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I may be wildly speculating here, but I am pretty sure there isn’t a person my age brought up in the United States that wasn’t in some way inspired by/shaped by/comforted by/taught by/entertained by the Muppets. Now this is likely also true for people not in their early 50s, but I know that we who were born in the early to mid 1960s were just the right age for Sesame Street when it came out, and just the right age for The Muppet Show when it debuted.

One of the brilliant things about The Muppet Show was the way they simultaneously humanized celebrities and allowed those celebrities to shine. (A full list of stars can be found here.) There are some great, memorable moments, like Sandy Duncan dancing with Sweetums, Gladys Knight singing “God Bless the Child” with Rowlf, Alice Cooper’s Faustian affect on the cast, and of course Harry Belafonte – perhaps the most memorable appearance of all.

Not only did Belafonte sing the classic “Banana Boat Song”, he helped bring to the screen one of Jim Henson’s best work, on Turn the World Around. As Belafonte recounted in Of Muppets and Men, he and Henson thought that the show ” might provide the occasion to take a look at the lore and history of other worlds, other places.” From there, the designers at The Muppet Workshop researched African masks that would support Belafonte’s story of the song’s inspiration – namely the stories and wisdom of people he met in Guinea. But here’s where the care comes in:  while the masks were patterned on African masks, Henson was very careful about the final choices, because, as Belafonte recalled, “he didn’t want to cause offense by choosing masks that would have some religious or national significance.”

And thus, we have a beautifully crafted piece that doesn’t just use another culture but explains, expresses, and celebrates. Here’s the full clip (the only version I could find):

Transcript of the story:

I discovered that song in Africa. I was in a country called Guinea. I went deep into the interior of the country, and in a little village, I met with a storyteller. That storyteller went way back in African tradition and African mythology and began to tell this story about the fire, the sun, the water, the Earth.

He pointed out the whole of these things put together turns the world around. That all of us are here for a very, very short time. In that time that we’re here, there really isn’t any difference in any of us, if we take time out to understand each other.

The question is: Do I know who you are, or who I am? Do we care about each other? Because if we do, together we can turn the world around.

Wow.

“Do we care about each other? Because if we do, together we can turn the world around.” I’m not sure there’s a clearer statement of our theology than that. And what a gift we have in this song, and in the care both Belafonte and Henson took to bring it to us, beyond a recording on an album. Without that appearance on The Muppet Show, my generation might not ever have known this song, and it might not have come up in the minds of this hymnal’s commission.

I am grateful… and happy to share with you the lyrics as we have them laid out – in what could be seen as a complex arrangement:

We come from the fire, living in the fire,
go back to the fire, turn the world around.

We come from the water, living in the water,
go back to the water, turn the world around.

We come from the mountain, living on the mountain,
go back to the mountain, turn the world around.

Chorus 1:
Whoa, so is life! Ah, so is life!
Whoa, so is life! Ah, so is life!

Chorus 2:
Whoa, so is life! Abateewah, so is life!
Whoa, so is life! Abateewah, so is life!

Chorus 3:
Whoa, so is life! Abateewah, (ha!) so is life!
Whoa, so is life! Abateewah, (ha!) so is life!

Section 1:
Do you know who I am?
Do I know who you are?
See we one another clearly?
Do we know who we are?

Section 2:
Do you know who I am? Do I know who you are?
See we one another clearly? Do we know who we are?
Do you know who I am? Do I know who you are?
See we one another clearly? Do we know who we are?

Water make the river, river wash the mountain,
Fire make the sunlight, turn the world around.

Heart is of the river, body is the mountain,
Spirit is the sunlight, turn the world around.

We are of the spirit, truly of the spirit,
Only can the spirit turn the world around!

It seems complex when you look at it, but it’s really quite simple – and with some good song leading, you can get a congregation to sing the various parts without freaking out. I think once they get the feel of it, and understand where it goes and what they’re supposed to sing, it becomes a truly joyful, meaningful experience.

—

Well, there it is.

The end of this spiritual practice.

I have some wrap up thoughts, and some thoughts about what’s next, which I’ll share tomorrow.

But for now, well… thanks. Thanks for reading, and thanks for indulging me in the outward expression of my inward spiritual practice. It’s been a pleasure, even on those days when it wasn’t a joy.

Ah, so is life.

 

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Use with care, use with care, use with care.

This song is listed as being generally Native American – which is likely all that the STJ commission could find at the time. A link to the source material, Songs for Earthlings, is now dead.

However, I did a search for the lyrics and discovered that one musician/environmental educator, Hawk Hurst, identified this as being from the Hupa tribe of northern California. There are additional verses in the version he’s printed, including two to grandparents,  and planets and animals showing up too.

The Earth is our Mother, we must take care of her;
The Earth is our Mother, we must take care of her.

Chorus:
heyyunga hoyunga, heyyung yung;
heyyunga hoyunga, heyyung yung

Her sacred ground we walk upon with every step we take;
Her sacred ground we walk upon with every step we take;

Chorus

The Earth is our Mother, she will take care of us;
The Earth is our Mother, she will take care of us;

Chorus

The Sky is our Father, we will take care of him;
the Sky is our Father, we will take care of him.

Chorus

The Sea is our Sister, we will take care of her;
the Sea is our Sister, we will take care of her.

Chorus

The Forest is our Brother, we will take care of him;
the Forest is our Brother, we will take care of him.

Chorus

And I say use with care because the last thing we need to do in our congregations is use this without acknowledging the culture from which it comes. I’ve talked several times throughout this practice about cultural appropriation and the use of music from cultures that are not our own; it’s a danger to just use pieces like this as spectacles – something we drag out once a year – just as it’s a danger to use them without acknowledgement or change the meaning or intent. We do a disservice to these rich cultures that have already been badly treated, and we throw mud in the eye of our first principle. So just… use with care.

Musically, I’m neither here nor there with it. I don’t love this piece, nor do I hate it. It honestly just doesn’t speak to me, despite my high pagan days. I think even then I wasn’t attracted to the native American traditions – I leaned toward the Germanic and Celtic (not surprising, since I’m German and English).  It’s easy to learn and can probably be done in sort of a round style, with the chorus being the second part of the round.

A programming note: tomorrow is the last day of Hymn by Hymn.

I know, right? How did that happen? It seems simultaneously like it was just yesterday and a hundred years ago that I started this spiritual practice. We’ll celebrate our last hymn tomorrow, and I’ll have a wrap up on Thursday, with a preview of what’s next.

—-

Image – ubiquitous view of the coastline of northern California.

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This is the last in our earth chant quodlibet (yes, since relearning the word last week, I’ve rather enjoyed saying it and typing it, especially since it’s appropriate), and it’s been an … interesting side trip. The melodies of the chants are, intentionally, rather simple, and I imagine the complexity builds as you add other chants – especially if you have a strong song leader and an attentive congregation.

But what’s been especially interesting is the question of appropriation. Over these last few days I’ve wondered about (or been called to wonder about) not so much the inclusion of a song from another culture but rather the use of distinctive phrases or lyrics or styles that come from/are reminiscent of the music and spirituality of American Indigenous cultures. And the truth is that for me, I’m not sure today where the line is between inclusion and misappropriation. And…  we can’t know what the discussions were among the compilers of STJ regarding these things – although by the early 2000s they certainly would have been dealing with some of these question, so I expect they chose with care. And, we know that even 12 years on, some things have shifted even more (such an awareness of binary and ableist language). I do know that I sometimes lean on the side of caution, but I would rather be cautious than careless. So… make of this what you will.

The good news, I suppose, is that this last one is rather neutral. It’s a simple tune that could come from anywhere, with language and metaphors that could come from anywhere.  I vaguely remember it from my high pagan days, and knowing that it comes from Circle of Song, I’m not surprised. (That resource was like a hymnal for one pagan group I was involved with.)

Evening breeze, spirit song,
sings to me when the day is done.
Mother earth awakens me
with the heart beat of the sea.

And… that’s it really. A sweet little chant from a great book published in the 1990s that has helped round out STJ’s collection of Sixth Source songs.

And thus endeth the quodlibet.

 

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Way way back on December 16, 2016 – back when this practice was still new – I wrote these words:

I wish I could make sense of this one.  No, seriously. I mean, I get that the lyrics are a rain song, and thus appropriate for a section called The World of Nature. I also get that we want to include voices beyond white men, and thus the hymn led me to learn about Joseph Cotter, Jr, who was an African American playwright and poet who died of tuberculosis at age 24.

But seriously – this too, too simple German tune? … MAYBE this tune sounds okay in a round, but certainly not in a song about dry earth and ancient (I assume native American) drums.

Everything just seems wrong about this.

Well, howdy. I didn’t realize until literally a minute ago that – much like his work on How Sweet the Darkness – had written a much better, much more appropriate tune for these lyrics.

On the dusty earth drum beats the falling rain;
now a whispered murmur, now a louder strain.

Slender, silvery drumsticks on an ancient drum
beat the mellow music bidding life to come.

Chords of life awakened, notes of greening spring,
rise and fall triumphant over everything.

Slender, silvery drumsticks beat the long tattoo —
God, the Great Musician, calling life anew.

The tune that Jason wrote (and which the hymnal commission put together as part of their quodlibet), does echo some of the chant styles we think of as coming from native American tribes, but even without that, the minor key and complexity of the canon works a lot better.

And yet.

I’m not sure even now that I would use it, given the weird conflagration of European American composer, African American lyricist, and sacred imagery that belongs to either (or maybe both?) Native American or African traditions. No offense to Jason, of course – his composition does a whole not more to honor the text than the German-washed-in-the-blood-hymn setting we find in STLT. But even now, I feel uncomfortable as a European American myself considering the use of this without a serious and perhaps belabored content warning.

 

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They say brevity is the source of wit; I can affirm that a stomach flu is the source of brevity.

So I’ll be brief:

The second part of our quodlibet is this chant by Windsong Dianne Martin. As noted on the UUA Song Information page,

This song was written on Spencer’s Butte, Eugene, Oregon in 1985. The composer writes, “I was sitting with my friend David, looking out over the vast view of the Willamette Valley, wondering about the ancient roots of the area, talking about the original native tribes who lived there before the white settlers came. We became quiet and sat in meditation for a long time. I was shifted out of meditation dramatically when I became aware that I was singing the song Mother I Feel You Under My Feet, Mother I Hear Your Heartbeat. I sang it for a long time and was very moved by the experience.”

And here are the lyrics:

Mother I feel you under my feet,
Mother I hear your heart beat,

Chorus:
Heya heya heya ya heya heya ho,
Heya heya heya heya heya ho

Mother I hear you in the river song,
Eternal waters flowing on and on,

Chorus

Father I see you when the eagle flies,
Light of the Spirit, gonna take us higher.

Chorus

I wrestle again, as I always do on these pages, with the exclusively binary language and always wish for “parent” to be one of the verses along with “mother” and “father”… but of course that wasn’t a consideration then, nor is it appropriate to just change a living composer’s lyrics.

Anyway. It’s a good tune and an easy thing to sing – it’s not written as a canon or round but it would certainly work like that if you were not doing the quodlibet thing.

—

Photo of the view from Spencer’s Butte by Tess Freeman/Oregon Daily Emerald.

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Sometimes the universe likes to prepare you in advance for something you will need. In some cases, it’s the impulse buy that comes in handy later that month, or a song you hear that the choir director asks you to sing a week later, or in my case, it’s a conversation on Wednesday that leads to your mentor looking for a different word and stumbling upon Dictionary.com’s word of the day, “quodlibet,” then talking about how it’s probably something I learned in music theory classes when I was young but have forgotten the term for…. and now here we are, a quodlibet set before us.

“But Kimberley, it’s a short chant. How can it be a quodlibet?”

Well, it’s….

“Hate to interrupt, but what the heck is a quodlibet?”

I’m so glad you asked. You see, a quodlibet is “a composition consisting of two or more independent and harmonically complementary melodies, usually quotations of well-known tunes, played or sung together, usually to different texts, in a polyphonic arrangement.” Dictionary.com suggests it is humorous, but I don’t think it has to be – Ysaye Barnwell leads communities of singers in quodlibets of spirituals, and those are quite moving.

Anyway, the whole reason this comes up is that there’s a note at the bottom of this chant – a traditional Navajo prayer – that reads “all of the earth chants, numbers 1069-1072, may be sung at the same time.” And handily, they are all in the same key (C), with the same number of bars (8), and honestly with the same basic theme (connecting to earth, sky, and spirit).

What I love about making a quodlibet out of these songs is that it blends themes from various traditions, along with imagery and language. Not all is gendered – although I totally get why some of it is. Some is true chant in that there are only a few words (like today’s). Others in this set are chant-like but have multiple verses. But all of them are easy to learn and easy to blend.

Today’s is a simple but powerful piece invoking the feminine divine; it’s up to you to decide if it’s about the earth, or about god, or about something else entirely… but it is powerful and beautiful.

Ancient Mother, I hear you calling.
Ancient Mother, I hear your song.
Ancient Mother, I feel your laughter.
Ancient Mother, I taste your tears.

You can hear a version of it by Libana from their album A Circle is Cast here.

Update: In my rush to get to a meeting, I neglected to address the need for care on this piece (thanks to Kristin Grassel Schmidt for noting the oversight):

This chant is from the Navajo tradition, a people who lived in the area we now know as New Mexico. They suffered centuries of colonization and conquest from Europeans, but unlike many native American tribes, they still live for the most part on their ancestral land.

The chant we have above is more than likely part of a much larger religious event called a ‘chantway.’ According to NavajoIndian.net,

The Navajo culture is big into ceremonies and rituals. Their performances are usually four days, two days, or one day. Although some chants could be as long as nine days and require dozens of helpers. The most important ceremonies are the ones for treatment of ills, mental and physical. The Navajo are also very big into nature, so almost every act of their life is a ceremony of nature, including their building of the hogan, or the planting of the crops. All the Navajo culture ceremonies are included with songs and prayers.

In the Navajo culture and traditions there are over 24 different Chantway ceremonies performed by singers, and over twelve hundred different sandpainting designs that are available to the medicine men.

I think it’s important to keep in mind that this chant is distinctive to the Navajo, and that we must use care to not assume a ubiquitous “native American” tradition. Just as the Irish are not the Scottish are not the English, the Navajo are not the Hopi are not the Iroquois.

—

Painting is by Navajo artist Tony Abeyta. Learn more about his artwork here.

 

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This may be one of the most elegantly crafted songs in our hymnals.

I mean no offense to other composers who read this, or to those songs that are also beloved. But there is something absolutely wondrous in this composition by Carolyn McDade.

On its surface, the song is another earth based song of praise and wonder. And a quick listen to the tune suggests it might be an old melody from the British Isles. And on their own, that’s plenty. There’s a great deal of gorgeousness contained within, expressing McDade’s vision of interdependence. As quoted on the UUA Song Information page, McDade writes:

“Earth shakes out a mantle of green—each blade of grass true to the integrity within, yet together with others is the rise of spring from winter’s urging. Our coming is with the grass—the common which persists, unexalted, but with the essence of life. Our humanness, our rhythms and dreams, the faith which nurtures our ardent love and hope for life—all this we share with earth community, of which we are natural and connected beings.”

This song is certainly that:

My blood doth rise in the roots of yon oak, her sap doth run in my veins.
Boundless my soul like the open sky where the stars forever have lain.
Where the stars, where the stars, where the stars forever have lain.

My hands hold the weavings of time without end, my sight as deep as the sea.
Beating, my heart sounds the measures of old, that of love’s eternity.
That of love, that of love, that of love’s eternity.

I feel the tides as they answer the moon, rushing on a far distant sand.
Winging my song is the wind of my breast and my love blows over the land.
And my love, and my love, and my love blows over the land.

My foot carries days of the old into new, our dreaming shows us the way.
Wondrous our faith settles deep in the earth, rising green to bring a new day.
Rising green, rising green, rising green to bring a new day.

But what’s elegant is the way the tune and lyric paint a feeling, an image, a texture, a sense of movement. It begins at the end of the first line of each verse… “sap doth run in my veins”… “sight as deep as the sea”… “rushing on a far distant sand”…”dreaming shows us the way” – each of those phrases evoking something bigger than ourselves, held open with a dotted half note, not ended quickly on the quarter note you were expecting. And then the next phrase soars up a fourth, an arpeggio in the bass clef leading the way, opening up the melody almost like a miracle, with “boundless” and “beating” and “winging” and “wondrous” giving language to that moment of opening and arrival. In the singing and listening, you can hear a sense of hope and release and movement, as the phrase settles back into the notes the verse began with, almost like a wave, or a sudden breeze, or an epiphany.

It is so elegantly crafted. I am in awe.

I should note that I’ve never used this as a congregational song, only as a solo, so I don’t know how easily it’s picked up. I’d like to think this one isn’t too hard, and I hope it’s not taken too slowly or too quickly – or people will miss the beauty that McDade’s piece evokes.

 

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One of the things I love best about pagan ritual is the embodiment of creating sacred space. It’s not just about entering a room and calling it sacred, it’s about being present to the physicality of the room, recognizing our connection to and grounding as part of creation, and visualizing the protective and enlivening presence of the immanent divine. There is intention in creating that sacred space, that ‘time out of time, place out of place’ where we can meet that which we call holy. In some circles, participants are asked to face in the four directions as we ‘call’ them into our presence. And as we do, we do have the sense that we are visualizing the energetic circle being formed around us.

That embodiment is reflected beautifully in this piece by UU composer Amanda Udis-Kessler; her lyrics connect us humans to the interdependent web not just as things to see but as things to feel and be changed by.

Mother Earth, beloved garden, living treasure under foot,
All our days you ground our being: sage and thistle, grass and root.
Herbs to heal us, plants to feed us, land to till and tend and plow.
With the pendant, deep as midnight, North we ask you: be here now.

Father Air, your inspiration holds together all that lives.
As we breathe, our minds see clearly, leading us to love and give.
Raging whirlwind, whispered breezes, violent gale and gentle cloud.
With the blade as sharp as morning, East we ask you: be here now.

Brother Fire, great transformer, share the passion of the sun.
In our hearths, your warmth revives us, cooks our food and heats our homes.
Flaming candle, blood within us, blazing desert, will to grow.
With the wand, directing power, South we ask you: be here now.

Sister Water, ever flowing, ocean, river, pond and rain.
Drink we now and quench our thirsting, cleanse us, we begin again.
Mist and ice, a host of changes, all that courage will allow.
With the cup, the holy chalice, West we ask you, be here now.

Lover Spirit, intuition in the center of our souls.
In your love we find relation. All connected, we are whole.
Timeless mystery, quiet conscience, deepest values, voice inside.
With the drum and with the cauldron, this we ask you, be our guide.

I really like this piece. It’s great, of course, for calling the directions to set sacred space. But it’s also great for talking about how we connect to the planet we call home. Of course, there are issues with the binary language – another case of how far we have come in just 13 years. I’m not sure what to replace them with, and I don’t know if our composer has considered a change, but I hope she has.

Meanwhile, it’s lovely to sing, easy to play, and a definite keeper.

 

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Rejected intro paragraphs:

This makes me think of Greg Greenway, Joe Jencks, and Pat Wictor – the members of the musical group Brother Sun. Except they’ve broken up now, and any memory I have of them has nothing to do with the song.

It’s nice to have a song that’s good to call the directions with…except…wait… huh. I don’t know how you’d do that physically. Never mind.

Let’s start right off with the ugly truth: there’s a lot of binary language. Because I am Captain Obvious.

Who doesn’t love a Scottish melody – because if it isn’t Scottish, it’s crap! Yeah, now I’m just getting silly. Plus, actor/comedian Mike Myers is notoriously a massive, impossible jerk and that’s why he doesn’t make movies anymore.

Well, folks, I’m out of ideas. This song doesn’t move me one way or another, and I can’t seem to find a way in. So… let’s just star. This song, by Sharon Anway, has some nice metaphors for elements of life…

O Brother Sun, you bring us light, all shining ‘round in fiery might.
O Sister Moon, you heal and bless, your beauty shines in tenderness.
O Brother Wind, you sweep the hills, your mighty breath both freshens and fills.
O Sister Water, you cleanse and flow through rivers and streams, in ice and snow.

O Brother Fire, you warm our night with all your dancing colored light.
O Sister Earth, you feed all things, all birds, all creatures, all scales and wings.
O Sister Death, you meet us here and take us to our God so near.
O God of Life, we give you praise for all your creatures, for all your ways.

…which are, by and large, the work of Francis of Assisi. Now normally I’d be cooing over stuff by this particular monk/mystic/saint, because I was born on his feast day and tend to like his mystic writings. But this one has always left me cold. Anway’s setting doesn’t help. The fact that it’s a list doesn’t help either. When we talk about hymns doing some work to get us from one state to another, this one gets me from unchecked-off list to checked-off list without anything actually being accomplished.

Ho hum.

And I’m very likely alone on this. That’s fine. I’m not a fan of it, I struggle to find a way to use it. But blessed are those who do.

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From so much to say to little to say. (Which is, of course, the nature of spiritual practice.)

This is a lovely tune, by  Pablo Fernández Badillo, a Puerto Rican lay minister and federal judge who held various positions in the Puerto Rican government. Yet it is his time as a missionary that led to his songwriting (with 104 hymns published in Himnario Criollo); this song is one of many written in a folk style.

According to the UUA Song Information page,  “Alabanza celebrates the glory of the Creator in the magnificent flowering of the natural world. This nature is filled with the particular accents of Badillo’s homeland, the duende (a smallish, purple flower) and the coquí (a small frog-like animal that makes singing sounds). Alabanza is one of 104 hymns Badillo published in 1977 in Himnario Criollo.”

Spanish:
Al caer la lluvia resurge con verdor,
toda la floresta. ¡Renueva la creación!
Mira el rojo lirio; el duende ya brotó.
¡Bella primavera que anuncia su fulgor!
Toda flor silvestre, la maya, el cundeamor.
¡Todo manifiesta la gloria de mi Dios!

El ‘coquí’ se alegra, se siente muy feliz.
Canta en su alabanza: “coquí, coquí, coquí.”
El pitirre canta y trina el ruiseñor.
¡Cuán alegremente alaban al Creador!
¡Cómo se te alaba en toda la creación!
Yo quisiera hacerlo en forma igual mi Dios.

English:
As the rain is falling, the forest is reborn,
All the fields are verdant; creation is renewed.
Look at the red lily; the ‘duende’ now has bloomed:
Beautiful the springtime, its brilliance showing forth.
Now all of the wildflowers are singing new songs of love,
All manifest surely the glory of our God!

The ‘coquí’ is cheerful, and filled with joy is he,
As he sings the praises: “Coquí, coquí, coquí.”
Mocking bird is chirping, as is the nightingale,
Sounding joyful anthems, a symphony of praise.
How all of creation reflects the glory of God!
I also would offer my songs in praise to God.

I’m sad to say I’m woefully unfamiliar with this one – it seems like a joyous celebration and yet also seems to call for reverence. Truth is, however you perform it, it’ll be a beautiful ode to creation.