Hymn 5: “How Hurtful Was the Choice of Lot”

If every Friday a hymn is uploaded, and today is Friday, that must mean that its time to upload another hymn.

We’re on to Hymn #5, with the heading “Lot in Sodom” or, if we use the first line for the title, “How Hurtful Was the Choice of Lot”. As usual, the hymn can be played below here, or downloaded on the side.

The Hymn

The hymn, by John Newton tells the story of Lot and the destruction of Sodom. The verse Newton focuses on Genesis 13:10, which says, “And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw that the Jordan Valley was well watered everywhere like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, in the direction of Zoar. (This was before the Lord m destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)”

Newton again, while writing a hymn primarily focusing on God’s righteous wrath, highlights God’s great mercy on Lot and on us. The hymn also seems to provide a firm, but loving warning about worldliness.

Melody, Arrangement & Production

While probably not appropriate for a congregational setting, I thought that melody seemed to fit the subject matter. Likewise I feel that the arrangement fits with the melody and mood of the hymn as well.

As a bit of an aside, I’d like to note that when I write, I have a tendency to write with the full arrangement in view, or at least with a full arrangement built before the melody. When it comes to careful songwriting, this is a weakness of mine.

Digression over.

The arrangement begins with a pattern of TR-808 samples, a droning bass-pad and an organ, which carry through the entire song. Throughout most of the song, I also abuse a vocoder along with abusing reverb (on the electric guitar especially).

You might be able to tell who some of musical influences are here as well (other than Lindsey Buckingham). On that note, I did mull over adding a powerful gated snare part, but ultimately decided it didn’t fit the mood I was going for with the song.

Continue past the break for the hymn’s text.

Update & Syllables

My apologies for the decrease in posting as of late. I’m currently on a two-week break from Drexel before the 2009-2010 year starts, and haven’t been able to post consistently.

Just to give a quick update on my progress, however, I am currently working on recording both the 5th and 6th hymns. The 5th will be released this Friday (as usual). I’ve been finding it a challenge recently to create unique melodies for the hymns since many of the hymns are written in common meter (which is used quite commonly in this hymnal). You can find out more about what I mean by “common meter” at my go-to source.

My tendency is to often improvise melodies until something works. This is easier for me to do when I have varying meters between songs. However, because many of the hymns share the common meter, my improvised melodies take longer to “work” because they’ve begun to sound similar. My other is issue is that once I have a melody that works, I often forget it by the next verse. I think I’m going to start either writing out my melodies or recording a scratch track on my keyboard for me follow. Either way, I think I need to start being more intentional in my melody-writing.

Any other suggestions?

Hymn 4: “By Faith in Christ I Walk With God”

Hello Friday! Looks like its time to post another hymn…in this case, John Newton’s “By Faith in Christ I Walk with God”. As usual, you can listen below or download on the side.

The Hymn

This hymn seems to follow the same text as the previous hymn, or at the very least is topically similar–that is–walking with God.

The words I sing in the hymn do vary slightly from the original text. I felt that some of the language needed updating. The line that says, “But he’s promised to be my guide” was originally written as “But he vouchsafes to be my guide”. According to Merriam-Webster, to “vouchsafe” is to either “grant or furnish often in a gracious or condescending manner” or “to grant as a privilege or special favor”.

I like that the word vouchsafe describes with great accuracy God’s condescension of us to graciously grant us favor. Unfortunately, I don’t think the word is used too often anymore. I do hope, however, that my “update” doesn’t change Newton’s meaning too much.

Melody, Arrangement & Production

As you may have noticed by now, the recording is very raw…almost like a field recording (…of a guy singing in his bedroom with a guitar…and banging on a box…). I had the melody worked out for some time, and it seemed to come rather easily for this hymn. However, I had some difficulty with arrangement and production. I first tried to record the song as a neurotic, tremolo-filled, finger-picked song. I failed miserably. I then thought it would work as a straight rock song or a shuffle, but that didn’t work either (can you tell I’m a big Lindsey Buckingham fan?). I decided to go totally bare-bones after my mind went here (complete with bouncy piano and vocoder).

The hymn’s original text is once again after the break.

Hymn 3: “O For a Closer Walk With God” Part 2

Well, it seems that today is Friday; therefore William Cowper’s “O For a Closer Walk With God” is now online. As before, you can either listen in the audio player below or download through the link on the sidebar.

Melody

In case you haven’t noticed, I did not keep the original melody of the hymn, which can still be found here (Warning: MIDI). I am, however thinking about coming back to this hymn and creating an arrangement of the original melody.

What I did, however, was take what was a six-verse hymn and turn it into a two-verse song, with verses three and six acting sort-of like a chorus. Melodically, I’m happy, because I feel as if the melody fits the mood of text pretty well.

Apparently, I have some aural “markers” that make this sound like it is a “Jason McGovern song”. When I had a friend listen to the song, he pointed it out me in the second time through the sixth verse when I sing lines like “So shall.” I’m still debating in my mind whether this is a good or bad thing…

Production and Arrangement

Instrumentation was very simple, with two acoustic guitars, a banjo and a shaker. The word I would use to describe the production however is “meh”. For a softer song, there is far too much “pumping”…I overdid the compression. It’s especially obvious when the background vocals enter. However, I am rather fond of the background vocals.

Well, that seems to be all for now. Happy Friday everybody!

Hymn 2: When Adam Fell/Cain and Abel

Happy Friday everybody! It’s time to go through the second hymn, which is called “When Adam Fell He Quickly Lost” or “Cain and Abel” by John Newton. You can stream it below or download it in the sidebar.

The Hymn

This hymn takes the next logical progression topically in relation to the previous hymn. Newton focuses in on Genesis 4:3-8, which says this:

3 In the course of time Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground, 4 and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, 5 but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. 6 The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? 7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.”

8 Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. (English Standard Version)

In the hymn, Newton continues to explain how we are all just like Cain by nature. Yet once again, Newton centers on the hope of the gospel, explaining how Jesus’ death brings his murderers (us) peace with God!

Melody, Arrangement & Production

To be honest, I struggled for quite awhile to come up with a fitting melody for this hymn (I actually had next week’s hymn completed before this one). However, I’m fairly satisfied with the outcome.

I also struggled with the production and arrangement for awhile, since I wasn’t sure where I wanted to take it. As you can hear, the finished product is primarily acoustic guitar and over-compressed drum loops, featuring double-tracked vocals, my office chair (sampled and looped), reverse acoustic guitar, and a rhythm-guitar solo (a contradiction in terms, I know).

Continue past the break for the text of the hymn.