Patti Lynn Clark Barnett

Watching the CMAs last week, I was reminded once again of how much country music has veered off the authentic traditional course. It is far more like pop and rap these days. So, I guess you might say country music has gone up town…I liked it better when it was country.  I've been categorizing some of my songs as country, but I won't be doing that any more. My songs don't sound anything like today's country and so from now on their just, "folk".
 
I guess there were a few good songs recognized at the CMAs. For the most part, they all sounded and were performed very much alike. Cookie Cutter is what I saw and heard. Shania Twain presented the Entertainer of the Year award to Kenny Chesney. It saddens me to think of what these last several months have put her through. But she is still the epitome of grace and beauty….a real class act. But somehow, you could still see the pain.   
 
These two songs, "Without A Song" and "Out of the Wind" are nothing like I heard on the CMAs and that's why I am in North Wales, Pennsylvania and they are there in the big time.
.
"Out of the Wind" is a song all of the rurally raised people, especially women, will relate to in some way. And I was very happy when a recovering cancer patient friend of mine said she, "Basked in that song". Growing up in the country meant going bare foot in the good old summer time. No shoes needed except for church and when the weather and school in the fall made them an unwelcome necessity. Ahh, those were the days. But shoes would not have been a bad idea to wear in the barns where there were rusty nails. You will hear, in this song, how parents dealt with such accidents…redneck style. Now, I guess that would be considered politically incorrect if I wasn't one myself.

Out Of The Wind
DIGITAL MUSIC FILE

Wrap up your neck and stay out of the wind
It’s cold and can make your throat sore
And I don’t want my baby girl to get sick
Honey, that’s what your buttons are for

When I stepped on that old rusty nail in the barn
Shoes were for school in the fall
It’s a thousand and ten wonders we didn’t die
With only iodine and alcohol

Wrap up your foot and stay out of the dirt
Watch out for red streaks running north
A sign an infection’s heading straight for your heart
Honey, that’s what your bandage is for

Chorus:
Buttons and bandages, small disadvantages
Keeping me safe, well and warm
Anything it would take, do or say for my sake
She loved from the day I was born

When first puppy love broke my young heart in two
I thought my world had ended for sure
But it didn’t take too long to mend like she said
Honey, that’s just what young hearts are for

They break and the mend and you’ll find there’s no end
To this Ferris wheel ride you are on
Up and down love makes the world go around
Honey, now and long after we’re gone.

Now when the clouds of life pour out the rain
Chances don’t knock at your door
When it looks like the wind has deserted your sail
Honey, that’s just what your faith is for

We bend and we break and we all get our share
Of heart ache and sometimes even more
If you’ve been short changed, life’s scale’s not the same
Honey that’s what forgiveness is for

Wrap up your neck and stay out of the wind

It seems every time you pick up the paper or hear the news there's a new scandalous infidelity. The number of divorces continues to rise, families are fractured and torn apart and innocent hearts are broken. In most of the cases with which I am familiar, it is usually a result of a great degree of selfishness on the part of the, "Leaver".

 

Heart Of Stone
Digital Music File
 
Heartache takes no holiday it's busy all year long
Pain takes no vacation, its always going strong
Everything you said you wanted you have now left far behind
All we have are memories now scattered in our minds
 
I tried so hard to understand just where did I go wrong
But I can't blame myself because you wanted to be gone
When you tasted freedom from responsibility
The grass looked ten shades greener you decided to be free
 
Chorus:
Our love just didn't matter you determined you would go
You built a new house 'round us then you left us on our own
Now everything is tarnished that should have a shiny glow
The house you left is wooden but you took a heart of stone
 
I guess it's not that different from what happens every day
And yes I know we all are made with unstable feet of clay
But what became of keeping vows, staying strong and true
I thought the last to let me down and break them would be you

I previously posted about the fact that President Bush is a Born Again Christian. This has always constituted my basis for believing in the authenticity, honesty, and integrity of our president. Regardless of how much his enemies rail against him, on the good faith of the Reverend Billy Graham, who led him to Christ, and President Bush's claim, I believe he is truly a Born Again Christian. I've come to realize that anyone can sound like and say they are a Christian. However, God knows the genuine articles. Those basically good souls, who will often fall from grace, but who will always return to the fold, never fail to get back on track with the Lord. All will be determined some day in a personal Judgment.
 
And speaking of God, Jesus and Judgment, I would like to take this opportunity to share an experience my father had shortly before his death in 1985. It is similar to a song found on one of my newly purchased CDs by the Sons of Song.
 
One night, in a vision, Daddy said he saw Jesus. And, yes, I believe just that. He could hardly speak for crying in trying to describe the loving warmth he felt encountering Jesus and His indescribable beauty. There was not a dry eye in that hospital room as he related this experience.

In Daddy's vision, he was walking down, "A wide road crowded with people running, rushing and crushing like cattle, headed for destruction". There was a division in the road up ahead with Some One sitting with a large Book in His hand. Daddy had no doubt the person sitting where the road split was Jesus. He was there judging the human race, looking for the names of those approaching. Scripture tells us that the instant a person accepts Christ as Savior their name is recorded in, "The Book of Life".
 
When trying to describe Jesus' personage, Daddy could only burst into tears, saying there was no possible way to describe Him or His brightness and beauty. My father, always the most stoic person I'd ever known, was never given to tears. As Daddy came closer to the fork in the road and approached Him, he said Jesus looked upon him with compassion, put His arm around his shoulder and placed him on the right path.
 
My father, Robert L Clark, was a man of few words and not one given to much emotion. However, I must say that his life was a sermon in so many ways. He honored truth and justice and had absolutely no tolerance for hypocrisy. I never once knew him to tell a falsehood or even garnish the truth….something that sometimes would embarrass my mother. If she occasionally got carried away and tended to get "colorful", when telling something, he would say, "Now, that's not the way it happened". She soon learned to tell it like it was.  His employees and fellow workers in the earth moving business loved him dearly for his justice and good nature. And though he never expressed it vocally, I know he knew and loved his Lord.
 
I am relating this now because, as I mentioned earlier, I received a Sons of Song music collection. One particular song in the collection, "Sorry, I Never Knew You" is also about a dream about the final Judgment. However, the dream in this song involves a more frightening element than in my Daddy's experience.
 
The Sons of Song, a trio of voices, like you will never hear again, have touched the world with their music.

Sorry I Never Knew You  CLICK HERE --> DIGITAL MUSIC FILE

WIN $100 !!!

David And The Ark

This song is taken straight out of 1 Chronicles (13-15, KJV) about the transferring of the Ark of the Covenant (The Ten Commandments) by King David and the Israelites.

There will be $100 to the first child or teenager that will learn this song then e-mail their recording or video to me.  The trick is to get all the names pronounced correctly. The winner's rendition will be posted on this website.

Now, there is something worth doing with part of your summer vacation…that is if you are sharp enough to nail it. Warning: it won't be easy. So be prepared for a real challenge. Now, get going!

August 16th update:

As of now, there has been no one sufficiently interested or up to the challenge of learning and presenting  this song to me. So, I am lowering the bar and raising the prize $$. Any one of any age may now enter. And the winner will recieve $150.00. It is a lot of fun to do--- once you learn it!


David And The Ark
DIGITAL MUSIC FILE

David was a man who loved the Lord
And followed after him with all his heart
And after Israel made David King,
He said "We're going to bring back the ark"

So he gathered all Israel together
He assembled the children of Aaron and Levi
Of the sons of Kohath, Merari and Gershom
 Elizaphan, Uzziel and Hebron

Then he called for Zadok and Abiathar the priests
For Joel and Eliel the Levi fathers' chiefs
For Uriel, Shemaiah, Amminadab and Asaiah
"Go sanctify yourselves so we can bring the Ark"

So David said,
"Appoint your brethren to be the singers
With instruments of music like the harp
I've prepared a place and a brand new wagon
Today we're bringing home the ark
We'll bring it on a brand new cart"

Chorus:

There was the sound of the cymbal
The trumpet and the timbrel*
The psaltery and the harp
It was a day of rejoicing
They were lifting up their voices
King David was dancing.
They were bringing back the ark

So the Levites appointed Heman the son of Joel
And of his brethren, Asaph the son of Berachiah
And Ethan the son of Kushaiah
Of the sons of their brethren, Merari

And with them their brethren of the second degree
Zechariah Ben and Jaaziel,
Shemiramoth, Jehiel, Unni, Eliab Benaiah
Maaseiah, Matathiah, Elipheleh, Mikneiah
Obededom and Jeiel

So the singers Heman, Asaph and Ethan
Were appointed to the sound of the cymbals of brass
And Zechariah, Benaiah, Maaseiah and Eliab
Aziel, Jeiel, Shemiramoth
With their brethren Unni
They were skilful and cunning
With their psalteries on Alamoth

And on the harps Mikneiah, Obededom Matathiah
Elipheleh Azaziah, Jeiel
And for the song Cheneniah But Elipheleh Berachiah
Obededom and Jeiah were door keepers for the ark

Chorus:

Then the priests, Zechariah, Netheneel and Shebaniah
Jehoshaphat, Benaiah, Amasai
And Eliezer were the priests that blew the trumpet
Before the ark of God

So David and the elders and the captains over thousands
Went to bring up the ark of the covenant of God
Out of the house of Obededom where they'd left it
'Cause they feared when God struck Uzza
'Cause he took hold of the ark