Hallelujah

[pmcd9]

My mother posted a link to this on her Facebook wall.  I expected it to be the Hallelujah chorus and not the Lenard Cohen song.

I never thought of this song as being Christian in anyway even though it uses much Christian imagery..  Is this a case of not understanding what they are singing.  Well obviously the little girl doesn't know, but her parents or whoever is pulling her strings is who I am referring to.  Are they simply hearing what they want to hear, some vaguely religious words and a achingly beautiful melody, and ignoring what the song is really about.  Or is it more complex than that? 

I'm trying to be kind and not simply laugh at the dumb Christians getting it wrong again.  On the one hand, who wouldn't love this song, it's one of the most beautiful songs ever written.  On the other hand, I don't think I'd like to see it hijacked by Christians. 

Would you guys care to help me sort out my mixed feelings about this?

[Asherdan]

That song has been mauled over by a lot of other people, too. It's OK to share, Paul, and let them take from it what they will. It doesn't diminish anything.

[jay-ell]

I couldn't get through past the first minute of overwrought eight-year-old-kid-wailing, but I know the song. I think of it as a secular tune, but Christianity has a long tradition of taking secular music and re-purposing it for worship.

The difference between a love song for another human being and a love song for a Deity is small, indeed. One of my favorite contemporary worship songs could easily, with a couple of word changes, be a secular love ballad. And as a Christian, I would not be offended if a popular artist took it and performed it as such -- though I imagine there are some Christians who would be.

Remember the song "Flood?" It was played on our local "alternative" radio station, but Jars of Clay bills themselves as a Christian band (and in fact most of the other tracks on that album are overtly religious). It's all a matter of interpretation, and I'm all for people listening to music in whatever way speaks to them personally, regardless of the original artists' intent.  

[wombat]

I would like to make it illegal to record children singing. There are plenty of things you can't do till you are a grownup and I think this should be one of them.

[AugustWest]

but...but... it's an eight year old with a speech impediment singing.   It must be about Jesus!

[Carlos del Vaca]

I'm not about to watch that. But did he sing this verse:

Well there was a time when you let me know
What's really going on below
But now you never show that to me do you?
And remember when I moved in you
And the holy dove was moving too
And every breath we drew was Hallelujah

[jay-ell]

Two alternate versions of the tune that I really adore:

Instrumental (string trio): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_SZp_L3q4c

And its polar opposite, the all-female a capella version: http://www.myspace.com/takenoteladies

Both stunningly beautiful. Both routinely move me to tears, no matter how many times I hear them. It's kind of frightening.

[pmcd9]

I would like to make it illegal to record children singing. There are plenty of things you can't do till you are a grownup and I think this should be one of them.

Children singing can be beautiful... when they are singing like children. 

[Asherdan]

I'm especially partial to these kids.

[side_show]

The thing about Leonard Cohen is that much of his work draws correlation between the sacrid and the erotic, and this song does so... I read somewhere that Cohen said that after Rufus Wainright's cover of the song that he felt that it shouldn't be covered anymore because Wainright had done the best cover possible.  Since the K.D. Lang version at the winter Olympics there has been another explosion of cover versions and Cohen is asking that people stop covering it, but no one seems to be listening.

[greenkoolayd]

I would like to make it illegal to record children singing. There are plenty of things you can't do till you are a grownup and I think this should be one of them.

youre like that preacher/dad from 'footloose'.

[Asherdan]

youre like that preacher/dad from 'footloose'.

Hey man, am I hallucinating again or are they putting out a remake of that thing?

[wombat]

I'm especially partial to these kids

OK, I will make an exception for children who are trained to sing via beatings.

[greenkoolayd]

Hey man, am I hallucinating again or are they putting out a remake of that thing?

i heard that lame news, as well.

[miles]

Hey man, am I hallucinating again or are they putting out a remake of that thing?

You're not! That's crazy.

I never thought of this song as being Christian in anyway even though it uses much Christian imagery

Seems really odd to me, too. He's Jewish and all of the references are to the Hebrew bible.

But yeah, people give songs their own meanings. Nothing new there.