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TopMon, 26 Dec 2005
Dec 26, 2005, 10:18
[home/journal] We had a great day yesterday! It was fun to have Christmas on a Sunday, to church with the family. I think we should try to attend church on Christmas every year, even if it’s not a Sunday— it helps us keep focused on the true purpose of the holiday. We might have to go to Catholic mass to find a church that is holding services. The kids liked their gifts. I love seeing their eyes wide with wonder, wrapping paper covering the floor, laughter filling the room. Already some of the toys are broken… too bad, but it happens every year. Chalk it up to life lessons for the kids— things break. We played a couple of rousing games of “Break the Safe,” a great game Lucas got from “Santa” this year. That’s a really fun game!! Today we’re lounging around the house, not really doing anything… I think we might try to return a broken toy or two, and Lucas got a couple of gift cards from relatives at Toys ‘R’ Us which he wants to redeem. Well, I think I’ll have a nap. Merry Christmas!
Christmas 05
~Jason
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Thu, 22 Dec 2005
Dec 22, 2005, 12:19
[home/music/song_bios] ~Jason
Merciful
Have you ever felt overwhelmed with how great God is? Have you ever considered the many blessings in your life and just had to sit down and catch your breath for a minute? If you answered no to both of the questions, than what about the pleasures of life? What about the smell of apple pie, or the smile on a child’s face? What about the excitement of driving really fast, or the peace in walking really slow?
In every moment of life we can raise our eyes to heaven and give God the credit. Nothing is outside of His notice, everything comes from His love.
We don’t deserve all this blessing, we didn’t earn all this stuff… not the workin’, nor the dreamin’, just His grace has been enough. He gives me more than we could ask for, and He gives us less than we deserve. We owe it all to Jesus, who I choose to serve.
All the Lyrics
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Tue, 20 Dec 2005
Dec 20, 2005, 15:37
[home/music/song_bios] ~Jason
Love My Neighbour
One afternoon I wrote this to use as a song for our church, then drove over to Tom Bigas’ studio (when it was still in his basement) and recorded it. We didn’t even know what we were doing until we started playing— he was on the kit and I was on the bass, just sort of making it up as we went… later he added a backup vocal part and brought me the CD.
Click to Listen
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Sat, 17 Dec 2005
Dec 17, 2005, 10:46
[home/music/song_bios] ~Jason
Up in the Tree Fort
This song is on the CD “Moving On” which I released in 1999. I entitled it “Up in The Tree Fort” because I wrote it with John Lyons- a friend with whom I built and played in tree forts when we were young.
Back when I was a kid, I loved to build them. I think it started when I was four and five years old, when my dad build a tree house for sister Stacy and I to play in.
But we moved away from that house, and of course, the tree house, too.
When I was a little older, ny grandpa Earl Abrams gave me access to as much lumber as I needed. Out behind his ‘shop’ I built a two-story treehouse empire.
I started by finding the perfect spot: a grove of ten trees growing in a circle, right beside a rocky cliff. I attached joists to the outside of the trees, a little above the level of the cliff, then put down floor boards. A little higher up I added a railing, and even further up, another circle of joists and another floor.
I built a drawbridge that connected the top of the cliff to the first floor of the fort. The bridge could be raised and lowered (albeit, I wasn’t quite strong enough to do this easily).
A couple of years later my dad gave me permission to build a treehouse in our backyard— if I first submitted plans to him. This fort had a trap door in the bottom and a peaked roof to protect me from the elements. It turned out pretty good, but a little too small for two to fit comfortably, so I didn’t play in it much. Later I built a platform above it, but it was so high up in the air that I was a little scared to play up there also.
Click to Listen
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Dec 17, 2005, 10:13
[home/journal] I watched the most amazing documentary on wildlife and history in the Algonquin park this morning. It makes me want to get out of the house, away from the city, into the solemn quiet of the forest. I love nature so much! I get all wishy-washy and weird about it. Just the notion of getting away pushes me to poetisize: smokey morning mist magically rising from a mirror of still water; the rusty colour of field grass whispering in the afternoon breeze; the soft swish of a paddle; the call of birds troubled by my intrusion. There’s something haunting and holy in the woods— the parallel lines of standing trees; a clearing in the sun; an ancient rock floor carpeted in moss. I love the solitude one finds away from technology. OK, for a second there I wanted to move back to the country near Kingston, where I grew up. Hamilton is great, but the cloest I get to hiking lately is driving by Gage Park or running to catch the bus. Joanne mentioned to me that she’s excited for summer so we can— get this— GO CAMPING! This from the girl who, until last summer, hated roughing it! Maybe this year we should go to Algonquin? ~Jason
Wishing for Wilderness
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Dec 17, 2005, 09:17
[home/music] I know I don’t have a lot of faithful readers to my blog… in the words of a good friend last night, my blog is a little boring. So if you are one of my faithful readers, would you please do me a favour? I would so appreciate an entry in your blog to www.jasonsilver.com to generate more interest in my music. Maybe you could make a post which says something like, “My friend Jason Silver has been making some of his songs available as free mp3s to download here. He’s looking for feedback, so go listen and tell him what you think.”
Request for Google Bomb
Thanks!
~Jason
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Fri, 16 Dec 2005
Dec 16, 2005, 13:36
[home/music/song_bios]
Needing Yesterday
May 1, 2004: I wrote a new song last week and just recorded it quickly… I thought you might be interested in downloading it or streaming it.
Take a listen, then comment on what you think about the song. Yes, it’s a little depressing, but I like it. It reminds me of Lionel Richie’s new one, or Phil Collin’s “Can’t Keep Lovin’ You.”
Don’t pay attention to the bad notes and stuff, I just did this quick and dirty.
~Jason
December 14, 2005 - Update: This link was bad, so I’m reposting this article. I still need to rerecord this one and clean it up a bit.
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Mon, 12 Dec 2005
Dec 12, 2005, 13:52
[home/faith] My life has shot off on a tangent of late. I don’t really know what’s going on. ~Jason
Liturgy, Protestants, and Celtic Christianity
I’ve mentioned before that it bothers me the way the protestant side of Christianity is so predisposed to splintering. This is partly because of the increased importance placed upon the scripture by Protestants. Sects often seem to highlight the importance of some specific part of scripture, and decide to break from their parent group as a result. This could be a product of our inherent disdain for tradition, as well as our use of the Sola Scriptura (only by scripture) edict: one of the basic tenets of Protestantism which claims scripture as the sole source of our beliefs.
While I find it fascinating and troublesome that Catholics would venerate some people above others because of their display of faith or because of their martyrdom, it also bothers me that well over 1500 years of tradition were abandoned a couple hundred years ago in favour of a new approach to Christianity. And few have looked back. This seems unreasonable. It’s typically modernistic to abandon truth because it appears to be not “historically correct.”
But some traditions are so hard to reconcile with scripture at all! For example, I still find myself struggling to accept the veneration of saints and the associated “pray for us,” or to call Jesus’ mother Mary, the Queen of Heaven.
I find contemporary protestant worship services troublesome too. I’ve had some good conversation over at Church Alienation, where contributors are concerned by the growing trend found in churches today: more and more adherants are coming to church in search of entertainment. I’ve experienced it myself: often people comment to me that “today’s worship was terrific,” or “I really enjoyed the service today.” I’m not exempt either: I have often caught myself lamenting over the details of the service: whether a song was a success or not, whether the message was too long, too boring, just right— whatever.
So our church services are packed— is that really what we want? The attitudes we face should reveal to us that we’re coming to church to have our own needs met, rather than coming to worship our Creator, or to enjoy fellowship with other believers.
But I’m so torn! As I weekly put together contemporary ways to communicate the Gospel and to encourage one another, I see life change in our body! People come in off the street and express a desire to accept Jesus as the Saviour they so need, they decide to be baptised, they begin to grow in faith! Long-timers begin connecting their lives to the needy! Whatever we’re doing, right or not, God seems to be using it! In fact, the churches I’ve been part of in the past have often seen dozens of new believers every year! Are pragmatics enough? How important is the mode of our worship to God? Does He care what form it takes?
I was interested by Glenn Teal’s mention of Celtic Christianity. He uses a Celtic book of prayer as part of his daily devotional. Though I have an Irish past, though I love Celtic music and art, (and play the penny whistle whenever I can) I was unclear about what makes Celtic Christianity unique. I started with Wikipedia, and found a lot of interesting, though obviously slanted information. Other articles have balanced out the views.
Some people feel that this elusive Celtic Christianity is the closest to the original form of our faith. They believe this because of a long and unsupported legend that Joseph of Arimethea himself brought Christiantiy to the Britons, along with the Holy Grail. This would make the Celts evangelised before the Romans were. Interesting, eh?
I also didn’t realise that Paul’s letter to the Galations is likely written to Celtic Christians! The Galatians, otherwise know as the “Gauls” may have been a celtic group living in the north.
All of this reading of traditional Christianity and accompanying liturgy has created a hunger within me for a formal expression of worship. What a tangent? What’s going on?
All I can say is to stay tuned… who knows how this will turn out!
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Sat, 10 Dec 2005
Dec 10, 2005, 10:29
[home/music/song_bios] ~Jason
Since My Saviour Came
This song was written with the same philosophy of “Loving Like You Do,” that a congregational song should be repetitive enough to be easy to learn and sing the first time through, and that the music which underlies the melody is where the interest lies— so that it sounds like it’s more complicated than it is.
So what would happen if you had an eight measure chord pattern, but a melody line which covered 11 measures? Every three measures the chord pattern would lay under the melody at a different spot.
Normally this would make for a very unpleasing experience as chords and melody disonantly disagree. But not with this song. I tried to make the melody universal enough to work over almost any chord it came across.
Please take a listen to it and tell me what you think. And I would so appreciate a link from your blog to www.jasonsilver.com to generate more interest in my music. Would you do that for me? Just make a post which says something like, “Jason Silver has been writing some songs and has made his mp3s available for free download here.”
Thanks!
Click to Listen
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Thu, 08 Dec 2005
Dec 08, 2005, 23:34
[home/music/song_bios] ~Jason
That’s Why
That’s
Why is another one of the songs written in the basement of the Wriston’s. In fact, it may be the first written
that year. It was a particularly difficult song to write.
You see, there are two types of experiences for me when writing: songs that write themselves— lyrics almost falling onto the page, and songs which sweat the living-daylights out of me.
Usually the sweat inducing kind are bad and the ‘look ma, no hands!’ kind are good. I don’t know why that is, but people usually like the easy songs.
Do you know how hard it is to write a song so that every single line rhymes with every other line, and still makes sense? And it doesn’t sound as cheesy as you’d think.
I initially recorded this at Doug Bowker(?)’s (Randy’s brother?) studio in Saskatoon. He was the first guy I knew of back in 1991 to have a digital recording studio on his PC. I think I used a Korg M1 Workstation for the main instruments, with blues harp and geetar leading the way.
But that recording is long gone so I rerecorded it this fall for the Philpott CD.
This song is important to me because it really describes the inner turmoil deep inside me. I love this verse:
When I’m deep inside of me, looking evil in its eye
I believe I need something to help me just get by
But all I’m really longing for is just what You supply
If only I believed it, I’d fly!
Here’s the whole song:
That’s Why
Far below the surface you can hear my soul cry
The scream of a child who believes he’s gonna die
I thought I knew the answer, I just lived a lie
You’re here, You’re the answer, that’s why
I tried to build a fortress, walls of granite to the sky
A castle meant to save me, just a place for me to hide
But feelings of rejection I could not deny
You were waiting, You’re the Answer, that’s why.
Chorus:
That’s why I live life undefended,
That’s why my castle lies in ruins.
Because to hide, I must unveil.
I give it all right up to You.
When I’m deep inside of me, looking evil in its eye
I believe I need something to help me just get by
But all I’m really longing for is just what You supply
If only I believed it, I’d fly!
[chorus]
I fear that I am mortal, I’ll die
But you’re here, you’re the answer, so why?
Still I fear that I am mortal, I’ll die
So I protect me, incorrectly, that’s why!
[chorus]
Click to Listen
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Tue, 06 Dec 2005
Dec 06, 2005, 18:59
[home/music/song_bios] ~Jason
Loving Like You Do
I
wrote Loving Like You Do a couple of years ago now— I think
it’s probably the first real ‘singable’ worship chorus I’ve written. The secret
lies in the extremely simple melody line which takes on different senses as the
chord progressions change beneath it…a neat trick if you ask me!
This
has become a favourite at Philpott, though I think we’re probably tiring of it a
little bit right now.
It was on the last worship CD (2004) but I had Doug
Dolbear singing it. He did a great job! But I wanted to put it on my site, so I
decided around midnight last night to record the song with me singing, then I
uploaded it this morning.
Click
to Listen
Loving Like You Do
Lord You reached out to me when I was all alone
I was feeling so lonely
You came into my heart and made my dreams come true
I want to play a part in loving like You do
For the least of these you did it unto Me
They’re the words You cry at the end of time!
What You did for me I will do for You
As You give me strength,
As You give me strength
In loving like you do
[repeat]
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Sat, 03 Dec 2005
Dec 03, 2005, 19:00
[home/music/song_bios] The plan was always to add stand-up bass and brushed snare to this song, but
we never got around to it, and it sounds pretty good as a piano/vocal thing. I wrote “There’s The Door” back when I lived in Saskatoon. I went out with a
girl named “Monelle” for a while, and when we broke up I was a little bitter…
But hey! I’m happy now, ‘cause it made me write a great song! Check it out and tell me what you think. Just click this to listen: Click
to Listen ~Jason
There’s the Door
I
uploaded another old song today— after trying my hand at mastering it. I’m
pretty satisfied with the results, except when we recorded it we used a buzzy
old microphone from the 50’s “for effect.” So you can hear some of my
louder notes distort and buzz some… oh well!
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Dec 03, 2005, 12:21
[home/hobbies/favourite_shows/Star_Trek] Wow! I can’t believe it! Kirk, Bones, Spock, and the rest of the crew are back— you’ve got to see this to believe it! Back in the late 1960’s, Star Trek’s “5 Year Mission” was cancelled after only three seasons. But that’s all about to change!! This is so exciting!!! ~Jason
Star Trek the Original Series Lives On!
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