Twice now, I have come across an interesting post on Facebook which asked me to consider my life as a movie and suggest what songs are on its soundtrack. I love(d) the idea of my life’s soundtrack album but didn’t exactly follow the instructions the first time I considered it as per the post.
That first time, I saw myself thinking of all my favorite songs, songs I have replayed over and over again at some point in life. While this is okay, it’s not exactly what a soundtrack signifies. It occurred to me only when reading the comments under the post the second time that I realized that I was to list songs which would accompany periods of my life. This realization made the exercise more introspective than initially perceived.
One of my secondary school teachers used to say singing is ‘worshipping doubled’. While that may be debatable, as a music lover with such eclectic taste, I have also come to realize that I compound the moods I feels with the sort of music I choose to listen to at those times- feeling soppy, more Mary J Blige, Feeling frustrated? Cry it out with Tamela Mann!
The music we choose to listen to [and the songs we favor] says a lot about the mood we’re in, want to be in, and what we’re going through… But they also tell a story of our growth. Have you heard of the saying ‘when you’re in a good mood you like the beats but when you’re down you understand the lyrics’? Similar can be said for our favored gospel songs. Consider your life journey, particularly your evolution as a Christian, how has your taste in music evolved? What songs do you relate to now which you didn’t get before? What songs got you through a particular time?
I’ll offer my list in exchange for yours:
My undergraduate years saw me excited about my faith for the first time. I was building my idea of what Christianity ought to mean and venturing beyond the ‘traditional’ hymns and locally composed chorals that I’d been taught in secondary school. I recall replaying Mary Mary’s It’s the God in Me and Kirk Franklin’s Thank you till the point where my neighbors got fed up. I was impressed by how gospel music could be made to RnB and Rap beats, and not necessarily somber. A similar type of joyful gospel was trending in Cameroon around that time too, and for the first time, we in the anglophone regions had imported French Cameroonian music like Je Suis Dans la Joie into our churches just as much as Nigerian.
By the end of undergrad though, I was becoming more of a prayer warrior. Life – or rather, adulting- comes at you fast. I suddenly ‘felt’ our locally popular -often Nigerian- prayer songs. You know those repetitive songs we were taught to sing as intros to our prayers…. like
Jesus, come and defend your name o Lord,
Jesus come and defend your name o Lord,
Lest my enemies come and laugh asking ‘where is the God I’m serving?’
Lest my enemies come and laugh asking ‘where is the God I’m serving?’
‘Flow in my life, cover my head to toes, (2)
Give me the power to do thy will, o Lord I pray, amen (x2)
I guess when your own prayers start getting deep, you come to see the need for an intro, outro, and bridge. With such prayers, you sometimes need to break into song halfway because a song says it better- or you’re too overwhelmed to even articulate what you’re feeling. Times when the likes of Jill Scotts ‘Hear My Call’, somber as it is, is most appropriate.
It’s been a long time since then, and I’ve seen my tastes change many times over, with the discovery of a new (or new to me) song, or the change of circumstances, growth in knowledge which makes one I’d already heard all the more meaningful.
These days, the gospel songs I’m repeating include;
Tori Kelly’s Ever Be and her version of So Will I,
Tamela Mann’s Change Me, God Provides, and Take Me to the King
Amber Riley’s versions of I’m His Child and Reckless Love
Lara George’s Dansaki
J.J Hairston’s You Deserve It
Pompi’ Silence
Transformation Church’s version of One Thing Remains
Tasha Cobb’s Gracefully Broken and Fill Me Up
The Walls’ Group’s And You Don’t Stop and Satisfied
Caleb and Kelsey’s medley of Oceans (Where Feet May Fall) + You Make Me Brave
and finally, a long spew of Jonathan McReynolds’ profound songs like Cycles, Limp, Stay High, Maintain, God is Good, and Make Room
This list will likely change within months to come, in fact just revisiting old favorites has made me make some adjustments on the playlist. Isn’t it amazing how that happens?
Now, let me in our your soundtrack… what songs are seeing you through the journey at the moment?
Looking forward to your comments!
xoxo,
Mo
