Kicking at the Darkness

J. Walsh Brian

Description

For forty years, singer and songwriter Bruce Cockburn has been writing beautifully evocative music. Bestselling author and respected theologian Brian Walsh has followed Cockburn's work for years and has written and spoken often on his art. In this creative theological and cultural engagement, Walsh reveals the imaginative depth and uncompromising honesty of the artist's Christian spirituality. Cockburn offers hope in the midst of doubt, struggle, failure, and anger; indeed, the sentiment of "kicking at the darkness" is at the heart of his spirituality. This book engages the rich imagery of Cockburn's lyrics as a catalyst for shaping and igniting a renewed Christian imagination.

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 01 décembre 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781441238856
• Langue: English

Extrait

© 2011 by Brian J. Walsh
Published by Brazos Press
a division of Baker Publishing Group
P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.brazospress.com
Ebook edition created 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means for example, electronic, photocopy, recording without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
ISBN 978-1-4412-3885-6
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989, by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations labeled RSV are from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1952 [2nd edition, 1971] by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
All lyrics by Bruce Cockburn have been quoted with permission. © Golden Mountain Music Corp.
The internet addresses, email addresses, and phone numbers in this book are accurate at the time of publication. They are provided as a resource. Baker Publishing Group does not endorse them or vouch for their content or permanence.
“At last, a robust engagement with Bruce Cockburn’s art that brings Canada’s prized poet-musician into sustained and creative dialogue with biblical faith. Brian J. Walsh writes with obvious affection for his subject but also considerable lucidity as he ranges far and wide across the Cockburn canon. Good things happen when erudite theological reflection takes popular culture seriously. This book is a case in point.”
Michael Gilmour , Providence University College, Manitoba
“YOU need to read this book! Bruce Cockburn is a shrewdly observant prophet and a graciously compassionate psalmist, ‘a troubadour on the way home,’ Brian Walsh calls him. Walsh, who has studied Cockburn’s music for forty years, here sings out his theological insights and political perceptions as a cantata that seeks to engender in us an alternative imagination. May Cockburn’s clear melodies of truth in this carefully nuanced book pique new imaginations for Christians and others throughout the world.”
Marva Dawn , theologian, teacher, and author of Unfettered Hope: A Call to Faithful Living in an Affluent Society
“ Kicking at the Darkness is not just for the Bruce Cockburn fan club, but for anyone who longs to explore the implications of an imaginative Christian vision for the world a vision that is heartbreakingly honest about brokenness and radically hopeful about the Creator’s sustaining promises. Walsh artfully and expertly toys with the many lyrical themes in Cockburn’s body of work, while maintaining an essential posture of humility and respect. Walsh might just be the single best scholar to engage this prolific artist’s work, bringing the reader over and over again to a sense of having communed with the Divine in the midst of the empire’s insanity.”
Kirstin Vander Giessen-Reitsma , *culture is not optional (Three Rivers, Michigan)
“Brian Walsh has invited Bruce Cockburn and us the readers into a thoughtful and profound theological engagement about the meaning of life and art, through a conversation with the lyrics of Cockburn’s songs. Along the way Walsh quotes C. S. Lewis’s comment that ‘what you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing: it also depends on what sort of person you are.’ This book both illuminates the depth of Cockburn’s spirituality and gives us a glimpse of where Brian Walsh stands and what sort of person he is. For those who know and love Bruce Cockburn’s music, this is a rich feast provided by a master teacher; for those who are new to Cockburn, this could be just the invitation to get them hooked.”
J. Richard Middleton , Northeastern Seminary at Roberts Wesleyan College
for Jubal, Madeleine, and Lydia
. . . with pain the world paves us over
Lord, let us not betray
God bless the children with
vision of the Day
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
Endorsements
Dedication
Preface
1. God, Friendship, and Art
2. Ecstatic Wonderings and Dangerous Kicking
3. Cockburn’s Windows
4. Creation Dream
5. At Home in the Darkness, but Hungry for Dawn
6. Creation Dreams and Ecological Nightmares
7. Into a World of Dancers
8. Humans
9. Broken Wheel
10. Betrayal and Shame
11. What Do You Do with Darkness?
12. Justice and Jesus
13. Waiting for a Miracle
Discography
Notes
Subject Index
Song Index
Back Cover
The stage of Toronto’s Massey Hall was full of a “who’s who” of Canadian musicians who had come together to honor the forty-year contribution of one of their most esteemed colleagues. The word iconic was used frequently. And no wonder. Consider the man’s résumé: thirty-one albums (twenty of which went gold or platinum), a reputation as one of the finest guitarists in the world, numerous Juno Awards, induction into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, and recipient of the Order of Canada. Now add in all of the honorary doctoral degrees in music or letters from Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. Thomas University, University of Victoria, York University, and McMaster University, and an honorary doctor of divinity from Queen’s University. Not bad for a music school dropout. And that music school the Berklee College of Music in Boston also conferred an honorary degree on this artist in 1997.
We are talking about Bruce Cockburn.
With Cockburn playing with a right hand influenced by the likes of Mississippi John Hurt and the left hand of an accomplished jazz guitarist, it is no surprise that this guitar virtuoso is placed in the company of Andrés Segovia, Bill Frisell, and Django Reinhardt by Acoustic Guitar magazine. Blending modal jazz, classic blues, folk, rock and sometimes even reggae, punk, and rap with a fine ear for world music influences, Cockburn’s music is simply unclassifiable.
Cockburn songs have been covered by artists as diverse as Jerry Garcia, the Barenaked Ladies, Jimmy Buffett, Anne Murray, Maria Muldaur, The Rankins, Dan Fogelberg, Steve Bell, Michael Occhipinti, Holly Near, Chet Atkins, Elbow, Judy Collins, the Skydiggers, Third World, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings, and k.d. lang. U2 refer to Cockburn in “God Part 2” on the Rattle and Hum album when Bono sings,
I heard a singer on the radio
Late last night
Says he’s gonna kick the darkness
Till it bleeds daylight.
The artists that gathered that evening in Massey Hall did so under that evocative Cockburn metaphor “kicking at the darkness.” And it was clear from both the performances and the testimonies from the stage that these musicians understood this kicking at the darkness to be a deeply spiritual discipline. Repeatedly throughout the show, comments were made about Cockburn’s spirituality. Perhaps this perspective on Cockburn came to its poignant and humorous height in some onstage banter between host Jian Ghomeshi and Barenaked Ladies lead singer Ed Robertson. Having launched his career with a cover of Cockburn’s “Lovers in a Dangerous Time” (in which we meet that metaphor “kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight”), Robertson was asked if this was his favorite Cockburn song. No, was the reply. And in the banter that followed it took a while to learn that the early song “One Day I Walk” was Robertson’s favorite. A good choice. But in the midst of the dialogue Robertson said, “Actually I like his ‘Jesusy’ songs the best.” The coining of the term “Jesusy” occasioned laughter from the audience and then some further joking around about whether this might have crossed some kind of line of religious propriety. But in the midst of it all Robertson still made his point clear: “I’m not really a ‘Jesusy’ kind of guy. But I love Bruce’s ‘Jesusy’ songs.”
“Jesusy” songs. In an industry that has been uneasy, at best, with anything that is overtly “Christian” in content, a non-Jesusy artist like Robertson is drawn to Cockburn’s songs about Jesus.
Jesusy songs. While Cockburn wisely steered clear of the “Contemporary Christian Music” scene early in his career and has intentionally avoided being labeled a “Christian artist,” his Jesusy songs are noted as some of his best at a concert celebrating his forty-year contribution. And no one in the audience was embarrassed or confused. Everyone knew what Robertson was talking about, and my hunch is that many people in the hall agreed with him, whether they were Jesusy kinds of people or not.
Now, I need to come clean from the outset. I am a Jesusy kind of guy. A profound sense of shared Christian faith is one of the things that have drawn me to Cockburn’s music over the last four decades. Like many other Christians, I have found that Cockburn’s art has resonated deeply with my own life and with how I understand myself to be a Christian. As we will see, Cockburn is uncomfortable and often disgusted with much that passes as Christian in our culture. I share that discomfort. And you will have to keep reading to discern just what kind of a Christian I might be. But it is clear that you don’t have to be a Christian of any sort to find yourself deeply moved by the music and lyrics of Bruce Cockburn. His audience is decidedly pluralistic. Christian, secularist, New Age, Jewish, Eastern spiritualist, you name it, and you will find folks from these various worldviews at a Bruce Cockburn concert. And maybe you don’t even need to have any interest at all in spirituality to love a good Cockburn song. But the word on the stage that night was that Cockburn’s spirituality is at the heart of his art. You can appreciate his music without paying much attention to the spiritual fo