However, as I’ve been improving in the craft, I’ve watched the noble art of the craft plummet into the depths of despair.  Perhaps I’m being a bit dramatic here, but often, when I’m reading or hearing many of today’s lyrics, I find myself groaning over the cheesiness of the content and the hollow and paltry result of the lack of craft.

OK, you say, give it to us, Pete.  Do your thing.

So glad you asked…

Rhyming
I come from the world of the theater where rhymes had to rhyme (“shoe” does not rhyme with “blues” nor does “time” rhyme with “fine”) and if your rhymes ‘cheated’, you would be severely reprimanded by the critics.  I studied under the tutelage of Alan Lerner, one of our masters, (Brigadoon, My Fair Lady, Camelot) and he wrote perfect lyrics that rhymed, scanned to perfection and are still today treasures of the American Songbook (If Ever I Would Leave You, The Heather On The Hill, I’ve Grown Accustomed To Her Face, and on and on).  He would work, not hours, but weeks on one song lyric and, when presented, it would be a flawless piece of masterwork.

He turned me on to the one and only professional’s rhyming dictionary – the only one I’ve ever used and still highly recommend – The Clement Wood Rhyming Dictionary.  None others come close.  I keep one in each room of my apartment and hardly ever leave home without it.  With it, the world of rhymes is literally at your fingertips and every possibility is represented within its pages.  Short of the Bible, it’s my favorite book.

Rap music today has simply slaughtered the craft of rhyming.  I am in no way against Rap music.  It is a completely legitimate style of music representing the urban culture of today, but in it, most rappers rhyme with no regard to craft using any word in the vicinity of the vowel sound.  For instance not only can ‘street’ rhyme with ‘beep’, but it can also rhyme with ‘ease’ or even with ‘help’ because ‘help’ has an ‘e’ in it.

To my ear that’s a point off – any of those kind of false rhymes.  Ultimately they disappoint the listener’s ear and prove unsatisfactory.  The trouble is that we now have a couple of generations so used to bad or cheated rhymes that they don’t even know what to listen for in the first place.  And so it strikes me that the powerful tonality of rhyming is in jeopardy of being lost for generations.  The result of this ignorance of style is that bad rhyming has now spread into pop music and even the theater where it is unfortunately now accepted and used often without criticism.

Call me ancient and stuffy, but it’s said that the decline of a civilization is often first seen in the decline of its language.  Look around you, America, it’s like happnin’, you like know what I mean?

I’m a total hard-ass with my students when it comes to perfect rhyming.  Cheat once and you get a point off.  Get 5 points off and you have a mediocre song.  Get 10 points off and you better start over and get to work.

Scanning and Jamming
I spoke to a ‘professional’ lyricist the other day and mentioned that in her second verse her lyrics did not scan.  She said back to me, “What’s scan?”  I stood dumbfounded.  This is like saying to a musician, “ You’ve got a mistake in the third measure” and them saying back to you, “What’s a measure?”

The most powerful tool in popular music is repetition.  It’s how we learn a song and it’s why good songs are ‘sticky’ or considered to be memorable melodies – because they scan – each time you hear the hook it’s the same notes in the same rhythms scanning (repeating) perfectly.  Each time you hear the verse, the melody is exactly the same even though the words are different. Change a word or jam two words into the line where there should only be one, jam two or three syllables in where there should only be one and you lose the scan, you lose the repetition of the melody and confuse the ear of the listener.

So much of the music I hear today is ruined by lazy lyricists jamming words into melodies and fouling up the repetitions so that the listener’s ear is confused and the otherwise good melodies are ruined.  In perfect scanning the repeated melodies are perfectly repeated even though the words change keeping the integrity of the music.  Even the accents of the words – 1^st syllable/2^nd syllable, etc are honored in the repetition.  So much of what I hear today is junked up by amateur approaches where scanning is ignored and melodies are slaughtered.

On top of that riffing and licks are also confusing the listener’s ears all in the name of two generations of vocalists trying to be as brilliant as Mariah Carey.  I like Mariah Carey, but she singlehandedly destroyed melody for a couple of generations as vocal wannabe copiers trying to sing like her and forcing a twist and turn onto every note – a severe defect that I call being “lick happy” — turned melodies into a series of riffs.  Oh, get me my soapbox.  I’m feelin’ a rant comin’ on!

Enough.  I hope you get the point.  Bottom line: Proper scanning is crucial to repetition.  Repetition is crucial to commercial music.  Without each, music is just not memorable and becomes lost in the wash of mediocrity taking over our industry.

Ira Gershwin, Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Lerner, Lennon & McCartney, Billy Joel, Michael Jackson, Alan & Marilyn Bergman, Lorenz Hart, Irving Berlin, Johnny Mercer, Cole Porter – all followed the great traditions of true rhyming and perfect scanning.  It’s why their songs are still sung, played and remembered today.  These are the masters.  Don’t let their discoveries and work slide away in the dissolving of our language into mediocrity.

John Lennon's Original - "Imagine"

Disneyfied Retreads
And then there’s the content…  How many more “I want you, I need you, I love you” songs must we wade through?  Don’t we, as a people, have anything better to think and sing about?  When’s the last time you heard a great song with a new fresh lyric that wasn’t a retread of teenage discovery?  Certainly love is a most powerful subject to write about, but can’t we yet find something new and interesting to write about that has a new twist, a new insight?

Every time a new animated film comes out I groan at the feeble attempts of the omnipresent love song in the score.  They all sound as if they were written by a room full of people trying to write a hit instead of a one talented pro coming up with an original idea.

R&B music, long the bastion of solid lyrical writing especially in the Motown era, has now sunk to pandering the teenage mind consumed with sexual encounter.  I listen to some of these blatant sexual references and wonder if any of the writers of today ever listened to “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes” or “Baby It’s Cold Outside” or “My Funny Valentine” or even “I’ve Got You Under My Skin”.  Here were songs that smoldered in their sensuality without clobbering you over the head with blatancy.

Art evokes.  Commercialism steamrolls.  I’d rather a song tickle my fancy than slap my face.  I prefer discovering a rich dramatic moment rather than being deafened by the obvious.  Give me a song that stimulates my brain and softens my heart and I’ll carry that song with me in the back of my mind for the rest of my life.  After all, isn’t that why we write ‘em?

Summary
Every age has its mediocrity.  “Flat-Foot Floosey With A Floy Floy” had its moment in the sun in the 30s but not many of us go around singing it today.  But decades are not remembered for their mediocrity.  They are remembered for their ground-breaking flashes of brilliance.  What will this music generation sing to their kids?  “I Want Your Sex”?

My generation sings John Lennon’s “Imagine” and Paul Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, Seals and Croft’s “Summer Breeze” and Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” and The Beatles’ “Let It Be”.  I could go on… and I will – Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish” and Earth, Wind and Fire’s “September”, Billy Joel’s…

Even More Inspiration

• Wonderful
• Even Now
• Gabriel, Come Blow Your Horn
• My Body
• You Must Remember This!
• Love Is The Reason For Living

Previous to this month I had only ever written one Christmas song – a song recorded by the Jenny Burton Experience called Christmas In My Soul.  They say, in the music business, that the month of June is the month to write and begin one’s Christmas album, the preparation of such to be around 5-6 months.  Who can write Christmas songs in June?  What a silly notion.

This year the Missus has come up short in her search for the perfect Christmas song for her Christmas Day performance in church.  She had decided to employ a terrific Boston harpist and together with her organist, Bryan Ashley, keep it small and delicate in accordance with the spiritual implications of the morning.  Last year she used a brass quintet plus the church four manual pipe organ and blew the roof off, so this year she wanted to do something completely different.

But no song came to mind to fit the criteria.

While watching her go through her turmoil, I happened to mention one day several weeks ago that perhaps I could write one for her.  This was said in a fit of compassion for her plight while I was in the middle of the mad dash of the final throes of my own CD, Goin’ Home.

Seeing a light at the end of the tunnel, she grabbed at the offer and signed me up.  At first I thought, “Oh no, what have I gotten myself into?”  Where would I ever find the time to do this?

Then she came up with the notion that not only should I write it and arrange it for harp and keyboard, but that we should also record it and sell it for Christmas.  Then she came up with the idea that we should also do the sheet music for it and sell that too and let others use it in their churches for their Christmas services as well.  Then she came up with the idea that as long as we were going to do all that, she may as well use the song for her musical Christmas Presence lecture that she does around the country with lecturer, Chet Manchester.  This only moved the deadline for all this up by about 2 ½ weeks!  “Egads,” thought I.  “What have I done?”

So I did it.  In the next 3 days Julia will record the lead vocal to the orchestrated track, Craig Wagner, the designer, will design all the packaging, I’ll mix the song, the WFM staff will manufacture about a hundred singles to start with and by Thursday we’ll be selling this song that will receive it’s first performance in St. Louis on this coming Sunday.  Whew!

Will we make it?  With God’s help, we shall.

It’s a new world.  Things like this can be accomplished in a matter of weeks, a matter of days now.  The power of computers – the power of Mind.

The writing was fun and accomplished in a matter of 48 hours.  Once that was done, I knew we’d be OK.  The rest was just a matter of getting’ it done.

Julia directed me to the Bible for my text and chose the tried and true – think Handel.

“And his name shall be called Wonderful,
Counsellor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace
Yes his name shall be called Wonderful”

But I also wanted to shed some new light on the subject – not just rehash George Fredric.  Julia suggested that I combine the Bible text with some of the text of Mary Baker Eddy and her thoughts on the life of Jesus.  Julia and her big ideas!  Using text (non-lyrics) always makes good songwriting very difficult in that text is not metered and has a way of not particularly sounding very musical much less poetic.  On top of that the text of Mary Baker Eddy cannot be changed by even the alteration of a comma.

However the text she gave me was poetic to a certain extent so I thought I’d give it a go.  I had a great deal more content than I needed to begin with.  Julia can have her long-winded moments, so I had to do some clever editing.  Always easier to cut than to add.  While fooling around with several lyrical directions the line struck me like a lightening bolt — “And his name shall be called Wonderful,”

“What a great idea,” thought I.  Call the song Wonderful!

And so I did.

I was on my way…

Here is the finished lyric.  In another magical musical week you’ll be able to hear, sing, play, perform, buy and listen to the whole thing through the wonderful world of MIDI, LOGIC, the INTERNET and God’s gift of inspiration.

Hot off the presses!

Wonderful

Text by Mary Baker Eddy
Lyrics adapted from the Book of John
Music by Peter Link

The wakeful shepherd beholds
The first faint morning beams,
Ere cometh the full radiance
Of a risen day.

So shone the pale star
To the prophet-shepherds;
Yet it traversed the night, and came
Where, in cradled obscurity, lay
The Bethlehem babe,
And his name shall be called Wonderful,
Wonderful

The people that walked in darkness
Have seen a very great light:
For unto us a child is born,
And a son is given:
And the government shall be upon his shoulder:

And his name shall be called Wonderful,
Counsellor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace
Yes his name shall be called Wonderful

Now the Son of man is glorified,
Yes and God is glorified in him.
Verily, he says unto you,
“He that believeth on me,
The works that I do shall he do also;
And greater works than these shall he do;

If ye love me, keep my commandments.
And I will pray the Father,
And he shall give you another Comforter”

The prophet of today
Beholds in the mental horizon
The signs of these times,
The reappearance of the Christianity
Which heals the sick
And destroys error,
And no other sign shall be given.

When a new spiritual idea is borne to earth,
The prophetic Scripture of Isaiah is renewedly fulfilled:
Saying “Unto us a child is born, . . .”
“Unto us a child is born, . . .”

And his name shall be called Wonderful.”
Counsellor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace
Yes his name shall be called Wonderful
Wonderful
Yes he is wonderful
Wonderful!

Even More Inspiration

• Even Now
• Love Is The Reason For Living
• The Decline of Lyrical Craftsmanship – Part 1
• Nothing
• You Must Remember This!
• My Body

NOTE: THE WFM LISTENING ROOM SERIES III CONCERTS HAVE BEEN POSTPONED UNTIL THE FALL OF 2011.  STAY TUNED AND WE’LL KEEP YOU POSTED AS TO THE COMING DATES.

Series III of the Watchfire Music Listening Room begins Sunday afternoon, July 17^th at 4:00 PM with Classical Crossover Sunday Afternoon – something a little different – something very special.  Inspirational music has never had it so good as to be presented most elegantly and professionally at 583 Park Avenue by a whole raft of world-class talent.

International artists such as Osceola Davis, Julia Wade, Gregory Emanuel Rahming and Marianne Moore will be joined by violinist, Alan Grubner and pianist, William Lewis, to present an afternoon of classic musical delights ranging from the works of Beethoven, to Ellington, to Billy Joel.  Don’t know how we can possibly fit such disparity into one afternoon?  Join us and experience for yourself!

The July 17^th Sunday Afternoon concert will be followed by three others this coming summer.  One is still in the assembling process, but others will feature WFMLR regulars Julia Wade, Chieli Minucci, Jenny Burton, Alan Grubner and newcomer to the WFM Listening Room experience, South American string quartet, Sweet Plantain, blending Jazz, Latin and Classic styles.

For Series III and going forward we’re going to start doing something extremely novel in today’s world.   It’s called, “Pay The Musicians”.  That’s right!  Heretofore at Listening Room concerts the musicians and artists have worked for free – giving their time and energies free of charge so that we could get this great idea started and over the hump of new music experiences.

Those of you who have been around from the beginning just 8 months ago have seen and heard the quality of performances and talent escalate dramatically not to mention the quality of venue.  We have presented these concerts at a ridiculously low ticket price of $15.  That has included free snacks, free liquid and no waiters in the face.

We did this to promote the experience around NYC through the artists, enabling them to come and spread the good news through word of mouth.  Well now the word is out and it’s time to move forward.

So we shall raise our ticket price.  Now before you groan, pay attention to what is still the best entertainment deal in NYC.  The new ticket price is, all in, $25.  Nowhere else in NYC can you go out for an evening, or afternoon, and experience such wondrous live music at such a price.

The Missus and I went out to a very average Cabaret entertainment the other night with the usual 50 minute act in a smelly bar room replete with watered down drinks, uneatable food stuff and noisy rude waiters.  It cost the two of us over $100 to have 4 drinks we did not want and a host of other frustrations.

Feinsteins, across the street, will cost you double that at the minimum with the same noisy waiters and comparable talent.

OK, there’s my pitch.  Oh yes, a 3D movie is now $19.  We’re better ‘n 3D.  We’re live, in color and rockin’ the house – and don’t forget those free cookies and chips – not to mention that fabulous bottled water.

So start puttin’ those Friday nights aside for the great music listening experience offered – still the best deal in town.

Want learn more?  The Watchfire Music Listening Room – Series III.  [Click Here!]

Even More Inspiration

• WFM Listening Room Series II – 3
• Kickstarter.com Campaign – I
• WFM Listening Room – Series II Finale
• WFM Listening Room – Series II – Event 4
• WFM Listening Room — Series II Opener
• WFM Listening Room – Series II

As American physicist, Barbara Brennan, states in her book ‘The Hands of Light‘: “Through experiments over the past few decades physicists have discovered matter to be completely mutable into other particles or energy and vice-versa and on a subatomic level, matter does not exist with certainty in definite places, but rather shows ‘tendencies’ to exist.  Quantum physics is beginning to realize that the Universe appears to be a dynamic web of interconnected and inseparable energy patterns.  If the universe is indeed composed of such a web, there is logically no such thing as a part.  This implies we are not separated parts of a whole but rather we are the Whole.”

This is just the beginning of a whole series of articles, comments, theories and scientific findings on the non-existence of matter.  If you are a regular reader of this blog, you already know what I think about all this.  Here’s just a bit more thought on the subject – not necessarily a scientific approach, but certainly a more poetic or lyrical approach to the subject.

NOTHING
Music and Lyrics by Peter Link

What is the chaff to the wheat?
Nothing
What is the dross to the gold?
What is the darkness to light?
Nothing
Nothing’s still nothing a thousand fold

Nothing’s no more than a fraud
Trying to be something when really it’s nothing
Claiming existence with no real consistency
What is matter to God?
What is matter to God?
Nothing
Nothing

What is the false to the truth?
Nothing
What are the tears to the crier?
What is an absence to presence?
Nothing
What is the ash to the raging fire?

What is the gain if a million lives
Are lost while the world is obsessed making war?
What is the point?  Good God!  What are the spoils?
What on earth is it for?
What on earth is it all for?
Nothing
Nothing

What is the past to the present?
Nothing
What are the remnants of time?
What are the scraps and shavings of dreams
Forgotten and long left behind?
What of a thought considered then spurned
And left in the dust forsaken?
What was it worth?  What does it matter?
If it was simply mistaken

What is death to life?
Nothing
What are the findings discovered by science?
What are the laws on which we place reliance
When we find the findings were flawed?
What is matter to God?
Nothing
Nothing

What is the chaff to the wheat?
Nothing

Even More Inspiration

• Even Now
• You Must Remember This!
• Love Is The Reason For Living
• Wonderful
• Valentine Thoughts
• Light At The End Of The Tunnel

For the producers, Watchfire Music, the evening has already paid back its initial investment in superb sound system and other ancillaries and is moving rapidly towards a day when the shows will be webcast across the world.  A T1 line (the technology one needs for webcasting large content like music and video) has recently been installed in the venue and now we are just organizing the future towards the implementation of a permanent 3-camera shoot.

People have spoken to me about franchising the WFM Listening Room – the idea of having one in every large city in America, but my feeling is, “Why do this when through the webcast we can reach everyone in the world with a computer?”  I know, there’s nothing like live music and I’m a great appreciator of that fact, but the costs, at this point, of franchising are truly enormous.  Let’s let nature take its course and see how the webcasts, a much more economical approach, will work.

In the meantime, the webcasts are still a lot to get together and require still further investment into additional equipment and staffing.  We’re on our way, but not there yet.  The prognosis is good!

Jimmy Roberts, a fine composer with wit and great charm, is also an exceptional pianist and most clever with his offerings.  My favorite was his Pachebel Canon/Stephen Sondheim Send In The Clowns fusion concoction.  A brilliant blending of two well-known iconic musical offerings from different centuries, different composers and vastly different styles.  Jimmy is greatly loved by his audience and did a 10 song set of tuneful panache from his treasure trove of musical comedy.

We’ll have him back again and again.  He’s a joyful entertainer and an experienced pro – just the kind of entertainer we love to present.

Following Mr. Roberts was the perennial Julia Wade who started this great adventure with 4 concerts in the fall of 2010.  This was her second concert this spring in Series II and one wonders how she could get better, but she continues to do so.  Her renditions of Upon The Mountain, Woman On A Train and Julie Gold’s From A Distance are becoming definitive standards for her as she weaves her spell over the audience with her gift of voice and commitment to the material at hand.

If you have not yet caught her act, do yourself a favor – no matter what kind of music is your choice – catch this act.  Here’s a major force in the music world on the rise.  It’ll be fun to watch her blossom.

Next show and last of Series II is a repeat of the Jenny Burton/Chieli Minucci concert of several weeks ago.  But it won’t be a total repeat – much new material will be presented and Chieli is adding superb vocalist Philip Hamilton to his set for several songs.  Word has it also that Jenny is adding a new closer to the act that should rock the foundations of 583 Park.

So if ya’ saw it before, c’mon back – there’s more to hear.  If you’re new to either of these two performers, do yourself a favor – click here for reservations! Friday, May 27^th @ 8:00 PM.

Even More Inspiration

• Gabriel, Come Blow Your Horn
• What Is A Cantata?
• Inspirational Music – The Category
• Spiritual Scientist
• Wonderful
• Kickstarter.com Campaign – I

With its graceful arches and most expressive lighting, the two-story space was home this past Friday night to both Chieli Minucci, world-class guitarist and Jenny Burton, a chanteuse of heart-stopping abilities, and their devoted fans.

Located at Park Avenue and 63^rd Street, NYC, even the outside of this gorgeous building promises a rare experience of visual and aural delights.

As the concert begins, the first thing one notices is that they’re not barraged by waiters serving drinks or food, but instead sit in comfortable seats with excess legroom and not a bad seat in the intimate, but packed space.  The ever-changing atmospheric colors of the evening reflect the multifarious moods of the music as light and sound coordinate to present a concentrated music listening experience.

The evening is emceed by yours truly who announces that besides the visual and aural experience, tonight we will add a most elegant gastronomic experience – that of Krista Hannesson’s hand rolled chocolate truffles.  It turns out that Ms Hannesson studied the art of bombarding the senses in chocolate fashion at Le Cordon Bleu in London.  They are free, but sadly, one to a customer.  Some customers are seen to defy the rules and sneak more.

At intermission the crowd overwhelms the snackbar — Ms Hannesson’s gifts to all, a roaring success.

But I get ahead of myself.  Back to our stage…

And to the fabulous flying fingers of Chieli Minucci.

Chieli plays a half hour set of 4 gorgeous instrumental compositions rattling our senses and expanding our musical minds with his amazing technique, but ultimately, what we’re left with is the deep soul of a profound musician at the height of his art.  This man and his guitar are one in music.  The experience is not to be described and must instead be experienced by listening.

We’re bringing him back Friday, May 27^th at 8:00 for a repeat performance.  He promises even more.  I’m ready for that.

And so, after intermission, it’s back to our seats and total immersion into the wondrous world of Jenny Burton.

Her strength, her mastery of the medium are evident in each musical offering whether inspiring ballad or room-rocking gospel celebration.

After the show any number of crowd comments are overheard, many covering the same issue: “She’s back and better than ever.”  “Gone five years, but never missed a beat…”  “I saw her with JBX in the late 90’s and became a huge fan, but now she’s even better, smarter, somehow deeper…” “When does she sing again?  I wanna make reservations now.”

At the end of her 8 song set, Chieli joins her for her last two songs.  Expected standing ovations follow and the audience hollers for more.  We’re bring them back together in May for the last concert of Series II.  In the meantime, Julia Wade and Jimmy Roberts will uplift you and turn your life around Friday, May 13^th at 8:00.  Be there.  Be part of these magical evenings.

The Watchfire Music Listening Room awaits your presence.

Thanks for taking the tour.

Even More Inspiration

• WFM Listening Room – Series II Finale
• Kickstarter.com Campaign – I
• Gabriel, Come Blow Your Horn
• Live Music Lives!
• WFM Listening Room – Series II – Event 4
• Progress Afoot

Albert Einstein

Down in the dumps?  Out of work?  Out of money?  Suffering?  Fighting the matter model?  What you need is to be inspired – inspired to change your thought.  Inspirational music can literally change your life.  An inspirational song can lift you up and rummage around in your mind for days reminding you of the truth even when the material picture around you looks bleak.

When things seem at their worst, they’re not really.  That’s the great thing about goodness.  It’s like light.  It’s always there waiting to be turned on.  You just have to throw the switch.

Buddha

One thing for sure:  Turn on the light and the darkness disappears.  Darkness is just the absence of light.  It’s not some thing; it’s no thing – it’s simply an absence.  You can’t turn on the darkness.  There’s no switch for that.

The same goes for goodness.  It’s just there ready to be goodness.  The turn-on switch is your thinking.  Just throw the switch and the goodness that sits waiting to be appreciated will be there instantly, just like light.  We just have to change our minds. Change our thinking.

“The world we have created is a product of our thinking; it cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” — Albert Einstein

“We are what we think.  All that we are arises with our thoughts.  With our thoughts, we make the world.” – Buddha

Confucius

“The more man meditates upon good thoughts; the better will be his world and the world at large.” – Confucius

Pay attention to these guys.  They’re three of the greatest thinkers and doers that we as a human race have ever produced.  They’re way ahead of you and me in their ability to put two and two together.  They understood how it works on a level that still leads the world long after their own personal transitions from the planet.  They knew what they were talking about.

Believe them.  Take their advice.  Put it into practice.

Even when things seem at their worst, rejuvenation is right at your fingertips.

Even Now

Music and Lyrics by Peter Link
As sung by Julia Wade on her forthcoming CD, Silk Road.

Even now
The sun will rise
The morning come
The day begin

Even now
When all seems lost
And darkness falls over all

Even now
God’s watching over you
Here in the dawn’s first light

At every turn
In every need
With every breath you take

Even now
With cross to bear
He’s always there
In simple truth

Even now
With heavy heart
His love will lighten your way

Even now
He soothes the salted wound
And eases your troubled mind

At every turn
In every need
With every breath you take

God loves you
Hallelujah
God frees you
Hallelujah

Even now
With broken dreams
And weary soul
He’ll carry you

Even now
When all has failed
And mountains are in your way

Even now
He stands a sentinel
The shepherd of all you do

Your every turn
Your every prayer
And every move you make

Your every turn
Your every need
And every breath you take

God loves you
Remember these words that I sing

God loves you
God frees you
Hallelujah

Even More Inspiration

• Even Now
• Love Is The Reason For Living
• Nothing
• Wonderful
• What Is A Cantata?
• Valentine Thoughts

It’s also always a time when I have a great excuse to pull away from the craziness of this world into a higher minded process of thought.  It’s a time of great creativity and consequently, a time of great satisfaction.

It is what I live for.

Now is such a time.  Why not?  It’s spring!  Time for the buds to blossom.  Time to grow.  Each experience holds within it the possibility and the opportunity to grow, to get better, to dig deeper, to flower.

And so we begin Julia Wade’s sixth CD, a departure of sorts, an expansion really.  I like the word “expansion” because it implies maintaining the old while exploring the new.  This CD will mark Julia’s foray into songs of issue, a deeper consideration of the world around her, its problems and the healing of the kinds of issues that we hear on the news every day.

Julia, a woman who spends 8 hours a week commuting to Boston to sing on the weekends, gets in a lot of reading as you can well imagine.  And she’s an avid reader of books dealing with our world’s problems and their solutions – books like Greg Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea. It’s her fascination and her life ambition to do something to make this a better world – to take a small part in the healing of our world’s problems.

With already a world-wide following, I think Julia would be happiest if she could go on tour singing in the villages of Africa.  If she could, she’d be in Japan right now trying to inspire the tsunami victims with her music.  So an album is the next best thing.

She’s constantly throwing ideas at me and keeping my mind focused on these world issues.  We talk about this stuff nearly every night over dinner.  (We’re married.)  And we are now planning our creativity around the healing of these world issues.

About six weeks ago I woke up one night with a song in my brain.  I had plucked the title from an article I had read and was exploring the ramifications of it secretly in my brain and consciousness, looking for a metaphor with which to explore the subject.

I like to start with a quest in my songs – a quest and an obstacle – that way I have drama and I want to always write songs that have great drama.  For whatever reason the image of a tsunami popped into my mind and the words “rising tide of fear” flashed into my consciousness.  I did not know why, but I knew immediately that this was the image I was looking for.

So I wrote this next song over that ensuing weekend for Julia’s new CD.  At the time I felt that it was a more general approach to the world and its problems, but less than two weeks after that weekend of creativity, the tsunami hit Japan.

Suddenly the song became timely on a level never imagined or anticipated.  It told us both that it was time to start the new album.  Since then I’ve written three more songs and I have another 3 in the mental incubator.

Here’s the lyric of the first and the prescient beginning of expanded direction for Ms Wade.

Love Is The Reason For Living

Music and Lyrics by Peter Link

We dwell in the arena
Of immense conflicting forces
Our lives are swayed by counsel
From a million diff’rent sources

As we near each troubled crossroad
With a rising tide of fear
And wonder what becomes of us
When the tidal waves appear

We cannot help but turn to God
To summon His defense
To stir instead the floodtides of love
His sustenance
His deliverance

And so we strip away the falsehood
From the truth of who we are
And commit our lives
To innocence once again

Love is the answer
Love is every answer
Love is God forgiving
Love is the reason for living
Yes love is the reason
For living

We long to stand the summit
In the pinnacles of spirit
Where death no longer finds us
No and we no longer fear it

And the light of life surrounds us
With its infinite embrace
And love pervades our consciousness
And evokes its change of base

Love is the answer
Love is every answer
Love is God life-giving
Love is the reason for living
Yes love is the reason
For living

Even More Inspiration

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• Wonderful
• Nothing
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