting other people—and, more important, yourself. The cello-burnished “100 Years” exhibits a healthier approach to love and faith (“Give me arms to pray with instead of ones that hold too tightly”) while “Grace,” written as a mea culpa to Welch’s younger sister, asks forgiveness for youthful indiscretions.'

Western Skies by Bruce Springsteen - 'Western Stars ... is populated by characters past their best – the title track’s fading actor, reduced to hawking Viagra on TV and retelling his stories for anyone who’ll buy him a drink; Drive Fast’s injured stuntman recalling his youthful recklessness, the failed songwriter of Somewhere North of Nashville and the guy glumly surveying the boarded-up site of an old tryst on Moonlight Motel – all of them ruminating on how things have changed, not just for the worse, but in ways none of them anticipated.'

Three Chords and the Truth by Van Morrison - 'There’s a warmth here that recalls his ’90s highwater marks, Hymns to the Silence and The Healing Game, and connects even farther back in time to 1971’s Tupelo Honey, which balanced the charms of domesticity with R&B raves ... “It’s called ‘the flow,’” Morrison said in a recent interview, detailing his optimal conditions for making music. “I don’t know the mechanics of how that works. I just know when I’m in it.” “The flow” makes Three Chords and The Truth a deeply pleasurable listen, but it’s the moments where Morrison sounds less settled that carry the most weight. The album’s third song, “Dark Night of the Soul,” never wanders as far out as epics like “Madame George” and “Listen to the Lion,” nor does it match spaced-out gloss of his ’80s albums with trumpeter Mark Isham, but it’s gripped by the same existential fervor. Its mellow heat has a lot in common with 1997’s “Rough God Goes Riding,” a gentle midtempo cut with apocalyptic visions hiding in plain sight. Revisiting the 16th-century Christian mystic St. John of the Cross’ poem about the unknowability of God, one he’s sung about a number of times before, Morrison showcases the way his twilight years haven’t dimmed his yearning for growth, his desire for a deeper understanding.'

My previous Top Ten's can be found here - 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013 and 2012.

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Violent Femmes - Everlasting You.

Discover & explore: Time

The music in today's Discover & explore service on the theme of Time at St Stephen Walbrook included: A Prayer of Henry VI, Henry Ley; To Morning, Gabriel Jackson; Even such is time, Bob Chilcott; and Nunc Dimittis, Gustav Holst. The latest group of Choral Scholars of St Martin-in-the-Fields sang for the first time in this service and will do so for the rest of this series:

• Monday 10th October: Talents
• Monday 17th October: Treasure/Gold
• Monday 24th October: Guidance
• Monday 31st October: Promises (All Souls)
• Monday 7th November: Safety
• Monday 14th November: Money
• Monday 21st November: Security

Here is the reflection I shared:

I wonder which of these rewrites of Psalm 23 is true for you: ‘The clock is my dictator, I shall not rest’ or ‘The Lord is my Pace-setter, I shall not rush’? There are moments in our lives when it seems that we have all the time in the world and other moments when it seems that we have no time at all. We can see this visualised in Kim Poor’s painting The Angel of the Hours where time is vanishing from the clock which the angel holds. Is this an indication that the angel wishes to draw us into the timelessness of eternity or is it, an indication of the speed with which we feel our days go by? The comedian Dave Allen famously said: “You clock in to the clock. You clock out to the clock. You come home to the clock. You eat to the clock, you drink to the clock, you go to bed to the clock… You do that for 40 years of your life, you retire, what do they … give you? A clock!”

The reality, of course, is that time is constant and unchanging; it does not actually lengthen or contract. What changes are the choices that we make as to how we use our time and the feelings we have as a result.

The famous passage from Ecclesiastes that we have just heard read (Ecclesiastes 3. 1 - 15) is often understood as meaning that God orders our time and allots particular events to particular times and seasons. However, it can also be understood in terms of one of those phrases like ‘stuff happens’, ‘life happens’ or ‘shit happens’ which mean simply that what happens happens. The reality it says is that all our lives will contain enough time for births and deaths, tears and laughter, mourning and dancing, conflict and peace to occur. There is time enough in each of our lifetimes for all these things and it is inevitable that we will experience them.

While it is inevitable that the highs and lows of life will occur over the course of our lives, we don’t know when these things will occur or how long our lives themselves will be, and so inevitability is combined with uncertainty. We often respond to this by trying to impose order either by detailed planning on our own part or by asking that God will order our days. When we do so, we can end up preoccupied with the future, instead of experiencing the present.

As we don’t know how much time we have, it is imperative that we must use the time we currently have wisely. We do so by savouring and appreciating the time we have whether that is: time at home - growing together as a family; time at work – completing tasks and supporting colleagues; time at church - in worship, fellowship and prayer; or time alone with God - praying and reading the Bible.

Van Morrison sings that ‘These are the days, the time is now … There's only here, there's only now.’ Similarly, Simon Small has written, ‘There is always only now. It is the only place that God can be found.’ Each moment we are alive is unique and unrepeatable. As songwriter, Victoria Williams, has put it, ‘This moment will never come again / I know it because it has never been before.’ We live in the present and can only encounter God in this moment, in the here and now, today.

Equally, we can only give in the here and now. In Deuteronomy 30. 11 - 20 we read of Moses saying to the Israelites, “today … I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses” and exhorting them to “choose life.” Similarly, in Hebrews 3. 7 - 19, the writer of that letter says, ‘Today, if you hear his [God’s] voice, do not harden your hearts …’ The emphasis of these passages is that now is the moment to encounter God, now is the moment to live, now is the moment to give.

This autumn we are encouraging all those who come to St Stephen to reflect on the various ways in which we can use our time, talents and treasure in God’s service. Each of us has time, talents and treasure which could be given out of gratitude and to help this church. In the Stewardship leaflet we have given you today we list a variety of roles with which we need help here at St Stephen, so I encourage you to reflect on those roles and consider whether you could help us in some way.

How much time have we got? We don’t know, so we must use it all wisely. The past is behind us, the future is yet to come, so now is the only moment in which we can live and move and have our being. This means that now is always the moment in which to encounter God, now is always the moment in which to truly come alive and truly live, now is always the moment in which we can give of ourselves in thanks for all that God has given to us. There's only here, there's only now. This moment is unique and unrepeatable. It will never come again because it has never been before. So, these are the days for encounter, for living and for giving. The time is now.

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Gabriel Jackson - To Morning.

James MacMillan and Van Morrison

There is a great selection of music on BBC4 tonight with the premiere at the Proms of James MacMillan's Fourth Symphony, Laura Mvula on Nina Simone, and Van Morrison's Cypress Avenue concerts.

A Guardian review describes MacMillan's Symphony well: 'Donald Runnicles’s second Prom with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra opened with the world premiere of James MacMillan’s Fourth Symphony, written to celebrate Runnicles’s 60th birthday, which fell late last year. MacMillan describes the symphony as “essentially abstract” rather than programmatic, though it also anchors itself within traditions of Scottish sacred music by paying tribute to the Renaissance polyphonist Robert Carver, whose 10-part Missa Dum Sacrum Mysterium – MacMillan sang it while a student – is liberally quoted in the score.

Lasting around 40 minutes, the symphony is effectively a single-movement variant on traditional sonata form built round a cluster of ideas heard in succession at the outset: ritualistic timpani throbs; a fanfare-like chorale; thickening string dissonances; and spiky, aggressive rhythmic figurations from woodwind and piano. Carver’s Mass is then introduced by low solo strings, and the development weaves its way through and over it, the textures alternately clotting and clearing, the mood turning increasingly tense.

Eventually serenity is achieved in a slowly unwinding cello melody accompanied by the exquisite yet eerie sound of overtones on eastern temple bowls. At this point, the emotional trajectory feels complete. But MacMillan pushes on to a big coda, complete with a series of grandiose climaxes that feel curiously forced after all that has gone before. Densely, at times exotically scored, it was grandly played. Runnicles conducted it with great affection and dignity.'

Stephen Johnson writes that: 'MacMillan is Roman Catholic by birth, and today his faith remains central to his life. His early involvement with Marxism was strongly coloured by Latin American Liberation Theology, and its impact can still be sensed in his work today, right up to his latest opera The Sacrifice (2005-06). At the same time MacMillan is keenly aware of the divisions partisan religious thinking can cause. While his works often draw on Catholic liturgy and chant for their basic formal and melodic material, he can also include elements from the Jewish Passover rite in his second string quartet, Why is this night different? (1998), or instrumental colours associated with the Japanese Shinto religion in Symphony No.3: ‘Silence’ (2003).

The result is music that embraces a startling variety of musical styles. Dense, thorny atonal textures can suddenly yield to soaring tonal melodies, reminiscent of Wagner (another crucial early influence). Jagged, complex, muscular rhythms may similarly melt into free-floating improvisatory lyricism, or fine-spun polyphony recalling Bach and the renaissance church composers. Thrillingly garish or abrasive colours sit alongside delicate, fragile patterns or velvety warmth. Hymn tunes, folk laments and brash marches float as conflicting layers in vibrant musical tapestries. One may be reminded of the teeming orchestral kaleidoscopes of the pioneering American composer Charles Ives, or the Russian ‘polystylist’ Alfred Schnittke.

What draws all this together is MacMillan’s deeply ingrained feeling for musical storytelling. Today grand narratives are often derided as outdated, irrelevant. MacMillan however has proved through works like Isobel Gowdie, Veni, Veni, Emmanuel and the massive orchestral trilogy Triduum (1995-97) that this kind of spiritual journey in music, as exemplified by Beethoven in his symphonies and Bach in his great ‘Passions’, can be recreated in terms which speak both to sophisticated musical intelligences and ordinary music lovers.'

Van Morrison recently returned to Cyprus Avenue, the quiet, leafy street in east Belfast that inspired two songs on one of the greatest albums of all time (Astral Weeks), to perform two concerts on his 70th birthday.

This was particularly appropriate for Morrison as a key theme in his work is the importance of memory. As he wrote in 'Got To Go Back' - a song in which he recalls gazing out of his classroom window in Orangefield and claims that the love he carries within from his childhood meditations remains within him and carries him through - 'we've got to go back ... for the healing to go on with the dreaming.'

Earlier in the year, the March edition of Uncut explored the making of many of Van Morrison's best albums from Astral Weeks (Lewis Merenstein - '... it was immediately clear to me that he was being born again') to Back on Top (Walter Samuel - 'I'm not sure how he does it... it just comes out of him. It just happens'). From the musicians who played on these albums there is much talk about 'looking for the spark,' 'channelling,' 'transcendental telepathy,' and 'intuitive communication'. When he channelled or connected with the spark Morrison set everyone else on fire so that the atmosphere was truly transcendental.

In his interview Morrison described this as 'creating space.' The key to the creation of space - the stretching out of time - is listening, watching and absorbing. Most musicians, he says, don't understand this. They 'might be great technically; but they don't have the feeling;' the ability to listen in order to be in the same space and have 'a collective experience,' The phrase he regularly used for the times 'when he felt it was working' was, 'I think it's all coming together.'

My co-authored book with Peter Banks, The Secret Chord, is essentially an extended exploration of this experience common to artists and musicians, which is often described in spiritual terms, of things coming together - gelling, coalescing - into something greater than the sum of its parts.

Jef Labes, a longtime associate of Morrison, notes that: 'He once said to me that he sees all his work as variations on one piece of music that he channels. He doesn't sit down and work on songs, he gets a rush of energy. He'll grab a guitar and start playing, switch on a recording device, and whatever comes out, he'll write down. It arrives as almost a complete work ... when that goes away he's sad and exhausted, and when it's there, when he's visited by the spirit, he's compelled to get it out. It's scary. He has no idea where it comes from.'

At their best Morrison's songs blend memories, visions, literature and musical genres (blues, folk, jazz, gospel, r&b, soul and pop) in order to take us to a point of silence, a moment of communion, a spiritual core. He has spoken about this in terms of switching off what's referred to as the constant voice: "That's what meditation is supposed to do - turn off the constant voice, all them thoughts you have, y'know, the refrigerator hum, did I leave the lights on? Or, is the dog crossing the street? What about my tax problems? When you switch off all that, that's what I mean by transcendence."

In Summertime in England, for example, the orchestration and vocalising circles the song's core, ebbing and flowing with the movement between ecstasy and silence. Lyrically, we are on a journey from the Lake District through Bristol to Glastonbury picking up on the literary and spiritual references as we travel. We have a companion who could be a human partner or, to quote T S Eliot, "the third who walks always beside you". Our journey ends, or begins afresh, in the Church of St John with a revelation of Jesus as the one who underpins spiritual life. "Can you feel the light in England?" Morrison asks. Have you felt it in Wordsworth, Coleridge, Eliot, Yeats? Have you felt it in memory, in landscape, in church, in drug induced visions, in the gospel music coming through the ether? And, as the music stills and the vocalising pauses, he asks us to touch the silence, the core of revelation. Don't touch, don't question, don't disturb, he pleads, just experience;

"It ain't why, why, why, why, why
It just is."

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Van Morrison - Cypress Avenue.

Discover & explore: Home

In 1992 the World Council of Churches published a short but influential book by Raymond Fung called ‘The Isaiah Vision’. In this book Fung set out a simple but profound agenda for social action based on the vision in Isaiah 65 for God’s new heaven and earth. In this vision: infants survive into adulthood with good health; older people live in dignity; there is decent housing for everyone; work is there for all who want it; and different kinds of people live together in harmony.

The main features of this vision are good health and long productive lives, shelter, food, work that benefits the worker, and peace. In the Isaiah vision for the world no one would have power over another in such a way that the less powerful are deprived. It is a vision of a settled, creative and fulfilled community and, as such, one where people are released from struggle to focus better on their spiritual lives and their devotion to God.

Van Morrison conjures up a similar vision of home in his song ‘On Hyndford Street’ which recalls in idyllic form his childhood in Belfast. His song combines a sense of familiar locales, people and activities with a sense of the wider world both through trips outside the City and through the influences of radio and reading. All of this is encompassed by a sense of God’s presence, so that both his dreaming and his living is ‘in God’.

Such visions of Home began to be realised in some measure in the Victorian period, which documented in the re-hang of the Guildhall Art Gallery’s collection. The beginning of the nineteenth century saw the separation of work from the home. The Arts and Crafts Movement and the Aesthetic Movement created beautiful objects which enabled homes to change from utilitarian spaces to comfortable and tastefully decorated refuges for families.

While these Victorian movements often catered primarily for the cultured and wealthy, Fung’s understanding of the Isaiah Vision is that it is a “minimum social vision” which encompasses the whole of society and “around which people of all faiths and none can unite.” Fung says that, “If the Isaiah Agenda is a Christian Agenda it is no less a Jewish, Islamic and a secular Agenda… Christians rejoice over the fact of our non-monopoly.” Therefore he calls the church to partner with “everybody and every organization which has anything to do with the Isaiah Agenda.” The book therefore recommends partnering with other groups in the community who would share this same vision, working with them for the transformation of society and then inviting them to get to know God for themselves.

Fung notes that the church engages in the Isaiah Agenda, not just through activities in the congregation but in “the involvement of its members — from where they are: in their homes, in their village or neighbourhood, in the market place, in schools, community organizations, trade unions, cooperatives … in short through their whole life and all their activities … Once it is recognized that the witness of the congregation takes place outside the four walls of its buildings and is carried out mainly by the laity in their homes, their neighbourhood, and the market place, the role of the clergy and the elders becomes clear. Their role is to enable the laity to do a better job.”

“A central focus of modern mission theology is that all our mission is God’s mission, the missio Dei. God’s love overflows into the creation, sustaining and renewing our world, patiently remaking and restoring the mess we have made of our beautiful planet. God calls us to help with this act of love and not to hinder it by destroying God’s reconciling action. The missio Dei includes human beings in this act of love, calling us to help create a world in which God’s vision and purpose for human beings can be realised right now. For the prophets of the Hebrew Scriptures the sinfulness and destructiveness of human behaviour means that world is exceptionally difficult to bring into being and to keep in being, but it also makes means that the prophetic vocation is to articulate what God’s future would be like.”

This is what Isaiah 65 and Raymond Fung have done. To what extent do we share this vision of new homes in a new heaven and new earth where: infants survive into adulthood with good health; older people live in dignity; there is decent housing for everyone; work is there for all who want it; and different kinds of people live together in harmony? If we do share this vision, to what extent are we prepared to work towards it here and now?

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Anton Bruckner - Locus Iste.

Who Is The Sender?

In the latest edition of Uncut several musicians speak about the spirituality of music.

One of the feature articles explores the making of many of Van Morrison's best albums from Astral Weeks (Lewis Merenstein - '... it was immediately clear to me that he was being born again') to Back on Top (Walter Samuel - 'I'm not sure how he does it... it just comes out of him. It just happens'). From the musicians who played on these albums there is much talk about 'looking for the spark,' 'channelling,' 'transcendental telepathy,' and 'intuitive communication'. When he channelled or connected with the spark Morrison set everyone else on fire so that the atmosphere was truly transcendental.

In his interview Morrison describes this as 'creating space.' The key to the creation of space - the stretching out of time - is listening, watching and absorbing. Most musicians, he says, don't understand this. They 'might be great technically; but they don't have the feeling;' the ability to listen in order to be in the same space and have 'a collective experience,' The phrase he regularly used for the times 'when he felt it was working' was, 'I think it's all coming together.'

My co-authored book with Peter Banks, The Secret Chord, is essentially an extended exploration of this experience common to artists and musicians, which is often described in spiritual terms, of things coming together - gelling, coalescing - into something greater than the sum of its parts.

Jef Labes, a longtime associate of Morrison, notes that:

'He once said to me that he sees all his work as variations on one piece of music that he channels. He doesn't sit down and work on songs, he gets a rush of energy. He'll grab a guitar and start playing, switch on a recording device, and whatever comes out, he'll write down. It arrives as almost a complete work ... when that goes away he's sad and exhausted, and when it's there, when he's visited by the spirit, he's compelled to get it out. It's scary. He has no idea where it comes from.'

The song 'Who Is The Sender?' on Bill Fay's latest album is about this same phenomenon, which Fay sees as 'songfinding' rather than songwriting:

'Ask Bill Fay about his relationship with his instrument and he says something revealing, not "Ever since I learnt to play the piano", but "Ever since the piano taught me..."

What the piano taught him was how to connect to one of the great joys of his life. "Music gives," he says. And he is a grateful receiver. But, it makes him wonder, "Who is the sender?" ...

joy and sadness are indeed deep in this material, which Bill describes as "alternative gospel". Though it clearly stems from his belief, he doesn't seek to proselytise or convert anybody, but just hopes to share the concerns he puts into the words and the feelings that he receives from the music: 

"Goodness, beauty, comfort. If something gives in the world, that's a good thing, isn't it? Maybe that's what music wants to do."'

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Van Morrison - Listen To The Lion.

Music in Lent: Search vs stasis

On Monday 31st March I will be talking at Chelmsford Cathedral about Van Morrison's 'Summertime in England' as part of their Lent Course. In this series five different speakers are talking about different pieces of music that inspire them in their Christian faith. The five meetings all begin at 7.30pm in the North Transept of the Cathedral, and will last around 90 minutes, ending with Compline. Everyone is welcome and there is no need to book in advance.

What I'll be saying will draw on one of the themes (Search vs Stasis) covered in 'The Secret Chord', my book, co-authored with Peter Banks, which is an impassioned study of the role of music in cultural life, written through the prism of Christian belief.

I'll be presenting some of the same material in the Going Deeper Evening Service at St John's Seven Kings tomorrow (6.30pm) and at St Laurence's Barkingside for their Listening to God slot on Sunday 6th April at 6.30pm.

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Van Morrison - Summertime In England.

Lent: Music that inspires Christian faith

I've been invited to contribute to the Lent Course at Chelmsford Cathedral this year. On Monday evenings in Lent five different speakers will be talking about different pieces of music that inspire them in their Christian faith. The five meetings all begin at 7.30pm in the North Transept of the Cathedral, and will last around 90 minutes, ending with Compline. Everyone is welcome and there is no need to book in advance.

Dates and details of the speakers and their pieces of music are as follows:

• 10 March: James Davy, Organist & Master of the Choristers at Chelmsford Cathedral - Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610, Magnificat.
• 17 March: The Ven Annette Cooper, Archdeacon of Colchester - Bernadette Farrell’s setting of Psalm 139, O God, you search me and you know me.
• 24 March: The Revd Kate Moore, Associate Priest at Chelmsford Cathedral - Pergolesi, Stabat Mater.
• 31 March: The Revd Jonathan Evens, Vicar of St John’s Seven Kings & Secretary of commission4mission - Summertime in England by Van Morrison, from the album Common One.
• 7 April: The Very Revd Nicholas Henshall, Dean of Chelmsford - Mahler’s Ninth Symphony, the fourth movement.

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Van Morrison - Haunts Of Ancient Peace.

A rough guide to Christian Art

Years ago I discussed at some length with a publisher the possibility of an A-Z directory of the Christian contribution to twentieth century Arts; in essence a Rough Guide to modern ‘Christian’ Art.

This was a hugely optimistic suggestion for two reasons. Firstly, there is no consensus as to what constitutes ‘Christian’ Art in the modern and contemporary periods and no consensus on whether there is any value or possibility of defining ‘Christian’ Art. Secondly, the Christian contribution to the Arts of this period is broad and significant but is far from having been comprehensively documented. Dealing with both issues in a directory would have been a challenging undertaking.

The A-Z never happened but this blog has become a place to post some of the material that could have been included in it - particularly with my ‘Airbrushed from art history’ series but also in a number of posts on literature and music. More recently, my co-authored book The Secret Chord has explored aspects of the interplay between faith and music (and the Arts, more broadly).

To explore this contribution is important because the story of modern and contemporary Arts is often told primarily as a secular story. To redress this imbalance has significance in: encouraging support for those who explore aspects of Christianity in and through the Arts; providing role models for emerging artists who are Christians; and enabling appreciation of the nourishment and haunting which can be had by acknowledging the contribution which Christianity has made to the Arts. 

Periodically I have opportunities to speak about this issues and ideas as with my talk about the work of commission4mission given last Saturday to the Friends of Chelmsford Cathedral. In my talk I used commission4mission’s name and aim to explore understandings of art in mission, perspectives on commissioning and debates about definitions of Christian Art. Within this framework I shared the following summary of the Christian contribution to modern and contemporary visual art (which is explored in expanded form in ‘Airbrushed from art history’):

Roman Catholic artists played prominent roles in Post-Impressionism, the Nabis, Fauvism and Cubism. Jacques Maritain’s Art and Scholasticism and the Thomistic Study Circles which met at his home influenced many artists. Expressionist artists frequently painted Biblical narratives while Futurism developed a strong strand of sacred art. Abstraction was viewed by many as the best means available to artists for depicting an unseen realm. Suprematism and Abstract Expressionism were both influenced by the underlying principle of icons. Dominican Friars and Anglican clergy alike called for the great artists and architects of their day to design and decorate their churches. A revival of traditional icon painting occurred with centres in Greece, Russia, Europe and Scandinavia. Visionary artists abounded within Folk Art while many mainstream visionary artists also used Christian themes and imagery. In response to the growth of Christian Art on the Asian continent, the Asian Christian Art Association was founded in 1978 to encourage the visual arts in Asian churches. Australia encouraged contemporary religious art through the establishment of the Blake Prize in 1951. Polish Art in the 1980s was marked by a profound interest in the whole question of the sacrum in art and many exhibitions were held in Roman Catholic churches. There has also been extensive use of Christian imagery by BritArt artists with such iconography and narrative often used as a frame for the artists’ critiques of contemporary life including politics and culture.

In March I will be one of five speakers inputting to the Lent Course at Chelmsford Cathedral on Christianity and music. I am the only one of the five to be speaking about popular music. By focusing specifically on Van Morrison’s ‘Summertime in England,’ I will explore our understandings of movement and stasis in music (themes also explored in The Secret Chord) as well as touching on the spirituality of folk music.

As background and as an equivalent to the visual arts summary above, here is an outline summary of the Christian contribution to rock and pop music:   

Rock ‘n’ Roll merged blues (with its spiritual strand) and Country music (tapping its white gospel) while Soul music adapted much of its sound and content from Black Gospel. For both, their gestures and movements were adopted from Pentecostalism. Some, such as Jerry Lee Lewis and Sam Cooke, felt guilt at secularising Gospel while others, like Johnny Cash, arrived at a hard earned integration of faith and music. All experienced opposition from a Church angry at its songs and influence being appropriated for secular ends. This opposition fed a narrative that, on both sides, equated rock and pop with hedonism and rebellion. The born again Cliff Richard was often perceived (both positively and negatively) as the only alternative. Within this context the Biblical language and imagery of Bob Dylan and Van Morrison was largely overlooked, although Dylan spoke eloquently about the influence of scripture within the tradition of American music on which he drew. 

With the majority of Soul stars having begun singing in Church, many of the most effective integrations of faith and music were found there with Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On and the Gospel-folk of the Staple Singers being among the best and most socially committed examples. Gospel featured directly with Billy Preston, Edwin Hawkins Singers and Aretha Franklin’s gospel albums. Mainstream use of Christian themes or imagery in rock were initially either unsustained (e.g. Blind Faith’s ‘Presence of the Lord’ and Norman Greenbaum’s ‘Spirit in the Sky’) or obscure (e.g. C.O.B.’s Moyshe McStiff and the Tartan Lancers of the Sacred Heart and Bill Fay’s Time of the Last Persecution). 

However, this changed in three ways. First, the Church began to appropriate rock and pop to speak explicitly about Christian faith. This led to the emergence of a new genre, Contemporary Christian Music (CCM), with interaction between CCM and the mainstream. Mainstream artists such as Philip Bailey, David Grant, Al Green, Larry Norman and Candi Staton developed CCM careers while artists originally within CCM such as Delirious?, Martyn Joseph, Julie Miller, Leslie (Sam) Phillips, Sixpence None The Richer and Switchfoot achieved varying levels of mainstream exposure and success. Second, the biblical language and imagery of stars like Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Bruce Springsteen began to be understood and appreciated (helped to varying degrees by explicitly ‘Christian’ periods in the work of Dylan and Van the Man). Third, musicians such as After The Fire, The Alarm, T. Bone Burnett, The Call, Peter Case, Bruce Cockburn, Extreme, Galactic Cowboys, Innocence Mission, Kings X, Maria McKee, Buddy & Julie Miller, Moby, Over The Rhine, Ricky Ross, 16 Horsepower, U2, The Violent Femmes, Gillian Welch, Jim White, and Victoria Williams rather than singing about the light (of Christ) instead sang about the world which they saw through the light (of Christ). As rock and pop fragmented into a myriad of genres, this approach to the expression of faith continues in the work of Eric Bibb, Blessid Union of Souls, Creed, Brandon Flowers, Good Charlotte, Ben Harper, Michael Kiwanuka, Ed Kowalczyk, Lifehouse, Live, Low, Neal Morse, Mumford and Sons, Robert Randolph and the Family Band, Scott Stapp, Social Distortion, and Woven Hand.

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The Brothers and Sisters Gospel Choir - All Along The Watchtower.

Anne Creasey: A mystic's métier

Anne Creasey is a multi-talented artist who has worked with great skill in a variety of media including textiles. She has, I believe, recently found her true mystical métier in a new style of painting which is expressive of the interconnectivity of reality. Siloam (above) is an early example of her new style which can be seen, along with a second new work, in commission4mission's Inspire: art as spiritual exploration exhibition at St Stephen Walbrook from 18th - 29th November.

I visited Anne today to collect her work for the exhibition. Although brief today, visiting Anne is always a source of real pleasure and insight because of her open discussion of her spiritual experience. She speaks of being released into this new phase of her work. There is a sense of flow within these new compositions as in her ability to realize the linkages within these interconnected images. As Van Morrison once sang, she ventures in the slipstream between the viaducts of her dream.

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John Tavener - Ikon Of Light. 

Pacing the Cage: Bruce Cockburn

Harper Collins are to publish Pacing the Cage: A Memoir by Bruce Cockburn. Their publicity states:

 

"Since 1970, with over 30 albums and numerous awards to his credit, Bruce Cockburn has earned high praise as an exceptional songwriter and pioneering guitarist, whose career has been shaped by politics, protest, romance, and spiritual discovery. His remarkable journey has seen him embrace folk, jazz, blues, rock, and worldbeat styles while travelling to such far-flung places as Guatemala, Mozambique, Afghanistan, and Nepal, and writing memorable songs about his ever-expanding world of wonders. Having been asked to write his memoir many times over the years, now is the moment when he will open up about his Christian convictions, his personal relationships, and the social and political activism that has both invigorated and enraged his fans over the years.

Born in 1945 in Ottawa, Ontario, Bruce Cockburn began his solo career with a self-titled album in 1970. Cockburn’s ever expanding repertoire of musical styles and skillfully crafted lyrics have been covered by such

artists as Jerry Garcia, Chet Atkins, Barenaked Ladies, Jimmy Buffett, and K.D. Lang. His guitar playing, both
acoustic and electric, has placed him in the company of the world’s top instrumentalists.Cockburn remains deeply respected for his activism on issues from native rights and land mines to the environment and Third World debt, working for organizations such as Oxfam, Amnesty International, Doctors Without Borders, Friends of the Earth, and USC Canada."

Rated “rock’s last great obscurity” by Melody Maker Cockburn has quietly made a living as a singer/songwriter since 1970 and his self-titled debut while never going all out for fame and fortune. As literate a guitarist as he is a lyricist he fuses sparklingly complex jazz/rock rhythms with metaphor loaded lyricism, as often spoken as sung – “sometimes things don’t easily reduce to rhyming couplets”. Forty plus years of consistent, intelligent exploration of the personal, political and spiritual, often within the same song, is no mean achievement. When combined with both an honesty about his own relationship and faith frailties and a willingness to campaign with the likes of Oxfam raging against US and IMF oppression in the two-thirds world, you have to give the man respect.

 

Dancing in the Dragon’s Jaws showcased the mysticism which, as Vox said, he seems to understand better than anyone not named Van Morrison. His Christian faith developed from an experience of God’s presence during his marriage ceremony and was given wings through the writings of C.S. Lewis and Charles Williams. Creation Dream opens this album and is worth quoting both as a wonderful depiction of God at his creation-work but also as a picture of what the Christian artist aims to imitate:

 

            Centred on silence, counting on nothing,

            I saw you standing on the sea.

            And everything was dark except for

            Sparks the wind struck from your hair.

            Sparks that turned to wings around you,

            Angel voices mixed with sea bird’s cries.

            Fields of motion surging outwards,

            Questions that contain their own replies.

 

            You were dancing, I saw you dancing,

            Throwing your arms towards the sky.

            Fingers opening like flares,

            Stars were shooting everywhere.

            Lines of power bursting outwards

            Along the channels of your song.

            Mercury waves flash under your feet,

            Shots of silver in the shell-pink dawn.

 

World of Wonders kicks off, by contrast, with the “you don’t really give a flying fuck about the people in misery” of IMF. Here Cockburn marries the energy of the music with the anger of the lyric, something he failed to do on the earlier Stealing Fire where he flirted with Dire Straits territory while unleashing the most un-Knopfler-like sentiments – “If I had a rocket launcher I’d make somebody pay” (Rocket Launcher). He hymned the absence of both God (Lily of the Midnight Sky) and his lover (See how I miss you) while celebrating the dawn of revolution (Santiago Dawn) and tropical partying (Down here tonight).

 

Nothing But A Burning Light was the first of two T-Bone Burnett produced albums, with Dart to the Heart being the other. Michael Been and Sam Phillips also contributed. The burning light of the album’s title is the Bible, an image taken from Blind Willie Johnson’s Soul of a Man which Cockburn covers here. Cockburn’s work is shot through by the illumination of that burning light. In a world where there are “Not many answers to be found” and where “We’re faced with mysteries profound” human love is one of the best of those mysteries (One of the Best Ones) while the very best is the redemption that “rips through the surface of time/In the cry of a tiny babe” (Cry of a Tiny Babe).

 

In 1992 in a song, Closer to the Light, written following the death of Mark Heard, Cockburn wrote the line - "There you go/Swimming deeper into mystery” – which seems to sum up the direction in which Cockburn’s work has been heading over the past forty plus years.
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Bruce Cockburn - Pacing The Cage.