Part 18 in a continuing series. See the right sidebar and click on "Music" for others in this study.
Tuesday, afternoon,
I'm just beginning to see,
Now I'm on my way,
It doesn't matter to me,
Chasing the clouds away.
Something, calls to me,
The trees are drawing me near,
I've got to find out why
Those gentle voices I hear
Explain it all with a sigh.
I'm looking at myself, reflections of my mind,
It's just the kind of day to leave myself behind,
So gently swaying thru the fairy-land of love,
If you'll just come with me and see the beauty of
Tuesday afternoon.
Tuesday afternoon.
Tuesday, afternoon,
I'm just beginning to see,
Now I'm on my way,
It doesn't matter to me,
Chasing the clouds away.
Something, calls to me,
The trees are drawing me near,
I've got to find out why
Those gentle voices I hear
Explain it all with a sigh.
"The Afternoon: Forever Afternoon" (also known as "Tuesday Afternoon")
Many years ago, the Moody Blues was one of our favorite bands. When the televised version of the Red Rock concert came on, we watched every minute of it and then bought the cassette. (That's how we listened to recordings in those "olden" days.) Keith had begun losing his hearing when he was in the service and was already in hearing aids at 27, so "listening" to music was difficult. He asked me to please get him the lyrics and I did—every lyric for every song on the recording.
As pleased as punch, he sat down and read through them. He grew quieter and quieter as he read. Finally he said, "I wish I did not have these lyrics. They mean absolutely nothing, and now I don't like the music nearly as much."
One set of those lyrics, and one of the best as I recall, opens this post. If you haven't yet, scroll up and read them. If you can tell me what it means, you are better than I. Basically it's a bunch of pretentious nonsense, cotton candy fluff masquerading as "deep" thought.
That made me think and I began to experiment with our hymns. Read them—don't sing them—as poetry and see what they actually say. If necessary to keep the tune from cropping up in your mind, read them aloud. Suddenly the hymn will become either one of your favorites or one you can easily do without. The tune and the rhythm won't matter.
New or old really has nothing to do with it. Granted, the older hymns have already had a couple hundred years of culling out and as a result they may have the advantage here. But you will still find one or two that make you feel like all you have been singing all these years is "Doo-wah-diddy-diddy-dum-diddy-doo" as far as their spiritual value goes.
Another caveat: save the chorus for last, don't read it over and over. That waters down the punch of the verses. That does not mean you should never sing the refrain more than once. Several of the Psalms have refrains in them, Psalm 80 for instance, which repeats its refrain three times. Obviously the Holy Spirit meant them to be read more than once—they repeat the theme. But for this test, you need to avoid the repetition and see what's left. Sometimes you discover that you are doing a whole lot of singing for practically nothing of worth.
So why do this test? Because suddenly you will understand that it isn't the spirituality of the hymn you like, it's the rhythm or the melody or the harmony, something that did not come along until a couple of millennia after the Psalms, by the way, and early on in only rudimentary form. And then, I hope, you will remember what our singing is supposed to be about. "Teaching and admonishing," (Col 3:16); edifying (1 Cor 14:15-26); "a sacrifice of praise" (Heb 13:15). If the song does not do one or more of those things, does it really need to be sung?
Psalm 34 A Psalm of David: Come O children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord, Psa 34:11.
Dene Ward
Tuesday, afternoon,
I'm just beginning to see,
Now I'm on my way,
It doesn't matter to me,
Chasing the clouds away.
Something, calls to me,
The trees are drawing me near,
I've got to find out why
Those gentle voices I hear
Explain it all with a sigh.
I'm looking at myself, reflections of my mind,
It's just the kind of day to leave myself behind,
So gently swaying thru the fairy-land of love,
If you'll just come with me and see the beauty of
Tuesday afternoon.
Tuesday afternoon.
Tuesday, afternoon,
I'm just beginning to see,
Now I'm on my way,
It doesn't matter to me,
Chasing the clouds away.
Something, calls to me,
The trees are drawing me near,
I've got to find out why
Those gentle voices I hear
Explain it all with a sigh.
"The Afternoon: Forever Afternoon" (also known as "Tuesday Afternoon")
Many years ago, the Moody Blues was one of our favorite bands. When the televised version of the Red Rock concert came on, we watched every minute of it and then bought the cassette. (That's how we listened to recordings in those "olden" days.) Keith had begun losing his hearing when he was in the service and was already in hearing aids at 27, so "listening" to music was difficult. He asked me to please get him the lyrics and I did—every lyric for every song on the recording.
As pleased as punch, he sat down and read through them. He grew quieter and quieter as he read. Finally he said, "I wish I did not have these lyrics. They mean absolutely nothing, and now I don't like the music nearly as much."
One set of those lyrics, and one of the best as I recall, opens this post. If you haven't yet, scroll up and read them. If you can tell me what it means, you are better than I. Basically it's a bunch of pretentious nonsense, cotton candy fluff masquerading as "deep" thought.
That made me think and I began to experiment with our hymns. Read them—don't sing them—as poetry and see what they actually say. If necessary to keep the tune from cropping up in your mind, read them aloud. Suddenly the hymn will become either one of your favorites or one you can easily do without. The tune and the rhythm won't matter.
New or old really has nothing to do with it. Granted, the older hymns have already had a couple hundred years of culling out and as a result they may have the advantage here. But you will still find one or two that make you feel like all you have been singing all these years is "Doo-wah-diddy-diddy-dum-diddy-doo" as far as their spiritual value goes.
Another caveat: save the chorus for last, don't read it over and over. That waters down the punch of the verses. That does not mean you should never sing the refrain more than once. Several of the Psalms have refrains in them, Psalm 80 for instance, which repeats its refrain three times. Obviously the Holy Spirit meant them to be read more than once—they repeat the theme. But for this test, you need to avoid the repetition and see what's left. Sometimes you discover that you are doing a whole lot of singing for practically nothing of worth.
So why do this test? Because suddenly you will understand that it isn't the spirituality of the hymn you like, it's the rhythm or the melody or the harmony, something that did not come along until a couple of millennia after the Psalms, by the way, and early on in only rudimentary form. And then, I hope, you will remember what our singing is supposed to be about. "Teaching and admonishing," (Col 3:16); edifying (1 Cor 14:15-26); "a sacrifice of praise" (Heb 13:15). If the song does not do one or more of those things, does it really need to be sung?
Psalm 34 A Psalm of David: Come O children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord, Psa 34:11.
Dene Ward
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