June 29, 1969

Wandering off the path today… or am I?

It was 39 years ago today that I was ordained to the ministry of Word and Sacrament by the Susquehanna Valley Presbytery of the former United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. (UPUSA).  June 29, 1969. The service took place at my home church: Union Presbyterian Church, Endicott, New York. It was, as I have mentioned previously, the church where my parents had been married, where I was baptized and confirmed, and where in ninth grade I first thought about being a minister. I chose a Presbyterian college, then a Presbyterian seminary, and after surprising my Presbytery by passing the ordination exams on the first try, I was OK’d for the “live” examination by members of Presbytery.

The only question that came from the floor of the presbytery concerned how I would use my knowledge of the original Biblical languages of Hebrew and Greek in the radio ministry I was heading toward. I got off easy.

My ministry in radio had begun while I was a seminary student in Richmond, and the “rock and religion” show (“Showcase” which would soon become “Celebration Rock”) was in its second year. There was enough potential for expanded media ministry in Virginia that the Presbyteries of Susquehanna Valley and Hanover (in Virginia)  agreed that my call as a media ministry specialist was appropriate for ordination. [An historical note: Susquehanna Valley was in the UPUSA, and Hanover Presbytery was a southern cousin, in the Presbyterian Church U.S. (PCUS). I had been nurtured in one as a child, but theologically educated in the other. And it was in Richmond that I would be serving the church.]

In some ways, the service was the same as any other ordination service in those denominations. The church gathered for worship, with friends, family, and congregation members joined by a commission from the ordaining body, the Susquehanna Valley Presbytery. We sang hymns, heard the Word read and preached, and said our prayers. As is the case in most ordination services of any stripe, there was the moving ritual of “the laying on of hands,” when all who had been ordained to an office within the “holy, catholic, and apostolic church” (ministers, elders, deacons, any other visiting clergy of any denomination) gather around the person to be ordained and place their hands on that person as a special prayer is spoken. Among those at the service were my parents, my five younger brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, high school friends, and a couple of college and seminary friends who had made the trip to Endicott. My pastor, the Rev. Gerald Hertzog was there, of course, and the preacher for the afternoon was the Rev. Sheldon Siebel, whom I first met when he was a counselor at church camp.

There were two things that were rather unusual, as I look back. First, there was a “condition” set by the ordaining Presbytery. And there was the “title” I was given, an unusual, perhaps even unique, designation. The condition was one I could live with, though I really didn’t have a choice. Susquehanna Valley was glad to ordain me, but with the understanding that I would leave its jurisdiction and the denomination ASAP. That sounds strange, but the fact was that I would be, in church terminology, “laboring outside the bounds” of the presbytery, way down there in the South, and it was fitting that I should be a member of the southern denomination. So, within a couple of months of ordination, I was examined again by the southern church, passed, and welcomed into Hanover Presbytery where I “labored” until the two denominations united in 1983, forming (for the time being apparently) the Presbyterian Church (USA).

As for my title, since I wasn’t called to pastoral work, or to chaplaincy, or teaching… what was I to be ordained as? Evangelist was one option. But somewhere along the line, someone suggested “Minister of Electronic Media.” So, there it was, written into the ordination service. As far as I know, I am the only person to be ordained with that title, anywhere. By the way, the designation didn’t limit my ministry in any way, ecclesiastically or practically. I had the same standing as any other minister in the denomination. And when I eventually left media ministry for a pastorate in Vermont, I needed no re-programming!

To be ordained is to be set apart, answering what is perceived to be a divine call to use one’s spiritual gifts in loving service to God and God’s children. Certainly every Christian has gifts of the Spirit, and every Christian is called to use those gifts. It’s the “set apart” thing that helps define full time ministry as a profession of servant leadership. My call was to proclamation of the Gospel, albeit through new media. Radio, television, video production, and other electronic media were my tools.

And June 29, 1969 was the day call, gifts, opportunity, and church all came together for me. This morning, I went back to my home church for worship, to mark the day, and to thank God for trusting me with ministry.

Listening to Myself

I remember being in a Hallmark Card store in Richmond on a Saturday night (yeah, a pretty dull Saturday night…) and hearing my own voice coming from the speakers in the ceiling. My public radio jazz show was often pre-taped, so that I could use my Saturday nights for other things…like hanging out at the Hallmark store reading greeting cards. So there I was, reading bad poetry, when I heard myself on the radio, piped through the store. It was fun, actually. And it was very early on in my radio life.

I did listen to myself on the radio at home, as often as I could tune in. It wasn’t so much an ego trip, as some might imagine. It was more the idea that what I had begun wasn’t completed until I heard it aired. An analogy might be a preacher who only writes sermons but never actually preaches them. Or, an author who is never published. Ever. Or, a singer whose song goes no further than the shower.

To follow up on the spark of an idea, choose music that pursues the theme, write meditations that add a theological thread, mix the whole thing into an hour-long audio montage, and produce a broadcast quality master tape of “Celebration Rock” …and then never hear it over the air? 

Obviously if broadcasters are involved with live  radio, as most local deejays are, they won’t be hearing themselves except through head phones as they do their shows. When I was in radio, each time the mike switch was thrown in a live studio, the deejay’s voice was recorded so that program directors could monitor what went over the air. Each week, the p. d. would meet with the jock and critique their performance, or at least that was the theory. I suspect that most of the time those “air checks” were accessed only if something went awry. If the jock sounded bored, swore, mispronounced something, announced the wrong call letters—the boss had the evidence right there for the legendary teachable moment.

I didn’t have a p. d. looking over my shoulder or monitoring my performance. So, I listened to myself. The best thing was to playback the master tape right after it was edited. But to be honest, sometimes I didn’t finish the show until 3 or 4 in the morning, and I just put the tape in the box and sent it off to the duplicator and drove home to bed. Ultimately hearing the program broadcast on the local station(s) was usually an enjoyable thing for me. Most of the time, I’d smile over the way a song came in under my voice and I “hit the post,” that is, finished my narrative just as the vocal began on the record. The tighter, the better! Or, hearing an interview that had been edited to clean up a sloppy conversation, or hearing an edit I had made (with the old wax pencil and razor blade routine) that made an error of mine disappear… well, those little things were satisfying to me.

But the main thing was to hear how the whole program came across to the listener. So, I tried to listen to “Celebration Rock” as the rest of the audience heard the program over the air. I’ve already noted in a previous entry here how sometimes the playback went terribly wrong because of some glitch at the station. That was one reason for me to keep tuned to my own voice, but primarily it was to hear the whole, for self-critique and for self-satisfaction.

Here we are some 17 years after the last program aired, and I still listen to old CR shows. Not all of them survived, of course. But I do have several on tape and now CD, and I listen to the best ones. I enjoy the music, I like what I did with it, and I still have the feeling that it was a creative and helpful ministry for many who caught it on the air. Ego? Maybe. I do have one. Nostalgia? Sure. I am aging. I’d like to believe, however, that I can recapture by listening today how the Spirit moved in days gone by. All so that I might recognize what the Spirit might move me to do next.

I’m listening.  

The Air-Prophet’s Role

“This is Jeff Kellam with ‘Celebration Rock’ for a Sunday. This week, an interview with a gay minister, a gun control advocate, a war protester, a civil rights leader, the director of the Free Clinic, and, in general, proponents of several other left-wing causes. The music begins with Whitney Houston’s ‘The Greatest Love.'”

Obviously, that show never happened. At least not all at once.

Traditionally the role of the ordained Protestant minister has included at least these three nicely alliterative functions: pastor, priest, and prophet. The pastoral piece involves being a kind of shepherd to the flock. If that analogy doesn’t work these days, then another way of putting it is this: pastors guide, comfort, nurture, and counsel. When, as the song goes, times get rough and friends just can’t be found, there is need for a pastor. A time of loss, confusion, illness, loneliness, or fear can be redeemed if there is a trusted (that’s important, and it doesn’t  go without saying these days), compassionate, and loving person to listen to and pray with you.

The priestly function is obvious if you’ve ever stepped beyond the threshold of a church building for worship, a wedding, or a funeral. The minister is the officiant, yes, the reader of the rite words, the leader of the service, the preacher, the theological emcee as it were. Many, if not most, ministers are introverts, studies show, but almost all are able to summon the inner strength to stand before the masses (so to speak), and, pardon the expression, perform their priestly responsibilities. The minister/priest has learned to study and proclaim the Word, to lead the Sacraments, and to generally avoid getting in the way of the Spirit as God and people sing to one another.

Some ministers are wonderfully warm pastors but terribly cold priests. Some thrive on the corporate communion of congregational fellowship, but flunk one-on-one hand-holding.

And then there is the prophet’s mantle. Here’s where things get sticky, and always have. Picture the white preacher in a southern parish during the civil rights era, the one who wants so much to advocate for racial equality and justice to a congregation that thinks of Dr. King as a communist sympathizer. Think of the pastor in a mill town where workers are exploited and the mill CEO is sitting in the back pew, where his family has sat for three generations. Or, the minister who is convinced, that is, convicted, that the war in Iraq is both illegal and immoral, and who believes that the Holy Spirit has led her to a scripture passage about beating swords into plows.

The examples may seem stereotypical, but you get the point. If you are a good pastor  and folks love to have you visit them in their hospital rooms, or if you are the good priest  who breaks bread and shares the cup with old words that seem fresh as today’s grace… well, the chair of the budget committee will smile on you two-fold. But play the role of the prophet and alienate the majority of members of the congregation with an unpopular reading of the Spirit, then watch out for the tar/feathers/rail thing.

Rare is the minister who plays all three roles well. Rarer is the minister who plays the prophet’s role boldly. I know, because I was a parish minister for many years, and I was a prophetic chicken. I insinuated, hinted, and leaned toward some prophetic ideas, but rarely clucked loud enough to be understood; I hoped that my church folk would read between my clever lines, and some did, but most as much as patted me on the head and said, “I enjoyed the service today.” Once on an Easter Sunday I read someone else’s “pastoral prayer” which I found in a worship resource. It inferred that people “just following orders” or justifying their injustices by “defending national security” were participating in crucifixions instead of resurrections. Man, did I hear it from a retired military guy. I may well have deserved it. Bad timing and all that. But when is the timing good for prophets?

Frederick Buechner writes, “Prophet means spokesman  not fortune teller. The one whom in their unfathomable audacity the prophets claimed to speak for was the Lord and Creator of the universe. There is no evidence to suggest that anyone ever asked a prophet home for supper more than once.” Here’s the thing for me, regarding boldly speaking out on the radio: I found it much easier to be an air-prophet than to be a prophetic voice from a church pulpit. Why? Because it was safer. I’m not proud of that, of course. But that’s the way it was.

My radio program was produced under the auspices of a Presbytery that was, for a Southern church body, fairly “liberal.” It had integrated its church camp early on in the so-called civil rights era. It took progressive positions on many of the social issues of the day— “the day” being the late 60’s through the 80’s when “Celebration Rock” peaked. I produced shows on everything from “gay lib” to the arms race…from prison reform to peacemaking and earth-keeping…and from sex education to gun control. And in almost every case, I could find a social justice statement from my church to back me up. If the “powers-that-be” that sponsored the program were upset by anything I said or by any guest who said it more boldly than I, they never threatened to pull the plug on my studio. I suspect that most of those “powers” were not rock music fans and didn’t really listen to the program week by week.

To be clear, I wasn’t a shrill voice, crying in the wilderness. I interviewed a couple of those folk, but all in all, our conversations were not tirades, but offered faithful and reasonable alternatives to the fundamentalist or conservative voices heard on Christian stations or purchased airtime. Given the variety of viewpoints held by all the folk who claim the Bible as their authority, the people I interviewed never claimed to hold the whole truth…just some pieces of it that needed to be prayerfully considered. The music I chose to play, from Bruce Springsteen to Bruce Cockburn, from Stevie Wonder to Carole King to U-2 …the message in the music would have pleased Isaiah and Micah and Jeremiah, I think. Liberal or conservative, the best we could all do was try to please Jesus. Try.

On the radio, on rock  radio, this minister could sound  like a pastor, but I was just a tape-recorded voice and didn’t make hospital calls. I was invited now and then to do some weddings, but for the most part, I served no priestly function that I am aware of. But I had the marvelous freedom to speak out on behalf of those with no voice, to advocate for the least of our brothers and sisters, and to promote the social justice ministries of various denominations. All so that audiences would know we followers of Christ are striving to sing loud the Magnificat, live the Sermon on the Mount, and walk in the light of love.

I’ve used the word a lot here, but I really wasn’t very bold.  I wasn’t that  prophetic. I was lacking in courage and understanding, truth be told. But I’m glad for the interviews, the songs, and the church-produced PSA’s that spoke more faithfully than I to the troubles of Northern Ireland, South Africa, Central America, and the four corners of the good old U.S.A.

Nonetheless, or all the more, only God can judge whether this ministry was faithful to the greatest love of all.

 

 

 

 

 

Jesus at the Servant’s Entrance

As a Presbyterian minister, I produced and hosted the radio program “Celebration Rock” for almost 22 years. As far as I know, there was no national organization of Christian Secular Rock Deejays with Weekly Denominationally-Produced Programs, or CSRDWD-PP. At least no one ever invited me to join it, if it did exist. Many of us who used the public airwaves to spread the Good News were members of organizations with a broader focus, such as “National Religious Broadcasters” (NRB) or (as previously referred to in this blog) the North American Broadcast Section of the World Association of Christian Communication, NABS-WACC.

I attended annual NABS conferences for almost 20 years, missing only a few along the way, and serving on the NABS Steering Committee for a term. I also produced the NABS-WACC program Showcase for several years, editing together radio and TV segments produced by NABS members so we could sample one another’s programs. And then there was the year I went to the NRB convention.

The NRB is made up of generally more conservative Christian folk, the ones who used to buy time on radio and TV for their programs and then ask for money from listeners to pay the stations…and in some cases…well, let’s just say that some of those folks were named Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Jimmy Swaggart. Then instead of buying time on stations, they bought stations. And networks. And built kingdoms.

I hasten to add that many NRB members are honest, upright evangelicals who love the Lord and have earnest zeal to spread the Gospel. And almost since the first broadcasters cranked up their transmitters, religious communicators have exploited the airwaves as if they were a gift from God. I joined in the party in 1968, but I never joined the NRB. I wasn’t that  Christian, I guess. But in the late 1970’s I got an invitation to their Washington, D.C. convention. It wasn’t a personal invite, you understand; I was on some mailing list, and received their mass mailing. After reading the contents of the envelope, I was so offended by something I saw there that I wrote a personal letter to the long-time President of the NRB, Dr. Ben Armstrong. He wrote me back, and apologized. I’ll bet you’re wondering what this was about, right? Good.

Included in the NRB packet was a letter from Armstrong describing that year’s conference, listing special speakers, and exuding over the accommodations at the posh Washington Embassy Row hotel (the Hilton maybe?) where conferees would live, move, and have their being while attending the convention. The letter gushed about luxurious rooms, sumptuous meals, and the likelihood that those attending the conference might well rub elbows with Washington’s elite: ambassadors, statesmen, and other people of power and prestige. The proximity of embassies certainly made that likely indeed. But with all that hype about its opulent setting and implied exclusiveness, I was more than put off by it all. I glanced at the hotel’s brochure, and looked again at Armstrong’s letter. Then, I wrote one of my own.

I told Armstrong that I thought I probably would attend the convention that year, but I would make other arrangements for accommodations. I told him that my budget was too modest, my taste more simple, and that my Christian sensibilities leaned toward following the one who had nowhere to lay his head, who taught self-denial, and who, if he were to attend the conference, would probably be asked to use the servant’s entrance in the back of the building. I didn’t mean to sound sarcastic, or too pious for that matter, but I did think the NRB letter described a place where Jesus might well sit down to dinner with power brokers, but then decline a luxurious room in order to identify with the powerless, the poverty-stricken, and the homeless of the District.

I will come to your conference for the first time, I wrote, but I will be staying nearby at the hostel run by the Church of the Pligrims. I must have sounded pretty self-righteous, but I said I’d be in a dormitory-style bunk with shared bath…my own little protest.

Ben Armstrong, much to his credit, soon wrote back and apologized for the tone of the NRB’s letter of invitation. He agreed with me that the mass mailing had inappropriately stressed the affluence and prestige factors connected with the hotel and its cultural surroundings. He confessed that the hotel had provided some of the information in his most offensive paragraph, and he promised that the NRB would monitor its future promotional mailings more closely. Then he reminded me of our denominational kinship (Presbyterian) and our common ministries (mass media) and said he hoped that I would attend and introduce myself to him if our paths crossed there. His was a good letter, and it was a fascinating convention.

I heard Malcolm Muggeridge speak, as well as a number of nationally-known (and sometimes infamous) televangelists and radio preachers. And who should I brush elbows with on an escalator at the posh embassy row neighborhood hotel? A Senator? A diplomat? No. It was the porn king, Larry Flynt, whose claim to be “born again” was greeted with both suspicion and enthusiasm by the religious broadcasters gathered in those prestigious hallways. It was no surprise that Flynt was surrounded by members of the press, and it was no surprise that many fundamentalist broadcasters assumed Flynt was merely seeking publicity for his “Penthouse” magazine. Still, other NRB folk knew that God does has a way of pulling wayward ones back on the path, and welcoming prodigals and sinners home, and surprising the daylights out of those who walk in darkness. Besides, Flynt was promising a Christian sex magazine full of naked people and even NRB-er’s must have been curious about that!

It was also at that convention that I met up with the BMI guy (or was it the ASCAP chap?) and was told I was “small potatoes.” (See the previous blog entry.) All in all, it was quite a convention. The bunk bed at the Church of the Pilgrims wasn’t all that bad either. But that was the only NRB convention I ever attended. The folks must have missed me, though, because the Bakkers split, Swaggart got caught with a prostitute, and the so-called “electronic church” faded out as a cultural phenomenon.

Now that I think about it, NABS-WACC is gone too. And so is “Celebration Rock.” Whatever happened to the Christian “Penthouse” idea? I assume people still get naked. Excuse me…someone’s at the back door.

 

The Record Collection

In my attic suffering the heat of summer is my complete “Celebration Rock” record collection, or at least what’s left of it. I still have the first record  I bought for the pilot back in 1968. It was called “16 Motown Hits,” and it was purchased at the now long defunct Woolco big box store on Richmond’s north side. (In fact, I still have the first record I ever bought, period. It is a 45 rpm copy of the Kingston Trio’s “Tom Dooley.” But that’s another story…)

As I’ve mentioned previously, once the pilot show was OK’d for refinement, and the initial broadcast was aired in February 1968, our WBBL counterpart WLEE was more than happy to loan me the “hop” file of 45’s so my Sunday night hour would be current with ” Big ‘LEE’s” playlist. Still, I had to use my limited budget (and some personal funds) to augment the sometimes scratchy hop file hits. I did try to buy wisely, choosing records that I thought would have some staying power, that is, records I would be able to use more than once. Remember, this was a very low budget experiment in religious broadcasting, and I had to be a very careful steward of church funds when it came to buying music by Eric Burden, Marvin Gaye, Spanky and Our Gang, and Simon and Garfunkel.

Each week after taping “Showcase,” the forerunner of CR, I would return the hop file to WLEE, but place a purchased record or two in my own library for future use. I built up a modest collection of 45’s and L.P. albums as one year led to another. I also began to add some early “contemporary Christian music” to my library, so I could have some pointedly faith-based songs to use on the show. In the late 1960’s there wasn’t much to choose from in that genre. I got a hold of some Catholic folk mass albums, some now-embarrassing-to-admit Christian “pop” stuff, and some very early (and earnest) attempts at singing the faith with a rock beat. One example of that was an album of traditional hymns set to a 60’s style rock sound by a group called “The Crusaders.” (It was, as I may have mentioned here earlier, a far cry from the Crusaders jazz group led by Joe Zawinul. But it did add a fun contemporary sound to old established hymns.)

Eventually, WLEE and later WRVQ and WEZS (and its successor WMXB) passed along new releases they had received as promos from record companies. Again, this was to the advantage of the stations airing the show; they wanted the program to sound fresh and current on their frequency, even if it was in public service time. So I began to accumulate “dupes” the stations could spare. About that time, around the mid-1970’s I guess, the local Columbia Records rep Randy Allen began passing along to me the latest current albums his company was releasing. Randy did this as a favor, but he knew that if I chose to play a particular album, I would feature it, play most of it, talk about it, and sell a few records in the process. Mutual back scratching. Kenny Loggins… Earth, Wind, and Fire… Chicago…these made for good CR shows. Then the local Warner Bros. – Electra rep did the same thing for me, and my collection grew some more.

Truth be told, not all the records that came my way fit my format or met my needs. I was given some records that must have gone straight to the cut-out bins at that Woolco store. But even records by obscure artists sometimes had songs that held some intrigue for me, and I would save a record just for one cut that I thought I might be able to use some day. At the same time, I received many other albums that went straight to the top of the charts, albums by top artists of the day, but they either didn’t fit my music format, free and broad as it was, or I found no cuts that would fit the message of the “Celebration Rock” ministry of music and meditations. I won’t name names!

(Occasionally, friends would bring me a favorite album and recommend that I use it on CR. “Jeff, you’ve got to hear this! Play cuts 1,3, and 7! Great messages.”  But often those records had been eaten up by home phonographs [as we called them], and they weren’t up to broadcast standards.)

After a few years, or several  years, I had a couple of thousand albums in a large record shelving unit donated by a local store. Here I would find multiple albums by Chicago, Carole King, Billy Joel, and Harry Chapin. And single albums by T-Bone Burnett, Suzanne Vega, and Grace Slick.  All were filed alphabetically by artist. And I had hundreds of old 45’s, filed by song title, many too abused by “back-cuing” to play, except under the most desperate circumstances.

Then one day…I wondered if maybe I might not be complying with copyright laws by using these records on my show. Now, locally, my broadcast of those records (more precisely those songs)  was covered by licenses secured by the stations which carried the show. The fact that I had made a “mechanical reproduction” (by taping the records into my show) didn’t bother me much. That was just a matter of convenience, and when it came time for the stations to log their music as either ASCAP or BMI (or more rarely SESAC), I was asked on rare occasions to submit my playlist for the stations’ record keeping. But when CR was heavy into syndication and I was making multiple tape copies of each show…hmm…was that legal?

On time, I bumped into a representative of either ASCAP or BMI (can’t honestly remember which) at a national broadcasting conference, and I presented my dilemma. “I’m taping your music for my syndicated show and sending those tapes to stations for broadcast. Is that legal? Do I need to buy my own music licenses in order to do that?” You see the risk here? What if the rep said what I was doing was clearly illegal, and, yes, I did indeed need a license to tape their music for my show? I’d be led away from the convention in handcuffs, and fined, and then before the next “Celebration Rock” tape was produced, I’d have to buy expensive clearances for the music I wanted to use.

The rep asked, “How many stations are you on…how many copies of each show do you make?” The answer at that time was, “Around forty.”  He then asked, “Do you charge the stations for your program?”

“No, it’s supplied free…public service, you know.”

“Well, no one is going to go after you on this.” That was kind of  an answer. Sort of  permission to keep doing what I was doing. And then came the clincher: “You’re small potatoes. The people we are after are the bootleggers who are making thousands of illegal tapes and selling them out of gas stations and mini-marts along the highway. We’re not worried about you!”

Whew! …but hold on; wait a minute! What did he mean “small potatoes” ?! It might have been better to be arrested than accused of being that! Here I thought I was doing pretty well: a sometimes creative show, often artfully done, always sincere, very welcome at the stations, drawing faithful listeners and some good reviews…and carried by more and more stations, and I might add, selling a lot of records, Mr. BMI (or was it the other guy?). On the other hand, yes, what I did all those years was modest compared to what whole networks and denominations were producing. Maybe I should have been totally up front about it all: “Hi– this is Jeff Kellam, and this week on ‘Small Potatoes’ we’ll feature the music of The Eagles!”

So, the music licensing people let me off. I was humbled, but relieved. And now, decades later, music copyrights and licensing organizations are playing catch-up with all the electronic and digital ways artists’ songs are played, posted, sampled, and shared over Internet, cell phone, and ipod. “Celebration Rock” is long gone. But I still have a couple of thousand old vinyl records in the attic, the soundtrack of my life, waiting to be dusted off so they can sing again. And more than a few old reels of tape that were once my ministry of faith, hope, and love. Small potatoes. But delicious!

 

The Mennonite Connection

I love the ambiguities of life that keep us just enough off-balance that we can never quite sink into ennui along the journey. On my first retreat at Holy Cross Abbey in the early 1970’s, the Trappist guest master Father Stephen proudly showed me his digital watch, calling it an “experiment” for the “Cistercians of the Strict Observance.” Later, my friend Randy led me to his ashram where simplicity was a rule of life, but where the latest in audio recording equipment helped the guru spread his wisdom far and wide. And for many years, whose state-of-the art stereo tape duplication service helped “Celebration Rock” maintain and expand its modest national syndication? The Mennonites’. You know. The ones with the wide rimmed black hats and the buggies. OK; not quite. Because it turns out there are different kinds of Mennonites, just as there are different kinds of Presbyterians, Baptists, and Jews.

I met Ron Byler and Ken Weaver at one of the many Fort Lauderdale annual meetings of NABS-WACC (North American Broadcast Section of the World Association of Christian Communication). They were connected with Mennonite Media Services in Harrisonburg, Va., near (or on) the campus of Eastern Mennonite College. These obviously were not the more conservative Mennonites whom many folk can’t tell from their Amish cousins in the Anabaptist tradition. Their recording facility in Harrisonburg was (still is, probably) a gem. They produced a superb series of radio PSA’s called “Choice,” as well as others that I often used in my local Richmond programs and on “Celebration Rock.”

A standard feature of each NABS-WACC conference was called the Showcase, where radio and television producers (NABS members) shared excerpts of their programs. Some of the showcased programs were produced in cooperation with major broadcast networks or network affiliates in major markets. Other entries in the Showcase were more modestly produced, like my show. I vividly recall Ken Weaver saying to me one afternoon right after the Showcase, “Jeff, why are you hiding your light under a bushel?”

“Pardon?”

“Your radio program is so good, you should be promoting it way beyond the small number of stations that are carrying it!” He was genuinely enthusiastic about what he had heard, and, as a national producer of radio and TV programming, he couldn’t understand why I was so low key about extending the reach of CR. I explained my budgetary restrictions, the sponsoring presbytery’s limitations, and the fact that I was all there was to the staff. (I think I’ve noted here before that it was one thing to imagine, write, record, edit, and duplicate the program; it was another to type the labels, seal the mailers, and drive the armful of cardboard boxes to the post office.)

Ken introduced me to Ron Byler, and made a proposal. I would produce the master tape (according to their higher quality specs) and mail it to Harrisonburg. Their facility’s high speed duplication equipment would reproduce several copies at once, they’d package and mail the tapes, and receive them back after the stations had broadcast the show. They’d recycle the tapes a few times and then retire the used tape to my studio for non-broadcast purposes. Oh, there was a cost factor in this, but the Mennonite Media Services (MMS) facility made the whole process so affordable that the presbytery didn’t hesitate to buy into Ken and Ron’s proposal. (Presbytery’s moral and financial support for my work were never-failing.) 

The Mennonite connection helped the ministry of “Celebration Rock” in numerous ways. The program sounded better than ever, I was freed up for other creative opportunities, and syndication widened. MMS held me to a high standard, kept me to a deadline (pretty much…), and certainly added to an ecumenical spirit of cooperation among faith groups.

I have to admit that one thing that had surprised me about the original proposal wasn’t the idea that the Mennonites would work hand in hand with Presbyterians, but that they would have anything to do with rock music! That surprise evaporated the day they sent me a music cassette they had produced: it was a rap version of Jesus’ parables! Mennonite rap. God works in mysterious ways…

Blogging on the Blog

Well, we’ve come to this. As I begin to admit that there may not be much more to say in this blog about its subject, my “Celebration Rock” radio program, I am moved to reflect on the blog itself! But only this time. (This won’t become a habit.)

Whenever I am moved to write something new here, I go to the “dashboard” and see how many people are actually reading what I’m writing. There’s you, of course, but how many others? Unfortunately, these occasions are called “hits,” a term not particularly suited to peace-loving folk like us. Besides the cold numbers, though, I am more interested in what  readers are tuning into. Web searches lead the unwary into, well, the web. What has this aging spider woven that draws the most hits? The page entitled, “Backstage with Harry Chapin.”

What a great thing that is! It means to me that though he’s been gone for many years, his music and his reputation as a man of compassion live on. I’m imagining someone hearing a Chapin song on the 70’s satellite music channel, or running across an old album packed away with the turntable in the basement, or finding the musical line, “All my life’s a circle, sunrise to sundown…” mysteriously and unrelentingly playing in the stereo between one’s ears… I can imagine that person entertaining warm memories of Chapin’s stories and songs and Googling the singer’s name or a song title. (Maybe that’s how you got here today…)

Eventually, up comes the “Celebration Rock” blog page about a backstage interview. It’s not the most authoritative page on the web, nor the most revealing, but it’s that “backstage” part. Sounds enticing, huh? Wouldn’t most of us enjoy being backstage with someone we’ve admired? (Did I tell you about the night I was backstage with Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Getz, and Herbie Mann? I did? Oh.) And “backstage” sounds so much more intimate than an interview on Oprah’s couch or in front of an L. A. club. Yet I have the feeling that most folks who are seeking some insight into Harry Chapin and his music are not merely curious in their search; it is more an act of devotion perhaps.

Insight and imagination, poetry and music… knowing how to tell a story with a real beginning, a perceptive plot, and an honest ending… those are Chapin’s hallmark. Add to his talent the personal commitment he applied to the tragedy of global hunger, and the artist is also the humanitarian. Or to put it another way, the star is a servant. No wonder his memory draws interest even today.

The second most viewed page in this e-journal is the one that dealt with so-called satanic lyrics and back masking (or backward masking): the hiding of messages that can only be accessed by playing magnetic tape or vinyl records backward. I suppose it’s quite a bit harder to hear a CD or MP3 recording backward, but if the devil is in the details (sorry), the point was not that listeners would be able to access, hear, or understand the backward message, but that the message (always a bad one…never “love your neighbor”) would enter one’s subconsciousness and drive one to think or act in awful ways. Since I’ve already dealt with the subject in that previous post, I won’t say more, but I am interested in the fact that people are still fascinated or troubled by the old rumors or the allegedly true technological manipulation of oxide particles on Ampex recording tape. At least they are interested enough in the topic to search for information on the web. Why? Maybe there’s not enough wrong with the world already, so we need to look for more trouble to wring our hands over.

By my calculations, the third most visited page was the one entitled, “The Celebrity with Cooties.” It was about the harrowing teen years of the singer who took her name from the Lackawanna train, Phoebe Snow. I had interviewed her when her song “Poetry Man” was ranked number 4 on the music charts. She told me about always being the unpopular kid in school, the one with cooties. I’m glad that blog has been popular because of its reminder that nerds, dorks, and cootie carriers often turn out to be very gifted people who bring healing and self-respect to others who feel as if they are losers. Someone helped Phoebe Snow discover her gifts, and as artist and mother she excelled as a child of God. And probably still does…but we’ve been out of touch recently. It occurs to me only now that she opened up to tell that story, I recorded it and used the interview on my radio show, but never asked the best question of the night: who was the one who helped her unwrap the gifts of music and performance in her life?

So there are the top three blogs in this series. I won’t mention the ones that I spent two hours writing that only my wife and one other person accessed. Heck. Those topics I might just as well have mentioned to Joan at breakfast that morning. As for the other reader…we can always pour another bowl of Cheerios for you.

Peace and grace to you…and please: do be gentle with people, and with yourself.                                                        Jeff Kellam

 

 

 

Listener Feedback, from Way Back

We may be heading toward the end of this “Celebration Rock” e-journal or blog. After over 75 entries, what more can be said that is of interest to anyone but me? Still I keep running across things that fit in this e-filing cabinet. And I did spend more than a third of my life producing that weekly radio show. Maybe entries will be posted less frequently, but every once in a while, I’m sure I’ll open a box in the attic and think, “Maybe my kids will be interested in this.”

Over the almost 22 years that CR aired in Richmond (and in syndication some of that time), I kept in touch with many listeners, mostly through letters. I did meet many listeners through speaking engagements, community meetings, etc., but the U. S. mail was the primary conduit between producer/host and those whom the program was meant to serve. Some of those who wrote or who told me “in person” that they enjoyed listening have become pastors (and some very good ones, at that!), talented musicians, or radio professionals. Here’s a look at one teenager who grew up to be… (answer revealed at the end) 

Do you like reading other peoples’ mail? Here are excerpts from two letters I just found yesterday as I sorted through boxes I hadn’t opened in years. The first is dated March 30, 1969, and the second arrived two weeks later. Both were written by the same high school student. (At the time the letters were written, CR was known as “Showcase,” and the program had been on the air for little over a year. I was still in seminary.)

Dear Jeff,

The Simon and Garfunkel show was out of sight. I think you should stick with message music as much as you can. Somehow “I Am a Rock” does more for me than “Dizzy” or maybe “Hair.” How about a night devoted to Bob Dylan or Donovan? Malcolm Boyd’s prayers are also good– he can really get himself across.

“Showcase” is really coming along. I even passed up reading “The Selected Short Stories of De Maupassant” (in French) just to listen tonight. (What a sacrifice.) I just thought I’d jot down a few ideas and comments for you. I hope they can help you a little. Take it easy.

The second letter was dated April 13, 1969 and came in response to an interview I did with Joe South, whose hit songs included “Games People Play” and “Walk a Mile in My Shoes.”

Dear Jeff, Thanks for your reply to my last letter– your stationary is real professional-looking.

“Joe South” was one in a million. The interview, the music, Malcolm Boyd, and your commentary couldn’t have been better. It’s kinda hard to express; it’s just that it all sounded tailor-made. I mean, Joe South would say something, and then a song would go hand in hand with what he said, and your commentary was exceptionally well done also.

Don’t get the idea that I’m just a “yes man” or something. I’m looking for faults– I just couldn’t find any. Keep slaving away though; it pays off. One suggestion: keep up the message music and “specials.” The combination of commentary and related music is unbeatable….

Then came a reference to my wife and I attending the high school musical “Guys and Dolls” at his school. He was pleased we enjoyed his show.

I found at least two things interesting here. One was the repeated encouragement to play “message” music, and to keep doing “specials.” I did, of course, over the next 20 years. The other thing of interest is that the writer, even in high school, wrote like a critic, reviewing my program, and admitting that he had looked for faults. (He didn’t look hard enough…) It turns out that our paths crossed many years later, and he had become a critic for the Richmond newspaper, reviewing recordings and concerts. He also had become a talented musician-songwriter. And if my recent web search for his name is accurate, he is a contributing writer and reviewer for Billboard Magazine. Still the critic.

To protect his privacy, I won’t reveal his name. But I wonder if he still prefers Joe South to Tommy Roe…

A Candle in the Window

Friends came over for dinner on the back porch last night and asked about the candles we keep in our windows. “There must be a story here,” Bob prompted us. “More than one,” was my reply. As I told those stories, it occurred to me that “Celebration Rock” had played a role in our custom. Thus this entry. (Perhaps I’ve  already alluded to this, but this blog is so “deep” now, I can’t recall every entry.)

A few years ago my wife and I took a nostalgic walk through the small town in Pennsylvania where we had gone to college in the 1960’s. We noticed that many homes had single white candles in each window (electric ones, of course; the town is still there). We asked a long-time resident about the custom, and he replied that they were “just friendship candles.” We liked the way the homes looked, and decided that after the following Christmas season, when we dismantled the decorations, we would leave the single candles in our windows. (We lived in Richmond at the time, and many homes there followed the Williamsburg tradition of single white candles in Christmas windows. But only for Christmas.)

By that Christmas, in 1990, the first “Gulf War” had taken U. S. troops overseas and away from families for the holiday. It occurred to me that those “friendship candles” were also signs of peace, light shining in a world enshadowed by heavy clouds of war. On both my WRVA “Sunday Morning” program and on the post-syndication (local) “Celebration Rock” show on WMXB (B-103.7) I suggested that listeners join my family and members of our church (Bon Air Presbyterian) in keeping at least one candle lighted in a front window. In that small way, we would be both “keeping Christmas” for the return of our troops as well as letting the light of peace shine from our homes. Now this wasn’t a huge coordinated media campaign; I only had those two weekly radio shows, plus the B-103 “Jazz Brunch” where I also mentioned the idea.

The idea caught on, however, when the B-103 morning team (was it “the Love Brothers”?) heard about it and began to talk it up each day on their show. Someone mentioned it in the newspaper, and then on a drive around Central Virginia after the holidays, Joan and I saw many, many homes– downtown, in the suburbs, and in the rural counties — with white candles shining in front windows. We happened to drop by a major hardware store in Richmond, and there was even a display of electric candles with a sign that didn’t quite pick up the original idea: “Honor our returning troops,” it read.

I persisted in calling them “candles for peace,” but when the Gulf War ended a few weeks later, many of the candles began to disappear, as if Christmas had been kept, the war was over, the troops home, and there was no more need for a light to shine in the darkness. Still, the Kellams and many neighbors, some friends and even the church, kept a candle lighted as a sign of our desire, our prayer, for “peace on earth.”

Two lessons have come from this candle idea. First, we saw the Parable of the Sower at work. (Mark 4) My first few remarks on the radio may have succeeded in planting a few candles in windows. The B-103 morning guys caught the idea and spread the word further and many more candles appeared. Neighbors told neighbors and eventually the lights shone throughout the city. Not every light stayed on, but enough did that we saw evidence of “peace” planted in wonderful ways.

A friend of ours was giving a young victim of sexual abuse directions to her home, so that the young woman would have a safe place to be for awhile. On the phone she explained that the distance involved was far and the directions a little complicated by rural roads. My friend told the distressed caller, “When you drive down my road a mile, look for the house on the right with the single candle in the window. That’s my home, and you’ll be safe here.” Peace at work.

When Joan and I moved to Vermont a couple of years later, there was a knock on the door at 1:30 a.m., on an extremely frigid night. I looked out the window of the front porch and saw two college-aged men. They said their car had gone off the road near-by and one guy wanted to call his father to come pick them up. They were glad to get warm a few minutes, relieved to be able to call for help, and happy to see a friendly face “in the middle of the night.” When they left their car, they had hiked by several homes until they saw the lighted candle in our front window. Peace, again.

Friendship, peace, light, welcome. Five watts. The light still shines in the darkness.

Long Live the Poet

“Celebration Rock” would never have worked without the power of poetry. Although one CR “spin-off,” “The Spirit of Jazz” was primarily a program of instrumental jazz, a program that only rarely featured lyrics, “Celebration Rock” itself was based on the poetic images of rock wordsmiths.

Admittedly, much of the hit music I used as little more than entertaining “filler” in that weekly hour was bereft of anything more than silly rhymes. But when “Celebration Rock” moved toward its primary focus each week, whether featuring the music of one particular artist or exploring a theme or contemporary topic through nine to twelve songs off singles or albums, lyrics were the heart of the show. And lyrics, by definition I suppose, are poetry. And some of that poetry was very good indeed.

Whether expressing feelings (joy, isolation, terror, disappointment, exuberance, peace) or telling stories (narratives of lessons learned, love lost or found, or bits of commentary about life, or parables, or biographical sketches, or….), song lyrics wed to music give voice to our common humanity. When the poet writes of loneliness, the reader or listener can identify. When the lyric sings of delight, someone smiles. If the poet rails against an injustice, even if not everyone is moved to action, at least the prophet has vented! And when we hear a poignant story of elderly friends, a lost child, a soldier, reunited lovers… if the words are well chosen and affective, the poet succeeds in gently reminding us that we are one with our neighbors.

The poetry of rock often sounds angry, unpleasant words about gritty subjects, prophetic in intention. Sometimes the words are sharp and the message painfully clear by the last verse. But as is the case with all forms of poetry, there are times when only the poet knows the meaning of word/symbols, and we who receive the gift of lines may appreciate only the sounds, or the mystery, or the silence of the poetic moment.

I have quoted in previous posts more lyric poetry perhaps than fair use allows, so I am reluctant to add copyrighted lyrics here to illustrate specifics. I’m no expert on what constitutes “good” poetry; I only know what I like, or what speaks to me. Meter, rhyme, imagination, spirit… what is it that draws me into a song or sonnet, e. e. cummings or Bono, a psalm or a trifle?

When Harry Chapin told the story of the “Sniper” or Jim Croce sang “The Workin’ at the Car Wash Blues,” or Suzanne Vega shared Luka’s story, or the Moody Blues spoke of the “cold-hearted orb that rules the night,” or Rush narrated the story of “The Analog Kid,” each touched some place deep within the listener. From the poetry of protest during the civil rights era (which is never over) to the “silly love songs” Paul McCartney wrote (“…what’s wrong with that, I’d like to know?”), from James Taylor’s “Millworker” to Dan Fogelberg’s “Netherland,” we celebrated the worry and wonder of being human on our weekly hour of air time.

[An aside: in terms of popular music, back in the first half of the 20th century, it was common that lyricists wrote poetry, composers wrote the music, and singers recorded the result. Arguably the greatest popular singer of the past sixty years, Frank Sinatra may have written only a couple of songs himself, but his gift was interpreting the music and lyrics of others. On the other hand, the pop lyricists of the recent past from Ira Gershwin to Johnny Mercer penned memorable poetry, but they were not known as singers. (Mercer may not have been my best reference here; he could sing, and did record, but he wasn’t known for his singing voice.) Today, of course, “American Idol” performances aside, audiences favor the “singer-songwriter,” and for some reason assume that if a singer sings someone else’s song that performer is “stealing” or at least engaged in a less respectable art form. That attitude ignores the fact that many of today’s popular singer-songwriters can’t sing all that well and may write totally inane lyrics.]

Finally, speaking of poetry, as I look back on the years that “Celebration Rock” was aired, it’s interesting to note that many listeners shared their own poetry with me. Within the first year of my radio ministry through CR, at least two teenagers read their poetry on my program. Many more sent in poetry for me to read. Obviously, I didn’t read much of it on the air. Some of it was not very good, and some was too personal. Plus, you read a poem each week and the next thing you know, scores of poets are sending in their writing and Celebration Rock” becomes “The Writer’s Almanac.” Nonetheless, for many listeners, writing poetry and finding someone who would read and appreciate it meant that their voice was heard, and that someone cared enough to write back and reflect not only on their writing, but on the depth of their feelings. There were times when someone would send me pages and pages of poetry, with the caution that it was not meant for broadcast, but only for my eyes. Dark secrets, deep emotions. Sacred pages.

So, here’s to the poets! With thanksgiving for the muse that moves us to write, and Spirit that moves us to live something worth writing about!