Protestant Blog Ethic

Lutheran Pastor/Musician Herb Brokering died on Saturday, November 7, 2009

2009-11-09T13:40:00.003-06:00

I only met Herb once, at a book signing he did in the Augsburg Fortress Bookstore at the ELCA Youth Gathering in St. Louis in 2000. Sometimes I tell that story when I'm playing a concert, and I always say "I felt like I was meeting Paul McCartney."

Herb has been a role model of mine since the LBW was published in 1978 and I heard his hymn "Earth and All Stars" for the first time. Not long after that I began to hear stories about Herb at Fortune Lake Lutheran Camp, where I was a camper. Our camp director, Pastor Cy Warmanen, would frequently tell stories about his adventures with Herb on trips behind the Iron Curtain, when they'd play guitar and sing illegal hymns out in public and in the East Berlin subway system, despite armed guards standing around. Those kinds of stories made a big impression on me when I was in middle school.

Later on, when I was in my early 20s, I had the opportunity to make a couple trips myself over to former East Germany and Poland. Frequently when I'd arrive in a village, the locals would show me around and say "Herb Brokering and a group of American youth built this church building" or youth center, or camp site, etc. Herb's impact was staggering, and everybody loved him.

Herb's hymn "Earth and All Stars" is probably the one hymn that I have sung most in my entire life. It's a huge favorite of mine, and I never get sick of it. I've played it in concert ever since I started playing solo two decades ago. In fact, there's even a clip on YouTube of me playing it...I'll post it below. Thanks Herb, for making the world a better place, and much more fun, joyous, and musical.

Free MP3 "German Flag" commemorating the Berlin Wall anniversary

2009-11-06T19:13:00.006-06:00

On November 9, 1989 the Berlin Wall came down. I remember being on tour with a Lutheran youth singing group and seeing the images on the front page of a newspapers in those vendor boxes they have at gas stations. I was only 18, so I didn't appreciate the gravity of the situation at the time.

A year later the situation in reunited Germany took on personal significance for me because the band I was in had been booked on a three month tour in former West and East Germany. By Summer of 1991, just nineteen months after the Wall fell, I was in Berlin myself walking along what was left of that concrete barrier.

In early 1991, before the trip to Germany, I had the idea to write a song connecting German reunification to a romantic drama. I remember staying up late at night after playing a concert in American Falls, Idaho (I was sleeping in an RV in somebody's driveway), and writing out

song lyrics for "German Flag."

After the Europe tour, and return to the states, I finally got around to writing some guitar riffs and vocal melodies to go with my lyric idea, and by 1993 I had a cassette 4-track demo recorded of the song. By Summer of 1994 I was recording my second album Wherever at This Here Studio in Iowa, and I recorded a stripped-down acoustic version of "German Flag" with drummer Lowell Michelson playing a small drum kit and various percussion instruments. The song appeared on the Wherever album, and I played the song regularly for a few years.

When the Wherever album went out of print in the late '90s I retired the song "German Flag" and it vanished from my setlists. I always had a positive feeling towards the song, however...it was one of the more advanced compositions that I came up with in those early years. Some pretty involved lyrical symbolism, a modal melody and chord structure (phrygian or what?), and an alternate chorus that appears after the second verse. It always seemed to me that the song deserved a big electric-band interpretation.

In 2005 I was working on what would become the album Protestant Rock Ethic, and drummer Lowell Michelson was at my house doing percussion tracks. Lowell had played on the original version of "German Flag," so I knew that he knew the song...it was the perfect opportunity to capture a new recording of it. Lowell's drumming was excellent, as always, and I saved his performance on my computer for future use.

Finally, after putting "German Flag" on the back burner for another few years, I finally got around to completing it in 2009, eighteen years after I started writing the song. This past January I was working in my friend Dave's home studio (where I had recorded most of Public Library in 2003) and I added guitar and bass to Lowell's drum track. Then, this past August while in my hometown of Ishpeming, MI, I set up my laptop in the now-empty house of my Grandparents and recorded vocals and tambourine. The song was done! My long-time mixing engineer John Simshauser mixed the song yesterday. And here it is, just in time to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Download the song at my Audio Page, and read the lyrics below:

GERMAN FLAG

words and music by Jonathan Rundman

cp1994 Salt Lady Music (ASCAP)

you say those words to me as we talk about the past

you say that it don't matter anymore

you say that we can set aside the way we used to be

forget about the way it was before

there's unity on paper but tension in the air

if I said this would be easy I'd be lying

it's a different kind of love now with a whole lot more to lose

the German flag is what I think we're flying

one plus one is one now, they say that's how it goes

when the banner hanging over you is love

I don't want to lose myself when I lose myself in you

I see other colors flying up above

German flag, black as ink on paper

German flag, red like my tired eyes

German flag, gold like the ring on my finger

I'm hoping and I'm praying we survive

if you drew a map of us maybe you could see

we can be together and apart

'cause I can't stand to see the loss of our identities

and I can't afford another broken heart

there's unity on paper but tension in the air

if I said this would be easy I'd be lying

it's a different kind of love now with a whole lot more to lose

the German flag is what I think we're flying

"Continental Divide" performed by Jonathan Rundman and band

2009-11-03T22:14:00.002-06:00

Here's a YouTube clip of one of my favorite original songs, "Continental Divide." John Kerns (bass), Troy Alexander (drums), and I performed this back in August at The Beat Coffeehouse in Uptown, Minneapolis, MN. I'm really pleased with our performance.

This peppy little number was co-written by me and my cousin Bruce Rundman back in the Summer of 1996. We were playing at a convention at Finlandia University in Hancock, MI (the birthplace of both of us) and we stayed up late one night and wrote the song. Bruce had the title and concept, inspired by his internship in North Dakota where he spent some time serving as the late-shift chaplain at the State psychiatric hospital. We loaded the lyrics with sneaky references...for example, the "Delco Radio" and the "four-door Buick" are shout-outs to our Grandpa Rundman who drove that car. And I love the random mention of Baltimore!

I was searching Google Images on the continental divide when I was surprised to find a photo of the actual road sign we describe in the song, with the same elevation number: "standing here at 1490"

The recording that appears on my Best of the 20th Century album is one of my favorite recorded moments as well. In August of 2000, right after the release of the Sound Theology album, I traveled back to Upper Michigan with my Sony Minidisc 4-track recorder, and captured my brother Tim playing the drum part in Ishpeming, and I drove up to South Range to get Bruce's vocal. Later I added harmony vocals and electric guitar, and much later in about 2005 I had John Kerns play bass. It's a simple, but hard rocking recording, and I never get tired of listening to it.

CONTINENTAL DIVIDE

500 miles from line to line
a thousand weather vanes
i think i've seen this place before
northern central plains
long nights at the hospital
long days out of touch
never thought she'd lie to me
never thought i'd lose so much

at the continental divide
east and west collide
and every road i tried led to somewhere
now i know she lied
and still i can't decide
at the continental divide going nowhere

it's a long way to baltimore
and straight down a quarter mile
i could call there for advice
but i never dial
stading here at 1490 i expected more
but all i got was endless grain
and nothing more than poor

i don't even think about her
i don't even care
out here in this nothingland
another mile square
i got a delco radio
i use to keep me sane
i got a four-door buick
in the open outside lane

Facebook is killing this blog.

2009-11-03T21:22:00.004-06:00

I don't recall exactly when I started using Facebook. Maybe around Christmastime of last year?

Anyway, in 2009 I noticed that Facebook was THE best way for me to promote concerts, share updates with fans from the road, talk about my musical work and family life, etc. Plus it's waaaay faster and easier than blogging. So I've not been very motivated to slog it out on the blog lately.

However, I continue to be inspired by the bloggers I do encounter. Last month I went to an emerging church conference called Christianity 21 and there I heard from dozens of folks who are serious bloggers, and who really do nice online writing. And I have friends and acquaintances, too, who write excellent blogs. The new post from Nate Houge is a fine, fine example.

So what is the future of Protestant Blog Ethic? I think it'll continue to be a place where I post and comment on YouTube clips (watch for a new clip of my band playing "Continental Divide" coming later this evening), and I suppose I'll always resurface for the occasional long and detailed rant, when the content won't fit in a Facebook status update. If you want regular and concise updates about my musical adventures, my best suggestion is to become a FAN at my Facebook musician Page.

Of course, I'd love to have the time to blog seriously each day. I've got pages and pages of content in my brain just waiting to blow. Some things I'd love to dig into:

+ the big vote at ELCA Churchwide Assembly this past August

+ reviews of my favorite albums

+ thoughts on the music industry

+ discussions on the craft of songwriting/recording

If any of you reading this are big showbiz/media sugardaddies, and you'd like to pay me full time to blog (and help me cover a few hours of childcare each day), help me be an online journalist, seek out and cultivate readership, etc., I'd love to do it. Email me at rundman@gmail.com if you'd like to make me the next Diablo Cody. Or whatever. Until then, I'll try to maintain my indie-folk showbiz career while changing the preschooler's diapers and getting my kindergartener off to the bus stop. And maybe blogging once in a while.

My song used in World Yo-Yo Contest competition

2009-08-30T16:11:00.001-06:00

Mike Hout from Ohio has been a big supporter of my music for many years. He's also one of the best jugglers and yo-yo experts in the country. Here he is earlier this month competing at the World Yo-Yo contest (Spinning Top, specifically), with my song "No One Does The Things My Lord Can Do" from the Protestant Rock Ethic album as his soundtrack. Oh, and he's competing on stilts, as well.

Maybe I should retitle the song "No One Does The Things Mike Hout Can Do."

As a songwriter, it's really incredible to see how the songs take on a life of their own after they're released to the public. I never could've imagined my music being a part of an event like this! Thanks, Mike!

My song "Minneapolis" being used as transition music for PGA Tour TV broadcast!

2009-08-14T15:04:00.005-06:00

My phone has been ringing this past hour, with people telling me that my song "Minneapolis" is being used as transition music during the television broadcast of the PGA Golf Tournament! Yee haw!

Different friends of mine have heard the song at different times, so I'm hoping the producers will be using the song throughout this entire weekend's broadcast of the tournament.

If you're planning on watching it, keep your ears peeled for the song, and email me with the details of when and where it was used!

If you've never heard my music before, but you searched out the song online, please check out info on my music career at http://www.jonathanrundman.com

The song being used for the PGA Tour broadcast is called "Minneapolis" and it's from my album Sound Theology. You can buy the album from me, or at Amazon, or download it at the iTunes music store.

Below are the lyrics for the song, the shortest song I've ever written:

MINNEAPOLIS

yeah it's fine

we all got friends there

the men are polite

the women have blonde hair

but when people move there

they never leave there

minneapolis

words and music by Jonathan Rundman, CP 2000 Salt Lady Music (ASCAP)

My version of the Styx song "Come Sail Away" appears on cover song blog!

2009-08-13T14:28:00.006-06:00

A year or so ago I discovered a really cool music blog that specializes in folky cover tunes, Cover Lay Down. I've been introduced to some great acts and awesome recordings on this site, and I'm pleased to announce that this week they're featuring me, along with some other excellent folk artists like Richard Shindell, Ollabelle, and Tim O'Brien.

The cover song of mine is "Come Sail Away," originally by Styx, and taken from the Styx Tribute album Too Much Time On Our Hands, released back in 2003. CLICK HERE to go to Cover Lay Down and download the MP3, which will be available for a short period of time.

If you like my version of this Styx classic, I'd encourage you to buy the album itself, by clicking here and getting it from my webpage. The tribute CD features some amazing covers by some of my favorite musicians and friends, including Beki Hemingway, Echelon, Jeff Krebs, Dag Juhlin, and my personal fave on the album, Tom Freund and Jon Brion doing "Blue Collar Man."

Recent appearances in Lutheran publications

2009-08-08T09:29:00.003-06:00

My wife, Dr. Dawn Rundman, and I have each appeared in Lutheran church publications this Summer, and one blurb is even driving traffic to this here blog, so I thought I'd let my readers know what's been cookin'.

Dawn wrote an article for the July/August issue of the magazine Lutheran Partners. The piece is called "Ministry for the Sippy Cup Set" and you can click here to read it. Also included in that issue is Dawn's helpful list for "Building Bible Literacy In Kids" which you can read by clicking here.

As for me, I just got a shout-out in the July/August issue of Seeds for the Parish, a resource newspaper for Lutheran congregations that's published six times per year. The issue contains a feature on Lutheran blogs, including this very one, Protestant Blog Ethic. Check out the article which can be read here, courtesy of blogger Pastor Chris Duckworth at Lutheran Zephyr.

Dawn and I are always appreciative of the support we've received from our denomination and its media outlets. We love organzied religion!

I was a judge for the Colgate Country Showdown!

2009-07-06T09:19:00.002-06:00

On July 4th I got to be a judge for the Colgate Country Showdown, sort of a country-radio version of American Idol. The winners advance to the regionals, and then national competition where they get to sing in Nashville at the Ryman Auditorium with Leann Rimes.

Here I am with the other judges, both professional singers. Bobby, the guy in the middle, toured as a backup singer for Kenny Rogers and had some interesting stories.

We heard 16 contestants (14 of them who were women, only 2 men) and they ranged from pretty lame to pretty awesome. And some just pretty. I heard more Taylor Swift and Carrie Underwood songs than I'd ever heard in my life previously. A few of the teenaged beauty-pageant types were loaded with potential: a couple more years of experience, some guitar lessons, and a good producer, and we could have some stars on our hands.
Here's Anna Reynolds, my favorite performer of the day. An 18 year old with a real hippie vibe, and a great voice not unlike Allison Moorer. Deep vocals, with a lot of vibrato...kind of a surprising sound coming out of her. Her image was not "mainstream country" but she was definitely the coolest act in the competition. Unfortunately the other judges must not have appreciated her, 'cause she didn't even make the top 3, despite my high score.

The winner was a Tim McGraw clone who had the country-stud image down perfectly (including the giant hat), and a truly incredible singing voice, complete with all the twang and yelps and honkeytonk hiccups. He was my third-highest vote getter. He'll go on to compete in the regionals.

It was nice to see some young Yoopers pursuing their showbiz dreams!

Piispani, ole hyvä!

2009-05-23T12:51:00.001-06:00

Church-nerds in America may have seen the "Take My Bishop" application on Facebook, where you can forward a photo of your own area Pastor-to-the-Pastors to anybody you want.

Apparently this same Application has been created for Bishops in Finland, and this YouTube video has been posted as well.

The background music is "No Matter" by Lost And Found from their Something Different album. I produced that recording, and that's me you hear on bass, and Pastor Lowell Michelson on drums, in addition to George Baum on piano and Michael Bridges on electric guitar. Cool connections abound!

"The Princess..." performed in 1999!

2009-05-11T20:05:00.002-06:00

Continuing the series of video posts from the orchestra show I played 10 years ago when I lived in Chicago.
Credits are:

Performed on March 25, 1999, at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Oak Park, IL.
MUSICIANS:
Jonathan Rundman: accordion, vocals;
Andy Deitrich: snare;
Benji Derrick: acoustic guitar;
Matt Marohl: mandolin;
Kym Spilker: violin;
Charity Caldwell: viola;
Jane Deitrich: upright bass;
Christopher Warmanen: oboe;
The studio version of this song appeared on the 1997 Jonathan Rundman album "Recital," and a remixed version appears on the 2007 album "The Best of Jonathan Rundman: 20 Songs From The 20th Century."

detailed interview at "Killing the Buddha," and extra questions below

2009-05-06T19:20:00.001-06:00

Last month the online religion magazine Killing The Buddha published what is probably the most in-depth interview with me that's ever been conducted. The journalist was Canadian writer Anthony Easton who asked me a ton of really good questions. We had a lot of fun digging into a whole bunch of issues. CLICK HERE to read the official interview.

As if the officially published interview wasn't detailed and strange enough, I happen to have the copies of some other questions I was asked that were edited out of the final version. You can read them below. Thanks to Anthony and the KTB folks for such an interesting discussion! (By the way, this interview was conducted in August of 2008.)

So, the first question that my editor asked me to ask, he is worried that you are not nearly famous enough for a feature. How famous are you exactly?

Paul Westerberg has a great lyric that goes “they ask him ‘are you famous?’ / ‘you’ve answered that, you know’.” My answer would be, not very. However, I think that whatever fame I’ve accumulated is thanks to niche appeal. Among Gen-X Lutherans in church leadership roles, I’m pretty well known. There’s some overlap in the other mainline denominations as well. I’m also getting some wonderful support from the Finnish-American community, who are just discovering me in the past year or so. One sub-set of folks who I’m always glad to have interested in my work are those people who follow suspiciously Christian fringe-Americana bands like Vigilantes of Love, Victoria Williams, Over the Rhine, Bruce Cockburn, etc.

You are a member of ELCA, which is is considered the more liberal of the Lutheran synods. Do you notice a leveling off or a decline of membership? Do you think the mainline protestant denominations are dying? What do you make of the conservative instinct, that suggests this is because of a lack of moral rigor?

In my travels around the country, I don’t notice the decline, although all the statistics say that it’s happening. I don’t think the membership shrinkage can be blamed on “liberalism”...what I’ve seen is that the proudly liberal and the proudly conservative congregations are growing. I think that any place that clearly, publicly takes a stand in either direction will draw new people. My own congregation here in the Twin Cities is one of the most progressive in the ELCA, and our membership is booming. We’re having trouble finding places for people to sit on Sunday mornings. Seems to me that the way to drive away your members is to be passionless and boring and have nothing challenging to say in any direction.

And if that is the case, what do you make of Ratzinger circling the wagons, and the Episcopalians in the middle of schism, considering you were founded as heretical?

I don’t know much about the Catholic situation, but it’s interesting watching the Anglican community dealing with their issues. I suppose it could be a preview of what could happen to us Lutherans. One thing I like about the ELCA is that our relatively young denomination is the result of a couple hundred years of denominational mergers...different kinds of Lutherans agreeing to team up. It would be a drag to introduce a split after such a nice run of cooperation. We move really really slow when it comes to social issues, and that’s annoying for us progressives, but I do think we’re making headway. I guess we can learn from the Catholics that a couple decades of waiting and studying is nothing when you look back across 2000 years of church history.

You talk about how Christian rock is profoundly white, and that you want to work against that, but if there is anything more white then Christian rock (of the Jars of Clay school), its indie rock. Is there a lack of diversity, in both categories? Do you find that a concern, and if you do find it a concern, how do you work on it?

I remember when I gave that “white” quote...it was to a writer from the Illinois Entertainer who was interviewing me about my Sound Theology album. It was a phone interview, and the comment just came out of my mouth...I wish I never said it, ‘cause my problems with Christian Culture don’t really have anything to do with race. Although, I’ve been denominationally influenced (some might say brainwashed) by the values of the ELCA since I was a child, so I can’t help but try to be as inclusive as possible in my own music and presentation.

You’re right, both CCM and Pitchfork-rock are pretty white. If I had to compare, I think indie rock is the whiter of the two. I’m not sure it’s a concern that indie rock is “too white.” The bands reflect the audience, and vice versa. What I think is really strange is how white people have adopted Black Roots music, and young African Americans have not. A year ago or so I saw the Blind Boys of Alabama in concert...they were awesome. The audience was almost entirely white. I bet it would be a similar situation for other old school black artists. When I lived in Chicago my wife worked with black teenagers on the West Side, and we’d talk to them about music, and none of them had ever heard of Chuck Berry or Aretha Franklin.

What is Whiter: Minneapolis, Indie Rock, or being a Lutheran?

Indie Rock wins again. I’ve lived in Minneapolis now for six years, and anyone who thinks Minneapolis is white just needs to go shopping at Target. It’s like a small scale UN in there. I suppose if one’s idea of Lutheran was “the 80 people I see at church every Sunday” then maybe it appears to be white, but I have the privilege of seeing the Lutheran church in its wide scope. I’ve been the interim musician at an all-African American congregation on the West Side of Chicago, I’ve presented music with Lutherans from Palestine, Africa, and India, and within blocks of my house there are Lutheran churches who read the Gospel in Hmong each week. As a kid I remember being so excited to discover songs from around the globe included in our Lutheran hymnal. One of the most fun things about being Lutheran is our awareness of the Christian family on a global scale....not just the folks at our own local congregation.

Also, how different are you from the usual Christian musicians, if you preform at places like Lifest, with Rebecca St. James and Switchfoot? Do you consider yourself active in that part of the community, or as a kind of outlier?

I’m certainly an outlier in the CCM universe. I’ve had a chance to play at Lifest and Cornerstone, two of the big Midwestern Christian Rock fests, but they’re probably the two most flexible of those events. Plus, I only got booked at those events ‘cause I happened to know somebody personally who was booking a certain stage. If I wanted to play at Creation or whatever the other fests are called, I couldn’t even track down a phone number for a booker. I know, because I thought that I should try to play at SonShine, the big festival here in Minnesota, since I’m a local guy, but I couldn’t even find a name or phone number of anybody who was booking it. The CCM world is a self contained universe, and it’s very rare for some indie artist to find a way in.

You opened for Switchfoot though, what do you figure about Christian bands going back into the faith closet after they mainstream themselves?

Yes, I’ve had the chance to open for few big Christian acts, and when I was playing keyboards for Beki Hemingway (who is kind of a Christian alterna-rock legend) I got to do even more shows like that. After playing endless solo shows for 30 people in the church basement, or the grungy bar, it really is fun to have a big PA and a soundman and an audience of a few hundred. I don’t really care if Christian bands cross over to the mainstream audience or not, or go from mainstream to CCM....I say, hey, if somebody wants you to play at their venue, and you wanna do it, then do it. I know that I’m thrilled to play anywhere that somebody will have me. So if I get asked to play some big Christian festival, or go on tour opening for Aimee Mann, I’ll gladly do either one.

Do you have any salacious gossip about Ms. St. James, a peak at her diva like tendencies, an outrageous rider, or is she just that nice?

In my experience schmoozing at the Christian celebrity events, I’ve found that it’s quite difficult to actually meet and hang out with the other artists. Most bands are there together with their own crew and families, and there’s not a lot of “hey, let’s make new friends!” The one thing I will say about the Christian music stars that I’ve been with is that, in general, they’re amazingly, jarringly good looking. The men and the women. And yes, they’re naturally attractive people, but they’re workin’ it, too, you know....they’re really thin and fit, with super trendy clothing, teeth whitener, and $300 haircuts, the whole nine yards. It’s really quite incredible. They’re like a master race.

You have worked, and played extensively at both Christian and secular venues, is there tension between being of the world but not in the world, what are the advantages to playing in places like the Colourbox, versus places like Lifest, or in small clubs versus church basement, and the opposite—which do you prefer?

I’ve done a lot of thinking about this over the years, and I’ve realized that I love both, and hope to be able to be legitimate in both (and all) situations. In the late 90s, before the release of the Sound Theology album, I spent years on the road playing mostly rock clubs and coffee houses, and it got really old. However, if I only played church gigs, that would be equally lame. Club gigs are fun ‘cause the media will actually cover you, preview the show, etc. And it’s wonderful to play a full band show with big loud guitar amps and not worry about the listeners’ ears. Church gigs are great, though, because they’re intergenerational...no club show will have senior citizens and babies in the crowd. And church audiences actually listen to every word you say and sing. I never really think about the “in but not of” issue...it’s natural for Lutherans to just exist in the world, wherever they are, as people of faith. Lutherans don’t bust things up into “sacred” and “secular.” Of course, as a performer, I always try to be aware of who my audience is, but I just do my thing...I play hymns in rock clubs, and I play love/life/politics songs at church.

One of your most memorable lyrics is "my faith is not erotic, my faith is not neurotic, my faith is not psychotic," which i found really interesting, because you have a talent for tender songs that are incredibly erotic. Do you find that there is any intermingling between the erotic feelings that you write about, and your relationship with God? It seems to be a very Lutheran ideal, one that is earthbound, not mystical at all, is that fair? Or did you just need a rhyme for narcotic, neurotic, psychotic, or robotic? And sometimes, isn't faith narcotic, when it relieves pain and gives comfort? Or do you consider that every day of survival, of experience, is a miracle, and that miracle, the miracle of existence, is considered a mystical awareness?

I have no problem with erotic feelings. I just get the heebie-jeebies when Christians totally bury their sexual selves, and so the only outlet they have for it is in “praise and worship” situations. Sometimes I’ll catch a late night TV infomercial for a Praise and Worship music CD and they’ll show a sports arena filled with thousands of middle aged women totally blissing out in orgasmic delight as they sing “Shout to the Lord” or whatever, and it gives me the creeps. Not everybody’s faith manifests itself that way, so I wrote that song “You Don’t Speak For Me” to represent another way of living out an authentic spiritual life. The same is true for the other words in the song, “narcotic,” “psychotic,” and “robotic.” I sing “my faith is not narcotic” to provide an alternative to all the Jesus-as-drug references in Christian culture...I’m always annoyed when Christians use the language of addiction to describe their faith, like the term “Jesus freak” or “high on Jesus” or that whole Pentecostal movement in where everybody starts laughing and falling over and acting drunk. My favorite fruit of the Spirit (from Galatians) is “self-control” so I wanted to be sure that self-control got some props in a culture filled with religious “freaks.”

Some questions about Sound Theology: Can you tell some anecdotes, find some context, about the song "Loneliness to Happiness," I find personally it is so far away from my personal experience, that I wanted to know why you found that?

I’ve lived a charmed life. No childhood trauma. Happy family. My dreams of being a musician are being realized. My children are healthy. I’m very thankful for how things have worked out, and I don’t take it for granted. All this, though, and I’ve found that it’s nothing I can share openly without sounding like a jerk. I remember once I was having dinner with a group of friends, and I was commenting about how excited I was to be going out on tour, and I had a chance to play some really great shows, etc. One of my friends got really mad and said “Some of us hate getting up and going to work every day, you know....I hate my job, and I hate doing it, and I don’t need to hear about how great it’s gonna be for you to go off on tour.” I was shocked and embarrassed, to say the least. Another example: my wife had healthy and easy pregnancies with our children, but I’ve discovered that I can never state that fact in public because so many couples struggle with getting pregnant, or if they are pregnant, they have lots of sickness and complications. So this moment of great joy that we’ve experienced has to be hidden. It’s the loneliness of happiness.

Have you succeeded in your prayer not to backslide into anger and contempt, at this failing rock star attempt? Do you still want to be a rock star?

I still entertain the rock star fantasy, but now that I’m 37 with a couple of kids, it doesn’t matter to me as much. And I know that I missed my window...if it was gonna happen, it would’ve happened a decade ago. Thankfully, I haven’t slid into anger and contempt. A good reality check for me is to watch the exploits of the celebrities on the tabloid magazines in the grocery store checkout aisle...it’s proof over and over and over again that fame and money do not bring happiness. I also have enough perspective to know how good I have it...I can make my living as an independent musician, I make the albums I want to make, I have a nice base of supporters who are interested in my work, I can travel around the country playing my songs, and nobody tells me what I can or cannot do. It’s really the best situation anyone could ask for.

You have spoken against the stupidity and commodity spectacle and much current American protestant forces. You refer to it as creating monsters. Do you have any suggestions that make traditional Christian texts alive again, to young Christians?

This is so tricky. I don’t know. I was in a confirmation class of about 30 kids. We all heard the same stuff, read the same Bible verses, sang the same hymns, knew the same Pastors and leaders. I loved it. Most of the kids were bored to tears. I’m still a part of the church. I bet about two thirds of my confirmation class are gone for good. Why do some people “get it” and others don’t? I think the answer might be in education....for some reason, I understood WHY we were saying and doing and learning that stuff. Most kids, and most folks in the pew, have no clue why we recite certain things, why the Pastor wears a dress, why the altar colors are purple during Lent, why we read certain Bible verses on certain days. There are specific reasons for every little thing we do in church, and I think they’re wonderful and beautiful and deep and helpful reasons....but most people don’t know it. To them it’s empty tradition. Or worse, they don’t know why we do it, but they come to idolize the rituals themselves, and get horribly stuck in a rut of repetition, inflexibility, and intolerance. One of the reasons I’m so excited about going out to play my own songs is that by bashing my guitar and yelling about liturgy and hymns and order, I can uncover those core meanings in a fresh way for some folks in my audience. Frequently I get emails or comments from folks saying “I’ll never think of Ash Wednesday the same way again” or “I’ve sung that hymn my whole life, but I’ve never paid attention to the lyrics until tonight!”

How lonely is the Midwest, in songs like "Omaha," you make it sound like a series of absences and spaces of mourning, as do Connor Obrest and Bruce Springsteen. Is there any fun to be had in Nebraska? Can you think of any examples of a kick ass party song about kicking it there?

Rural Midwestern geography has been a recurring theme throughout all my albums, and a lot of good regional artists from Mellencamp to Uncle Tupelo to the Jayhawks have tapped into to those lonely, dreary feelings. For me, it was challenging to grow up in an isolated little Midwestern town, and even now I get a bit of the small town blues whenever I get out of the city and visit places like that. If you want fun, positive songs about rural life in the Heartland, all you need to to is watch country music videos. Sometimes when I’m in a hotel room with cable TV I’ll watch CMT, and I’m amazed at how so many songs are raucous party anthems about “getting back to the country” and “remembering the good old days” with images of dudes on flatbed trucks and combines, strumming guitars, dancing in the wheat fields, and jumping in the old swimming hole, surrounded by a bevy of babes and cases of beer. When it addresses small town USA, country music accentuates the positive, rock music accentuates the negative.

Tell me about why and how much you love Liz Phair? What are you feelings about "HWC" and how did you celebrate the 10th anniversary of Exile in Guyville?

When critics rave about Liz, they only talk about her dirty mouth. The media never mentions what really makes her brilliant...riffs riffs riffs! She’s one of my favorite rock guitarists and composers, and her chord changes and rhythm guitar playing is totally inspiring. I can’t help but think that she wrote that “HWC” song as a total commentary on her own infamy for using foul language...she took her claim to fame, and stretched it to ridiculous lengths, probably just to see what those cuss-loving journalists would say about it. I didn’t buy the Exile anniversary reissue...not enough bonus tracks. I think my all-time favorite Liz album is Whitechocolatespaceegg.

How has the indie scene in Chicago differ from the one in Minneapolis?

I’m not sure. When I lived in Chicago I was a pretty active participant in the scene...I was out seeing shows numerous times a week, playing tons of clubs, and I got to know a lot of people. When I moved here to Minneapolis I became a parent, so my evenings were instead spent changing diapers and trying to sleep.

Larry Norman yes or no?

I’ve never heard Larry’s music, and don’t have any of his albums, although occasionally I get compared to him. My friend Beki Hemingway was Larry’s backup singer for a few years, and this Summer I sat in with Beki’s band and we did a tribute to Larry...one of his songs called “Why Don’t You Look in to Jesus.” It was the first Larry Norman song I’d ever heard, and it was pretty rocking.

Danielson Famile, yes or no?

Never heard them either. Although people tell me I should watch that movie about them. I never listen to Christian rock, or suspiciously-Christian Indie Rock. I prefer the suspiciously-Christian rock of the ‘80s and ‘90s: Maria McKee, T Bone Burnett, Peter Case, Sam Phillips, Tonio K, Bruce Cockburn.

Just how Christian is Sufjan Stephens? Are you envious of his success in the middle west?

I’ve only heard one Sufjan song...a Christmas one. It’s on my iPod. It’s a pretty cool song. And I want to get his Michigan and Illinois albums ‘cause I’ve lived in both those states. I recorded a song back in 1997 called “Front Row at the Fashion Show” where I sang quietly over a banjo and trombone, and this year the song got licensed for airplay in all the Starbucks Coffee locations around the world. After that, a couple people said to me “Hey, you must be influenced by Sufjan Stevens.” It was kind of annoying ‘cause my song was written and recorded a decade ago, way before Sufjan was around. So that’s my only beef with him.

Do you think that being explicit about your faith makes you more money, less money? Do you play "We're Creating Monsters" at FinnFest, for example? In an incredibly practical way, how do you feed your kids doing this sort of thing? Does it become a voluntary vow of poverty?

I didn’t realize it was going to happen at the time, but my entire career changed when I made my first faith-explicit album. It was the Sound Theology project, and when that came out it really launched me to a new level of visibility, and income. Before that album I was sort of a generic pop/folk songwriter, but once I addressed faith-based issues I discovered that I could bring something unique to the table, and a really great audience of interested people popped up all over the country. So when it comes to feeding my kids, and contributing to my family, I owe it all to the church and to church people. They’re the population who makes my vocation possible. My wife Dawn has always had a normal job throughout my entire career, so thankfully I haven’t need to be the only breadwinner.

How does the making music, the touring, the recording, and the like, interfere with your having kids? Especially touring for the last few years, throughout the United States, Canada, Finland and Sweden?

It totally and completely interferes. In the decade before I had kids I was on the road about 150 days per year. Then when I became a parent I became a stay-home-Dad during the midweek while my wife is at work. Now I can only tour on weekends, play locally in the evening, and a few weeks during the year I’ll go off on extended tours while my kids are with their Grandparents. But yes, taking care of babies and preschoolers makes touring, writing, and recording nearly impossible. This new album I just released is called Insomniaccomplishments because all the late night feeding and diapering totally messed up my sleep schedule, and I ended up with pretty serious insomnia. Rather than lying awake and bored alone in the dark all night I’d get up and write and record songs instead, so the bulk of this new CD was completed at 3AM while my family was sleeping. The last time I played in Finland and Sweden my wife and 2 year old son came with me. For my gigs in Finland we left our toddler with my cousins while I played, but in Sweden he had to come along to the club. I was playing a show at Club Mondo in Stockholm, which is this giant multi-roomed rock venue and disco, and we had to create a little play area behind the bar where my son could hang out with my wife during my set.

"We all need love, the serious kind"—do you think that occasionally we need love the comic kind?

Maybe in our personal lives, but I think the love we need in society and around the globe is pretty serious business.

What is it like to be a youth worker? Did it emerge organically from the youth group being one of the few things to do in the Upper Peninsula? Was it evangelical work? Or was it a way to keep teenage kids as Christians? When they are in the middle of trying to figure out what it means to be Christian, or if they want to be Christians at all, what are the implications of organizing around them? Is it a way to keep them safe, from stopping thinking outside the margins, to be good Christians, or to challenge them into otherness? What happens when the difficult questions start? What do you do, as a youth worker, if one of your 15 year olds wants an abortion, comes out of the closet, or tells you he is no longer Christian?

I did get interested in working in youth ministry because of my own positive experience as a teenager in a church youth group, and at church camp in the Summers. When I was kid at camp and at youth gatherings I was encouraged to play guitar, get up on stage, be a leader, and develop my gifts...I was given a lot of encouragement back then, and it was the beginning of what would become my life’s work as a musician and songwriter.
I had a very part time job as a youth director in a congregation back when I was 21, right at the beginning of my solo music career. I was never much of an evangelist....my strengths have always been in preaching to the choir. Some people are really good at reaching out to people who aren’t in the church at all, but I’m best at encouraging the people who are already there. I had a squeaky clean career as a youth director...no trips to get kids out of jail, no pregnancies, no abuse, no serious drama. The bulk of my work was just being present...talking, going out for pizza, taking kids to movies and concerts, helping kids plan songs and skits for worship services, planning service projects, taking kids hiking, and just celebrating those small joyful moments of life with them.

The All Music Guide quotes this about you: "Rundman formed a musical vocabulary grounded in the budding strains of Americana/roots rock, Lutheran hymns, traditional American folk music, and '70s rock to present a uniquely eclectic variant of Midwestern roots? I grew up in Alberta, so this part of your All Music Guide, fascinated me. I have a few questions about it. Did you listen to chart country, which was the only station that was available to me sometimes, on trips into the city? Which Lutheran hymns did you sing? Do you still remember them? How did they differ from Episcopalian or Methodist or Catholic, or were there just Lutherans up there? My mother and father only let me listen to folk music until I went away to school when I was 14, was this a similar condition, and if so, do you find Pete Seeger as sanctimonious as I do? Could you find enough weed to make Foghat or Frampton palatable? Is there a rock scene there, like the straight edge scene in Provo, filled with kids who had nothing else to do?

I never listened to country music on the radio as a kid. My parents mostly had Top 40 on the radio, and in the car we listened to 8-track tapes of Simon & Garfunkel and Kenny Rogers. I got my own radio in my bedroom when I was 5 years old, and because of that I know every pop single from 1975 until 1988. Lutheran hymns were a big deal to me as a kid. Our denomination got a new hymnal in 1978, and I grew to love all those songs. Lutherans around the USA still sing from that repertoire. Our town had Methodists and Catholics and everyone else, but I don’t know what they were singing. It was before the “praise band” trend, so I think everybody had an organist or pianist back then. When I first started playing guitar in church in the late 80s, it was still a pretty novel idea. I have an uncle who collects 78 RPM records from the Depression, so as a young teenager I got really into listening to old country songs by The Carter Family, and my cousin and I learned all those songs on guitar. I never heard Pete Seeger back then, but the local radio was filled with Rust Belt arena rock: Foghat, Ted Nugent, Bob Seger, etc., plus the hair metal of the day. There was no rock scene at all. This was pre-Nirvana, so kids in my town weren’t learning to play guitar. I was one of the only kids in the whole school who played a rock-band instrument, and the only boy who dared to sing in public. I got teased and called “fag” because I played the piano and was a serious band geek. In the mid-80s I discovered the developing scene of “neo-traditionalist” rock bands, and got really into groups like The Silos, The Rainmakers, The BoDeans, Fire Town, Violent Femmes, and others who were playing proto-Americana. I was literally the only kid in town who liked this music...I would save up my money, and when my church youth group would attend big youth events in Chicago I’d rush off to the record store and buy all the albums that were unavailable in the Upper Peninsula.

Also, speaking of Provo, growing up LDS, i came to believe that my peoples casseroles and jell-o salads were superior, my Lutheran friends tell me that they have better ones. Any opinions? Any exciting recipes for either?

Culturally speaking, I’m a bad Lutheran. Lutherans are supposed to love coffee, casserole, jello, beer, and sitting in the back row....but I don’t like any of those things.

How is a protestant rock ethic the same and how is it different from a protestant work ethic?

One of my proudest moments is coming up with that album title Protestant Rock Ethic but I think the joke is lost to almost everyone. The “protestant work ethic” that we have here in America has been taken to such an extreme that many American Christians can’t grasp the idea that God’s love for us is a free gift, regardless of our good work. So I thought I’d diffuse the idea, by replacing the word “work” with the word “rock,” which I think is a really funny joke.

Your "Texas Kyrie" has an energy, and an almost desperation, that other Kyries lack. Did you think about Texas when making it? Are you doing any other state Kyries? What would a North Dakota Kyrie sound like, a California one?

Actually, that song was not one of my commissioned works. I wrote it as a songwriting challenge, to see if I could create liturgical music that could be played by full band without rehearsal, and that could be sung by a congregation without sheet music or any printed text. That’s why the chord progression is a loop, and why the response is an echo. It’s called “Texas Kyrie” because I had a gig at Concordia University in Austin, TX, and after my show I was staying in the campus’ guest apartment. That night I stayed up late writing the song, and I didn’t want to title it just “Kyrie,” so I named the piece after the state I was in at the time. The song appeared soon after on my Sound Theology album, and I discovered that there was a huge interest out in the church for rock-band based liturgical music, so eventually I composed the rest of what would become my Heartland Liturgy.

How exciting is the American Swedish Institute?

Every year that I get older, the more excited I get about my ethnic heritage. My wife is Swedish and I’m Finnish, and we’re both learning more and more about our family backgrounds. My relatives came to America in 1903, and they brought their faith with them. I’ve been able to go back to Finland, to those little towns where they came from, and I’ve stood in their old church buildings and seen my family names on the gravestones over there. It’s pretty powerful.

In your song, "Meeting Nixon", you write "Somehow, somewhere, something/down the line/we will be meeting Nixon, Meeting Nixon/When we go to the White House in the sky": Do you really think that Nixon went to heaven? I always thought that he was one of the minor princes in hell, brought to earth in a Faustian bargain, engineered by Kissinger. Was this an oblique reference to Luther's "by grace alone, through faith alone, because of Christ alone"? Do you really want to meet him? What would you say to him?

Yes, I think the song is trying to remind people that we get to heaven because of God’s love for us, not because of how wonderfully we’ve behaved. It’s fun to sing about Richard Nixon, but the I don’t think of the song being about him specifically....it’s really about all presidents and politicians, and how God’s love transcends all the political divisions that we spend so much time and money and energy worrying about. It’s a good reality check in an election year, especially.

Insomniaccomplishments CD review in Christian Century magazine

2009-05-04T20:41:00.002-06:00

The May 5th issue of Christian Century magazine features a review of my Insomniaccomplishments CD, along with reviews of the new U2 and Billy Bragg projects. Click to read the whole thing.

The text for the review is below. A shout-out for Beki Hemingway, and a mention of Matt Patrick's delicious production work on "I thought you were mine!"

Jaunty Minneapolis Lutheran-rocker Jonathan Rundman returns with an album spurred by bouts of insomnia. The sleepless nights were worth it, as Rundman demonstrates on a delicious minor-key rock hymn "If You Have a Question": "When you lie awake at 3 a.m., trouble running through your mind / You don't need to be afraid to ask, you can leave your fear behind." The prolific Rundman delivers 18 solid songs. He's joined by Denver singer-songwriter Beki Hemingway on the tender ballad "I Thought You Were Mine"; listen for the instrumental break teaming toy piano with mellotron.

NEW SONG "Flying On A Plane" free MP3 download

2009-04-11T10:10:00.002-06:00

For my entire musical life I've been very secretive about any new songs. I've kept them all safely under wraps until I can record them and release them on an official album. Only then have I been comfortable with the public hearing my fresh material.

These days, for some reason, I feel different about it. Maybe because I don't have any plans for a new album in the near future. Whatever the reason, last month I was excited to leak an MP3 of a new song called "Robert Traver Blues," and this month I've posted another song for download called "Flying On A Plane." This newest tune was written and recorded only a few days ago on April 1st when I was on Spring Break.

The song took fourteen years to compose. Back in 1995 Dawn and I flew to Poland from Seattle. While we were crossing the Atlantic I got bored, and I felt like writing, but I had no writing utensil. So I asked the passenger ahead of me if he had a pen I could borrow. He gave me a pen, and I started writing off the top of my head, with my internal editor turned off. The result was a few strange rhyming verses on a yellow legal pad. I tore out that page, stuck it in my songwriting book, and forgot about it for 14 years.

Then, a week ago when I was on Spring Break in my hometown of Ishpeming, I wanted to use my free time to come up with some new music. These days I have no lyric ideas, so I dug through my lyric book to see if there was anything interesting within to salvage. I discovered the wrinkled old sheet of yellow legal paper from that airplane flight back in 1995, and BOOM, I had my idea. The only thing I needed was a chorus, and it didn't take long to come up with a good angle.

Within a couple hours I had set up my brother's pawn-shop keyboard, programmed in a cool, stompy bass and drum track, and overdubbed some vocals, mandolin, and guitar.

The song reflects on how some of the technology we use is ancient (writing with a tool on a surface, "like the Mesolithic Age"), and some is incredibly sophisticated and amazing (flying across the sky inside a metal tube). And we interchange these technologies without even thinking about it.

You can download the song at my AUDIO PAGE.

Lyrics are below:

FLYING ON A PLANE
Words and music by Jonathan Rundman
cp 2009 Salt Lady Music (ASCAP)

I borrowed this pen from the passenger
In front of me on this plane
He’ll never see his pen again
He does not know my name
We’re cutting through the clouds and beginning our descent
Down to dirt and trees and streets, water and cement

Flying on a plane
Writing on a page
Scratching out a message
Like the Mesolithic Age
Such technology
I struggle to explain:
Ink upon paper
Flying on a plane

Tons of glass and steel and fire
Paper, flesh, and sound
Push against the gravity
Cursing at the ground
Letters ain’t no better than a pictograph
Turn and angle down with the power cut in half

The woman with the silver bracelet
Reaches upward for her reading light
There are older men in suits and ties
On her left and on her right

live performance of "Johnny Horton" from 1999!

2009-04-07T20:02:00.003-06:00

Continuing the series of YouTube videos recorded in concert back in 1999 at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Oak Park, IL, I'm pleased to present this solo acoustic performance of my song "Johnny Horton."

This song is a favorite of mine, but has become sort of a rarity in my catalog. It was written in Spring of 1999, right around the taping of this concert. A few months later I would begin the recording of the Sound Theology album, and in Spring of 2000 I made the only studio recording of "Johnny Horton"...the only song recorded in that period that did not appear on the Sound Theology album.

Instead "Johnny Horton" it was released on the now-super-rare Trunkstock Sampler CD, featuring me and other songwriters from Chicago (including Beki Hemingway!). Later on in 2000 and 2001 the song became a regular part of the set list when I would perform with Chicago musicians Benji Derrick (bass), Andy Deitrich (drums), and Matt Marohl (pedal steel).

In 2003 I remixed the studio recording of "Johnny Horton" and the updated version appeared on the Salt Lady Records Extra Credit CD sampler, which is still available for only $5!

The song is inspired by 1950's-era country/rockabilly singer Johnny Horton, who was born on April 30, 1925. In honor of Johnny's birthday this month, I send this one out to him! The lyrics are below:

"Johnny Horton"
words and music by Jonathan Rundman
cp 2000 Salt Lady Music (ASCAP)

the car pulled up and I got in
we shut the doors and went
Johnny Horton on the radio
talkin' 'bout the Old Testament
Johnny never let his guard down
and he died out in his car
and I can hear him even to this day
I wonder if he knew he'd go so far

Why do you think we were up so late?
What was that spirit blowing through us?
Why did we lie there talking 'til the sun came up?
Maybe Johnny Horton spoke right to us

I think about our situation
I think about our life
you are strong and beautiful
just like Johnny's wife
you know if I had a fortune
I would give it all to you
but until then we'll stay up talking
and you know my love is true

I'm the guest on nationally syndicated radio show "Grace Matters"

2009-04-01T11:55:00.001-06:00

On March 29 I'll be the guest on "Grace Matters," a nationally syndicated radio show. Visit the "Grace Matters" webpage to learn more, and find the radio stations in your area that broadcast the program.

After the show airs, they'll post a podcast for download.

I taped the interview with host Peter Marty back in January. He's a brilliant guy, and we had a really cool discussion. The show also features a few of my songs, including "Librarian," "Narthex," and "Forgiveness Waltz." Previous guests have included author Jim Wallis, CBS News' Charles Osgood, and Emily Saliers of the Indigo Girls!

I'm thrilled with how it turned out, and I hope you all tune in or download the show!

++++

Okay, it's Tuesday now, and the show has aired. You can download it at the Grace Matters website. Check it out!

NEW SONG "Robert Traver Blues" about Ishpeming and "Anatomy of a Murder"

2009-03-09T21:50:00.008-06:00

For the first time in my music career, I'm publicly releasing a brand new song before having it available on an album. A couple months ago, on December 27, 2008, when I was on vacation in my hometown of Ishpeming, MI, I wrote and recorded a new song called "Robert Traver Blues." I'd had the song's concept for a few years, but it wasn't until I was back in Ishpeming in person, and playing my 1918 Gibson tenor banjo, that I was able to finalize my melody and lyrics. Since I was away from my own recording equipment, I used my brother's cassette 4-track recorder to record the song, and what you'll hear on the recording is 3 tracks, all first-take performances, written, recorded, and mixed in about two hours:
1. acoustic guitar and vocals with a keyboard-generated drum loop in the background
2. banjo and harmony vocals
3. more banjo and more harmony vocals
You can visit my AUDIO PAGE to download a free MP3 of the song.

Last month I was having the recording mastered (so that it would sound best for downloading) and as I thought about what to do with the it, I discovered online that 2009 is the 50th Anniversary of the movie "Anatomy of a Murder," the film that is the central concept for the song!
2009 is also the year of my own 20-year high school class reunion, so I've been thinking a lot about Ishpeming lately. Or "Iron City," as Ishpeming is called in the movie.

Here are the lyrics for the song, along with some details about the people I'm singing about.

ROBERT TRAVER BLUES
words and music by Jonathan Rundman
cp2009 Salt Lady Music (ASCAP)

Robert Traver walked the streets of my hometown when I was young
In Iron City, my hometown, the place we both come from

Otto Preminger set up his cameras out on Lakeshore Drive
It was Iron City, my hometown, on the silver screen

Doctor Seaborg got himself an element that bears his name
Yes, Iron City was his birthplace, he won the Nobel Prize

Gerhard Theodore Alexis played and sang and fell in love
In Iron City, my hometown, you can hear his melody

You're gonna go far...

Tell me, can you change the world from somewhere small and far away
like Iron City, my hometown?

John Voelker walked the streets of my hometown when I was young
Iron City, my hometown, the place we both come from

Some words about the people in the song:
ROBERT TRAVER/JOHN VOELKER
Robert Traver was the pen name of Ishpeming-based author John Voelker. He wrote the novel "Anatomy of a Murder" which was made into a movie. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture.

When I was very young I was aware of Voelker. My parents and other folks in town talked about him. He lived a few miles down the road from my elementary school, and I remember hearing about him in class, seeing him on local TV, etc. I never got to meet him. He died in 1991.

OTTO PREMINGER
Preminger was not an Ishpeming native, but this famous Hollywood director came to our little town in the Upper Peninsula to shoot the movie version of Voelker's book. Jimmy Stewart was his lead actor. Other Yooper locations (Marquette, Big Bay, etc.) are featured in the film as well. It's really an incredible movie, and you all should see it.

GLENN SEABORG
Born in Ishpeming in 1912, Seaborg was in elementary school with my Grandma. He went on to become a world famous chemist, discovered some elements, was a leading atomic scientist, and won the Nobel Prize. He did so many amazing things you'll have to visit Wikipedia just to get the idea.

Seaborg didn't have anything to do with "Anatomy of a Murder," but John Voelker's work got me thinking about other Ishpeming natives who went on to do amazing things that impacted society at large. My song idea began to evolve, and began to ask "Can you change the world if you're from a small town in the middle of nowhere?" These folks were answering that question with a "Yes."

The last person that I included in the song is someone to whom I really feel connected.
GERHARD THEODORE ALEXIS
Alexis was an influential church musician and composer in the early 1900s, working in the Swedish Lutheran Church (Augustana Synod) that would eventually merge into my current denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. I became familiar with his work when I learned to play a hymn from the old 1950s-era Service Book And Hymnal, the "Red Book" that I sang from as a child. The hymn that I found had a tune called "Ishpeming!" I couldn't believe that my hometown had its own song, so I had to find about the composer, Alexis.
I Googled his name, and found a very comprehensive webpage maintained by Alexis' grandson, David Melbye, also a musician. Turns out that Alexis spent one year in Ishpeming (1910) where he served as the musician at Bethany Lutheran (I bet he was the choir director for Glenn Seaborg's family!), the Swedish congregation in town (the same congregation where my Uncle Lance Roberts would eventually serve as an interim Pastor in 2003!). Alexis fell in love with a Yooper girl that year and married her, and wrote the tune "Ishpeming" in honor of the place where he spent such an important year of his life. As a Lutheran church musician myself, I had to put old G.T. in my song, too. He might be the first person in history to have written a song inspired by Ishpeming.

So, there's the background "Robert Traver Blues." Thanks to Traver/Voelker, Seaborg, and Alexis for the inspiration and for being great vocational role models. If you'd like to check out another song of mine written about Ishpeming, Michigan, check out this vintage live performance video of the song "581" that I just posted.

"581" performed 10 years ago!

2009-03-09T19:40:00.004-06:00

Here’s another clip from a show I played in Chicagoland 10 years ago this month...it was March 25th, 1999. This was our opening tune that night, and I love how the instrumentalists interpreted this song.

That’s Andy Deitrich playing drums, Benji Derrick singing harmony and playing bass (that bass guitar was once owned by John Stirrat of the band Wilco!), and Matt Marohl adding some super tasty pedal steel.

It’s a pretty old tune, written in 1993 in Eugene, Oregon, and recorded for my 1994 album “Wherever” (the CD is out-of-print since about 2000). The song is about County Road 581 that runs South from my hometown of Ishpeming, in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I’ve driven/ridden that road thousands of times in my life, traveling 13 miles to my Grandpa’s camp on Big Perch Lake, and I feel like I have every inch of the trip memorized. Here are the lyrics:

581

You want to get to where the pavement ends
You want to watch it as the acres fall
You want to cross the South branch on the narrow bridge
Find a passage to the reservoir
You take 581

Some kind of trouble waiting back in town
You need the county road to take you far away
You take the S-curves to the Wayside
Don’t stop ‘til you leave Faith behind
On 581

Are you farther than you’ve ever been before?
Can you feel the project closing in?
You pass the clearcut and the airfield
Don’t you want to just fly away?
Fly away...
On 581

For those of you Yoopers reading this blog entry, I’ll decipher some of the lyrics:
+ “pavement ends”: the pavement does end, and turns to gravel a bit after Perch Lake and before reaching Casey Lake.
+ “acres fall”: Ishpeming residents may recall the incredible change in the landscape in the late 80s and early 90s when much of the trees along 581 were cut down by loggers.
+ “South branch” of the Escanaba River
+ “reservoir” the Greenwood Reservoir
+ “S-curves” dangerous driving between the Stoneville Road intersection and the Beagle Club Road
+ “the Wayside” landmark tavern just past the S-curves
+ “Faith” Faith Lutheran Church, just past the Wayside
+ “the project” Project ELF (Extra Low Frequency), high-security miliary communications system installed in the woods South of Ishpeming to help submarines, etc., to communicate....rumored to have negative effects on animals and environment
+ “clearcut” more logging
+ “airfield” private airport near Perch Lake, close to the end of the pavement

Check out another video from this same show, the song "When Rising From The Bed of Death."

new book Reinventing Richard Nixon mentions me and my song "Meeting Nixon"

2009-03-04T14:11:00.004-06:00

Daniel Frick is a professor at Franklin And Marshall College in Lancaster, PA, and he has authored a new book entitled Reinventing Richard Nixon. Check out the book at Amazon.

I appear in the book, thanks to my song "Meeting Nixon," in a section of the book called "Nixon in Music and Comedy," along with some legendary rock recordings that also mention Tricky Dick, including:

+ "Ohio" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young
+ "Sweet Home Alabama" by Lynyrd Skynyrd
+ "Gimme Some Truth" by John Lennon
+ "We Didn't Start The Fire" by Billy Joel

Thanks, Dan, for putting me in such good company!!

Pacific Northwest Tour Summary

2009-03-02T17:49:00.003-06:00

A few days ago I returned to Minneapolis after a fabulous tour of Oregon and Washington. The concerts were great fun, I had many reunions with old friends, and the natural beauty was awe inspiring. I love living in Minnesota, and there are very few places in the USA where I can see myself living, but everytime I return to the Northwest I think "Yes, I could move back here again."

Here's a shot from my steering wheel as I drove from Portland to Camas, Eastbound along the Columbia River. It might be hard to see in this photo, but that's Mount Hood rising up above the highway in the background.

My rental car was part hotel, part office, part stereo system, part closet on my tour. On Saturday night after my concert in the Portland area I listened to Bruce Cockburn's "Further Adventures Of..." album and drove North on I-5. When I got too tired to continue I stopped at the RelaxInn in Chehalis, WA, where I enjoyed Room #4.

I spent Sunday and Monday morning in Seattle and Everett, WA, with mountain ranges surrounding me on both sides. I never get tired of those views!

On Monday afternoon I drove my rental car onto the Edmonds/Kingston ferry, and zipped across Puget Sound.

I had many flashbacks to my visits to Sweden and Finland as I rode the ferry. No wonder there were so many Scandinavian immigrants who felt at home here!

Thanks to everybody who hosted me, came out to hear me play, and took me out on the town! Let us do it again.

Insomniaccomplishments CD review at Powerpopaholic Blog

2009-03-02T17:34:00.004-06:00

The PowerPopaholic music blog has posted a review of my new album! CLICK HERE to read the review at the site. Gotta love the Lowe and Crenshaw references! Text is below:

Jonathan Rundman "Insomniaccomplishments" Jonathan Rundman tells his story with simple arrangements and an acoustic guitar for the most part. As the title suggests, these tunes were born in his basement studio in the wee small hours. The songs range from forceful folk of "If you have a question" to the Neil Young-ish pop of "New Eyes." Some songs have a more traditional instrumental angle ("Kuortane") and others have progressive rock feel ("Nothing Downtown") so stylistically it has something for everyone. Duet partner Beki Hemingway add her harmonies to "I Thought You Were Mine" to make it the best track on the album for me. Some of the indie pop tones recall a mix of Nick Lowe and Marshall Crenshaw. And that's fine with me. Jonathan also has a "Best-of" collection that will give you insight into the man's previous works.

Seattle and Portland-area concerts summary

2009-02-23T03:08:00.005-06:00

Here's the place I played tonight, the Fremont Abbey Arts Center in Seattle. One of the coolest venues I've seen lately!

What 24 hours I've had! A quick recap:

Last night (seems like a month ago) I was near Portland, across the river in Camas, WA. Thanks to all my local pals, as well as the new listeners who came out. Lots of kids in the audience. I took some audience questions, and did a lot of catching up with friends. I'm trying to remember what I played....I'm a bit mentally fried. One of the highlights was the last tune: we did a South African folk song and we passed around percussion instruments and everybody rocked out on shakers and bells and stuff. Oh...and a 9 year old in the audience requested "Angels We Have Heard on High," the classic Christmas carol, so we sang it.

After that gig I got some fuel for the car and for my stomach, and I hit the road with intentions of making it to Seattle. I got too sleepy to continue the drive, so I stopped in Chehalis, WA at the RelaxInn. It was RelaxIng.

Got up this morning early, and got back on I-5 Northbound. Drove through downtown Seattle and arrived in Everett, WA in time to play music for my friend Kari's one-year-anniversary celebration of her call as a Pastor there. It was a Sunday morning church service unlike any that I've ever played....special guest musicians from Micronesia, and from Pakistan. Some truly amazing music...tabla drums, harmonium, and very energetic singing. I got to play the Heartland Liturgy, as well as my new fave hymns from the ELW including "How Small Our Span of Life" and "Each Winter As The Year Grows Older."

This afternoon I hit some cool Seattle record stores and found a few gems (Kerry Livgren, and the Nashpop Nashville Power Pop compilation).

And tonight was the Fremont Abbey. Sean Bendickson was the opening act, and his soulful vocals and skilled guitar playing were a welcome addition to the evening. I had an attentive audience of emerging-church folks, all grownups, allowing me the freedom to play some of my more challenging material including the rarely-played "Closed Out," as well as the debut live performance of "Imperfection." I also unearthed some songs that I haven't done in a while including "Minneapolis" and "Bright Funeral."

I'll be at Trinity Lutheran College tomorrow morning and across the Sound in Poulsbo tomorrow night. This has been a wonderful trip so far, but I'm starting to miss my sweetie and those two cute kids at home.

On tour in Oregon

2009-02-21T20:14:00.003-06:00

This is exactly the view I saw about 45 minutes ago as I drove along the Columbia River from Portland, Oregon. It's 60 degrees and sunny here, and Mt. Hood is looming beautifully. I lived here in this state from 1992-1996, and I always love to come back.

Last night I played in my former town-of-residence, Eugene, Oregon. I was hosted by Emmaus and Central Lutheran Churches, both who are taking their youth to the ELCA Youth Gathering in New Orleans this Summer. I played music during a fundraiser, helping to finance their trip.

There was about 200 folks at the concert, and it was really fun to see so many familiar faces. Highlights from the show included "Carol of the Bells," "Dialysis Carpool," and "Each Winter As The Year Grows Older."

I spent my free time yesterday and today hitting all my favorite used CD stores in Eugene and Portland. I found some treasures in the bargain bins including:
Bob Dylan "Blonde on Blonde"
The Everly Brothers "Best Of"
Butch Walker "the Rise and Fall of"
plus a bunch more that I can't recall...

Tonight I'm playing across the river in Camas, WA, and later on I'll drive three hours to Seattle with new music rocking my rental car stereo.

I love the Pacific Northwest!

"When Rising From The Bed Of Death" performed 10 years ago!

2009-02-06T21:31:00.002-06:00

I recently bought a converter box allowing me to take old VHS video footage and dump it into the computer. This was my first experiment.

Ten years ago when I was living in Chicago I performed an "Orchestra Show" using strings, oboe, and a full gospel choir. It was a huge undertaking with lots of arranging and rehearsals, but it turned out well, we had a great crowd, and the music was quite fun to perform.

Since this song was played this week on Radio Suomi in Helsinki, Finland, it seemed appropriate to post a live version of it. The studio version of "When Rising..." appeared on my album Recital back in 1997, and with my band at the time (Andy and Benji) we performed the song pretty regularly. In retrospect, it seems like a weird song to put in the set list. This orchestra version was the coolest way it's ever been played. I don't think I've performed the song in concert since then!

It's one of only two songs that I've written using pre-existing lyrics (the other song being "A Farm In Minnesota" from a poem by Lewis Simpson, and music by me and my cousin Bruce). Thomas Tallis is a bigshot writer in the sacred and classical fields from a few hundred years ago, and his lyrics for this song are serious business.

Here are the credits:
"When Rising From The Bed Of Death"
lyrics by Thomas Tallis (1505-1585), music by Jonathan Rundman.
Performed by the Jonathan Rundman Orchestra, March 25, 1999, at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Oak Park, IL.
MUSICIANS:
Jonathan Rundman: acoustic guitar, vocals;
Andy Deitrich: drums;
Benji Derrick: bass guitar;
Matt Marohl: pedal steel;
Kym Spilker: violin;
Charity Caldwell: viola;
Jane Deitrich: upright bass;
Christopher Warmanen: oboe;
Scott Aaseng: piano;
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church Gospel Choir: vocals;
The studio version of this song appeared on the 1997 Jonathan Rundman album "Recital," and a remixed version appears on the 2006 Jonathan Rundman album "Protestant Rock Ethic."

superheroes and toplessness

2009-02-02T20:56:00.003-06:00

My 5-year-old son is very interested in superheroes. Recently his Grandmother went to the library and checked out some books for him, including a Marvel Superhero Encyclopedia. He enjoyed looking at all the detailed drawings and diagrams for each character, but got a strange look on his face when he stumbled across a superhero he'd never heard of before: the She-Hulk.

Paavo: "Dad, when this lady turns into the Hulk, does she grow really big and tall?"

Me: "Yes, just like the guy who turns into the Hulk."

Paavo: "So why doesn't her shirt rip off?"