As much of the country is wearing the
first snowfall, this seems appropriate. Today Bob Fraser treats us to a lovely
song written with his wife Val. We’ll let him tell you about it…
(By the way, Bob has a long history of
making fantastic music, including writing songs still being sung in churches up
and down the country).
There are a few songs that I’ve written that can only really be sung at certain times of the year. They just don’t seem relevant if I sing them outside their seasonal references.
One such song is Snow on the Roof, with lyrics written mainly by my wife Val, with a few lines and the tune added by me. It was written during a time when, amongst other challenges, we were both going through the decline and eventual loss of parents. The lyrics I added were in what song-writers refer to as the Middle 8 – ‘Joy and pain run side by side, like ebb and flow of time and tide. Friendship matters and family too, so here in my heart I remember you’.
This resonates with the comments by Graham Peacock in Advent Conspiracy 11 when he refers to older hymns saying ‘they seem to hold joy and pain together better than any other form of song that I know’. The video Val created to go with Snow on the Roof tried to capture those feelings of joy and pain running in parallel, together with the importance of family ties and friendships in our lives.
This season, and the songs that accompany it, can lead to a kind of mellowing, a melting of hearts hardened by life’s challenges. We remember Christmases of old, sometimes all the way back to our own childhood, grieve once more for the folks who are no longer with us, and huddle around the fire to feel warmth and comfort from those close to us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8p3gNgu1Kg
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