Rejoice
How do we rejoice in a time such as this? Has there been a time in your life where you did rejoice? Do you think it’s still possible to rejoice? What is rejoicing? The song “Rejoice” attempted to touch a world of hope, a world of love, a world of peace. I tried to capture the exuberance of rejoicing. I thought a samba always makes me smile, always makes me move, always makes me want to dance so that’s where I went.
The first iteration of this song was for a group that Joe, Larry and I were in a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away called the Joliet Junior College Wolfpack Guitar Ensemble. I wrote the song to start the concert because of its energy and its guitar oriented melody riffs. This song would engage the band and the audience right from the beginning. Here’s a video of us rehearsing this song which is kind of fun (
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nb1pQhYNVF0).
This was shot during a rehearsal. All three of us are in this video, a kind of a where’s Waldo moment for you.
In the new version I wanted to feature Joe’s agile bronco agility and mastery of melody. Joe played amplified harmonica thru this awesome old little amp with just a volume control. Some listeners thought it was actually an electric guitar. When I was recording the drums, as soon as Larry started playing, he made me smile. He caught the joy of samba.
I couldn’t stop smiling. It was a beautiful moment when he was nailing it right from the beginning.
It was a tricky song to mix because it went from this light samba to a thrashing rock song. When I played the first mix for Larry he said, “The bass drum is too loud.” Imagine a drummer saying that. Then he said, “Let the bass drive the flow.” “Okeydokey, I will.” Since our ensemble is just harmonica, drums, bass and acoustic guitar, I decided to try a rhythm guitar solo for fun. I thought it would be unique using 16th notes with the melody on top. I always envisioned doing a timbale solo in the song. Larry had a lot of fun breaking a lot of sticks, but it was worth it. Joe’s didgeridoo drones on his low harmonica made it extra fun to play over.
I hope the song touches the possibility of rejoicing for you, touching something greater than us. We were definitely reaching for it. It was a challenge but I guess rejoicing is always a challenge. That’s the cool thing about music: it expresses the inexpressible. If rejoicing is possible,
I think it would feel like this.
