Music Notes – Sunday, June 21st:
This Sunday’s musician is UUCC Pianist Karin Tooley.
Centering Music: A Change Is Gonna Come – Cooke
Written and originally performed by Sam Cooke (1931-1964), “A Change Is Gonna Come” is one of the most significant songs in the history of American music. The song first appeared on Cooke’s 1964 album Ain’t That Good News, and was inspired by Cooke’s experiences as a person of color, especially a 1963 incident when he and his entourage were refused entry to a motel in Shreveport, Louisiana because of their race. The song’s original release only met with modest success, but “A Change Is Gonna Come” is now thought of as Cooke’s signature song, becoming an anthem for the Civil Rights Movement and meeting with near-universal acclaim by music critics and historians. In 2005, “A Change Is Gonna Come” was voted number 12 by representatives of the music industry and press in Rolling Stone magazine’s “500 Greatest Songs of All Time”, it made NPR’s list of “The 300 Most Important Songs Ever Recorded”, and the song was selected for preservation in the Library of Congress in 2007. The words “A change is gonna come” are inscribed on a wall of the Contemplative Court, a space for reflection in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, and Cooke’s lyrics were famously quoted by Barack Obama in his acceptance speech after winning the U.S. Presidential Election in 2008. “A Change Is Gonna Come” has also been covered and sampled by many other artists, including Beyoncé, Lil Wayne, Céline Dion, and Seal.
Song: Wake Now, My Senses – Irish folk tune/Mikelson
#298 in Singing the Living Tradition, “Wake Now, My Senses” is a setting of “Slane”, an Irish folk song that is most commonly associated with “Be Thou My Vision” (which is also in our hymnal as #20). “Slane” is named for a hill in County Meath, Ireland, where St. Patrick’s lighting of an Easter fire – an act of defiance against the 5th Century pagan king Loegaire – led to his unlimited freedom to preach the gospel in Ireland. The words you’ll be hearing – and hopefully singing along with – this Sunday were written by the Rev. Thomas Mikelson (1936-2020), a UU Minister and native of Iowa who was also an educator and activist for racial justice and LGBTQ+ rights.
Special Music: No One Is Alone and Not While I’m Around – Sondheim
Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) was one of the most important and distinctive compositional voices in the history of American Musical Theatre. Sondheim earned numerous awards and accolades over his long and remarkable career, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, a Pulitzer Prize, eight Grammy Awards, eight Tony Awards, and an Academy Award. Some of his most notable contributions include West Side Story (lyrics), A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Sweeney Todd, and Into the Woods, a 1986 musical adaptation and re-imagining of stories and characters from familiar fairy tales, including “Little Red Riding Hood”, “Jack and the Beanstalk”, “Rapunzel”, and “Cinderella”. Into the Woods won three Tony Awards and enjoyed several long-running productions as well as a critically acclaimed 2014 film adaptation. “No One Is Alone” is one of the best-loved songs from Into the Woods.
“Not While I’m Around” is a tender ballad that serves as a temporary respite from the darker themes and moods that are prevalent in Sondheim’s landmark 1979 musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, winner of eight Tony Awards including Best Musical. Sweeney Todd has also lived on with many other productions, as well as its own film adaptation in 2007.
Offertory Music: We Shall Be Free – Brooks and Davis
“We Shall Be Free” was co-written by American country music icon Garth Brooks (b. 1962) along with singer-songwriter Stephanie Davis, a Montana native who has spent most of her career in Nashville. The song was first released in August of 1992 as the lead single from Brooks’ fourth studio album, The Chase. In numerous interviews, Brooks has said “We Shall Be Free” was written in response to the 1992 Los Angeles riots that erupted in the wake of the Rodney King verdict. The song’s lyrics explore topics not typically found in modern country music, including world hunger, racism and racial justice, homophobia, and freedom of religion. “We Shall Be Free” rose to #12 on Billboard’s Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart, despite it receiving an airplay ban on some radio stations. When Brooks re-released the song on his 1994 compilation album The Hits, he included the following liner note:
“‘We Shall Be Free’ is definitely and easily the most controversial song I have ever done. A song of love, a song of tolerance from someone who claims not to be a prophet but just an ordinary man. I never thought there would be any problems with this song. Sometimes the roads we take do not turn out to be the roads we envisioned them to be. All I can say about ‘We Shall Be Free” is that I will stand by every line of this song as long as I live. I am very proud of it. And I am very proud of Stephanie Davis, the writer. I hope you enjoy it and see it for what it was meant to be.”
Song: We’ll Build a Land – McDade and Zanotti
“We’ll Build a Land” (Singing the Living Tradition #121) is one of the best-known and most beloved UU Hymns. The song was written by Carolyn McDade (b. 1935), a self-described songwriter, spiritual feminist, and social activist, who is also the composer of other UU favorites like “Spirit of Life”, “Come, Sing a Song with Me”, and “Rising Green”. The words, written by Barbara Zanotti, are paraphrased from the Old Testament books of Amos and Isaiah.
Postlude: I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free – Taylor and Dallas
#151 in our Singing the Living Tradition hymnbook, “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free” is a jazz-gospel song written in 1963 by Billy Taylor (1921-2010) and Dick Dallas (1937-2004). The song became one of the anthems of the American Civil Rights Movement and has been covered by dozens of artists, most famously by Nina Simone in 1967.
-Mike Carney, UUCC Music Director