averyfineline

I wish I had thought of it first, but more than that, I’m mostly just grateful for having discovered this line from Madeleine L’Engle on faith and art, from her book Walking on Water:
If it’s bad art, it’s bad religion, no matter how pious the subject.
Henceforth, this shall be my reply to all joyful noisers […]

Daniel Mount’s interview with some of gospel music’s leading men has generated an interesting, if somewhat misdirected, conversation about piracy and digitally provisioned music content (but honestly, though … a “serious problem” in sg? Really, Daniel?). David Bruce Murray takes the time to delve a bit more deeply into the vagaries of fair use and […]

Speaking (I suspect) for untold legions of colleagues, Joel Lindsey writes about the songwriter’s most valuable renewable resource: hope (and a little luck):
… we’re songwriters — we’re used to rejection — we can take it. And maybe, just maybe, the miracle will land on our shoulders this time. So, we are all scrambling, typing and […]

On my junket to Asheville for the bloggers conference, I came away with a few cds, including Calvin Hunt’s latest Vine Records project (hear clips here). Were I reviewing it, it’s ALI rating would only clock in at around 25-20%. And by far my favorite song was written (shocking news tonight) by a southern gospel […]

Daniel Britt argues in a recent musicscribe post that even though the quality of production and general professionalism of albums usually goes up when handled by a record label, there’s a slightly greater chance that custom recorded albums (aka table projects) will produce “variety and possibly a surprise-success.”

I’m oversimplifying his argument for […]

Songwriter Sue C. Smith laments the frustrations of unintentional quasi-identity theft in comments threads (ftr the blog she’s talking about is avfl, where she occasionally comments here as just “Sue”). Ah the curse of the common name.

First, via Martin Roth, a thoughtful and provocative essay on the mediocrity in, and demise of, Christian arts.
Part of me has a great deal of sympathy for what’s being said here - which is, more or less, that much of Christian arts culture has bankrupted itself on phony displays of piety and the celebration […]

As I write, the Singing News website appears to be overwhelmed with traffic given the announcement of Roger Bennett’s death (sogospelnews has an announcement here). I didn’t know him, only exchanged a few brief emails with him a couple of times, and have nothing by way of eulogy that won’t seem to be trying too […]

Ever since we started talking about the Dove awards and SOTY nominations, I’ve been wondering: what would it take, in terms of votes and money, to secure a SOTY nomination if you wanted to go about it in a strategic, organized fashion?

In order to answer the question, or at least hypothesize about its feasibility, […]

Songwriter Joel Lindsey reflects on great mothers, gospel music, and irises in March. Read the whole thing. It is, among many other things, a powerful reminder of the difference between being a Writer and just writing.