Update: Sheet music for this song is now available at gregscheer.com.
My fourteen Psalm extravaganza continues with a new text by Charles Freeman. Charles chose Psalm 146, an exuberant Psalm of trust and praise. When I sat down at the piano, I immediately heard Black Gospel. I wanted this song to sit comfortably between Andraé Crouch’s “Bless the Lord” and James Moore’s “Taste and See.”
One of the things that has been different about this month’s collaborations is that I’ve had to communicate my vision for a song while it’s still in the draft stage. Whereas my workflow is ordinarily scribble, revise, ruminate, refine, notate, record, and edit notation, this time I often need to let the text writers hear the direction I’m taking the music so they can make adjustments to the lyrics. My piano playing is atrocious, but I’ve still tried to play and sing the rough drafts. So far all my collaborators have been gracious, assuring me that my piano playing could be worse. I will spare you those recordings, but I thought you might be interested to see what my musical chicken scratch looks like. Below is the first draft of “Praise the Lord!”
Praise the Lord!
O my soul, praise the Lord!
O my soul, praise the Lord!
I will sing praises to God my whole life long.
Praise the Lord!
1. Put no trust in mortals,
you’ll find no help there.
Breath departs, laid in earth,
and all their plans just disappear.
Seek the God of Jacob,
hope in God your Lord.
The One who made the heavens and the earth
is faithful evermore,
is faithful evermore,
our God is faithful evermore! Refrain
2. God is bringing justice,
feeds the hungry, too;
and God sets prisoners free–
behold and see what God will do!
God restores our vision,
lifts the broken high;
and with the ones who live in righteousness,
the Lord will abide,
the Lord will abide,
with the righteous will the Lord abide. Refrain
3. God cares for the stranger,
hears the orphan’s call;
widows find a faithful friend
in God, who is the Lord of all.
Our Lord reigns forever,
Zion’s God on high;
now let the praise, the praise of our Lord
forever be our cry,
forever be our cry,
God’s praise forever be our cry! Refrain
