Posted by Bryan Moyer Suderman on Mar 27, 2012
Here’s an introduction that Brian McLaren and Dave Csinos have written for the new project I’m working on (aiming to have it ready for release at the “Children, Youth, and a New Kind of Christianity” (CYNKC) conference in Washington, D.C. in May). We dream of a church (and a world) in which the young and old (and everyone in between) join hands as they walk in the way of Jesus. But so many resources seem to divide the faith community into different age groups instead of uniting us in a common mission. Bryan Moyer Suderman’s music invites many generations to come together to sing a new song to the Lord. Bryan takes up the challenge of uniting the old and the young, the tall and the small, with songs of faith that echo the depth, beauty, struggle, complexity, and unconventionality of walking in the way of Jesus. Bryan is a minstrel, a prophet, a visionary, and a follower of Jesus who invites listeners of all ages to join him in “infiltrating the world with the love of God.” His music is captivating, his lyrics are theologically-rich and thought-provoking, and his voice invites us all to live God’s kingdom wherever we are. Whether reminding us that we are “Disciples-in-Training” or encouraging us to “Take Good Care” of the earth, Bryan’s music offers a glimpse of a new kind of Christianity, one in which the tall and small join together to worship God, disciple one another, and seek peace and justice in the world. This new collection of Bryan’s songs is drawn from five albums released over the past ten years. We like to think of it as a “best of” album, not only because these songs have become favorites in homes, congregations, and communities around the world, but also because they offer some of the best messages that a new kind of Christianity has to share with our world, messages of peace, justice, unity, curiosity, responsibility, and cooperation. Brian McLaren – Author, Speaker, Activist Dave Csinos – Founder of...
Read More »
Posted by Bryan Moyer Suderman on Mar 13, 2012
When I opened my Inbox this morning I found three different messages (from three different people) with stories of how a song of mine has touched them or proven useful to their community. An online devotional reflecting on the text of “You’re Not Alone,” and the experience of singing (and hearing/receiving) it in the company of many others… a pastor sharing a sermon structured around the refrain “When You Learn To Follow Jesus (You Will Act A Little Strange)… and another pastor looking forward to singing “New World Coming” with her congregation, as she prepares to preach an apocalyptic text… All this, as I continue to ruminate on the sermon that I heard at yet another church last Sunday, which has sparked at least 2 or 3 new song ideas that I am looking forward to delving into… Amazing how this works… reminds me of the “water cycle” (or “carbon cycle” or “nitrogen cycle”) depicted in my son’s science textbooks… what goes around comes around… maybe we can call it the “inspiration...
Read More »
Posted by Bryan Moyer Suderman on Feb 27, 2012
Judging by the many friends who are going on a “Facebook Fast” for Lent, I am tempted to observe, given my very infrequent blogging as of late, that perhaps I should give up NOT blogging as a Lenten discipline this year… (GRIN). Well, I won’t promise any kind of dramatic up-tick in blog posts, but there are some significant developments in this music ministry that I want to let you know about. The mission statement of SmallTall Music is “to build up the body of Christ by creating and sharing songs of faith for small and tall.” 10 years on, this continues to describe very well what this music ministry is all about, I remain passionately committed to this mission (sporadic blogging notwithstanding), and am grateful to have such humble-but-important work to do, and so many colleagues and co-conspirators in the cause. Waaaay back, when I was first dreaming what it might look like to take this songwriting thing seriously as my “main thing” instead of as a “side thing,” I was doing a lot of thinking about the nuts-and-bolts of how such a ministry might be structured, including its economic structure. Fairly early on, the diagram came to include 5 main “revenue streams,” and this “business model” has remained remarkably durable: Performances, CD sales (which has come to include songbooks and digital downloads), Publishing, Special Projects (a bit of a “catch-all” category for one-off contract work that comes up from time to time), and the Membership system. As far as a “business model” goes, it’s that last category – based on the “community supported agriculture” or CSA model – that I saw as the most innovative, and that I hoped would grow to be a major means of support for the long term viability and sustainability of this music ministry. I thought about it a great deal, blogged about it quite a bit (here’s a series of blog posts, if you’re curious), worked hard to envision an economic structure that could be coherent with my faith and my values and the way I understand my music ministry to function. Much to my surprise, I found this thinking/dreaming/analyzing/strategizing to be an energizing creative outlet in itself! These were the days before Facebook… days when it took a lot of time and energy to explain to most people what “community supported agriculture” was, much less to try to describe what I had in mind by adapting this model to a form of “community supported music.” After working on this idea for a few years, I officially launched my “CSM,” invited people to join, and made my first “delivery of songs” in October 2006. Since then I have made 19 “deliveries” of songs to the “members” of SmallTall Music – some 60 new, original songs over that time, including mp3 audio files, lyrics, chords, notation, thoughts and reflections and activity ideas...
Read More »
Posted by Bryan Moyer Suderman on Nov 2, 2011
One of the delights of “doing what I do” is when someone else teaches me my song. This happens so often, and in so many ways. It happens in the recording studio, when we’re crafting an arrangement of a song that, in many cases, I’ve been singing for a long time. But then one of the musicians I’m working with will bring something new to the table – an instrumental riff, a structural tweak, a change of tempo or “feel” – and suddenly the song is new for me and will never be the same again. I have been taught my own song, by someone who has picked it up and played it in their own way. This is how Steve Hogg “taught me” Listen Up People (the picking pattern/counter-melody that forever changed the way I play/sing it), and how Darrin Schott “taught me” New World Coming (the little guitar “tag” at the front end of that song that has now become a “hook” that I use throughout), how J.K. Gulley and Rick Hutt “taught me” Take Heart (the slowed-down tempo and slightly revised structure that salvaged the song from the dustbin and landed it at the heart of the new CD). Even more amazing and fulfilling, to me, is when I am “taught my own song” by a community that has embraced it, and sings it, and adapted it in whatever way to become part of who they are as a community. I’ve just come back from two weeks on the road (one week in Ohio, and another in Manitoba), where I experienced this repeatedly: – in Stryker, Ohio, where they “taught me” Take Good Care as a simple refrain sung by the children, with actions… and “Peace Be With You” – again with their own actions and way that they have developed to use this song to bless one another. – in Portage La Prairie, Manitoba, with the request to sing “God’s Love is for Everybody” as part of a sending/commissioning service for a family moving to a different community… the moving way this commissioning was done brought out multiple meanings and levels in the song that I hadn’t realized were there… – in Brandon, Manitoba, where the community sent me out after the concert by singing to me, as a congregation, my own “Sending Song,” as a blessing on my way (and a blessing for each concert-goer on their way)… – in Archbold, Ohio, where after the concert the pastor approached me and asked for notation and words for the song “For Just Such A Time” because she wanted it sung at her ordination service the following week. It had become her song already… – and on and on and on it goes. A few years ago I was doing a concert in Saskatoon, and a little girl was in the front row with her family....
Read More »
Posted by Bryan Moyer Suderman on Sep 13, 2011
I have been invited to lead music in worship at a conference next May in Washington DC called “Children, Youth and a New Kind of Christianity.” The event is being organized by Dave Csinos and Brian McLaren, and here’s the event’s home page, with a video clip of Brian McLaren introducing the theme. Contributors include Tony Campolo, Shane Claiborne, Jim and Joy Wallis, and others… I’m guessing that if you’re reading this blog you likely have an interest/passion for this agenda as well… I’m looking forward to it and I hope you can come...
Read More »
