Stuck In My Head - Turn Your Eyes

A modern version of that beautiful old classic, 
by Nichole Nordeman.

Another music video

Another side effect of winterism is that we've turned to music to liven things up at home. I'm still in a Rich Mullins phase (may it never end) but here's an acoustic video of my current favorite Bebo song:

Stuck in my head

Wouldn't it sound amazing with congas? In general, I mean - not played by me. 

While on the subject of music, Emily is working through this piano book with her piano teacher. Such delightful pieces! I surreptitiously play them, too, when no one else is using the piano, because Grade 1 Piano Pieces are about as advanced as I can handle for sight-reading.

Also on the subject of music, I went to a rock concert a couple weekends ago all by myself. It was Audio Adrenaline, now helmed by Kevin Max. So I got to see/hear KMax sing live.

Fun. The rainy fog I had to drive through to get there, though - not so fun.

Three opening bands before AA came on, and one of them was spectacular. Spectacular in that they made us dance. I laughed because I haven't "danced" in yonks. The other day I tried to teach Emily the waltz. She looked at me as if I was possessed. Clearly my dance days are over.

Stuck in my head: Rich Mullins

I love a lot of music people. And I am shamelessly exuberant about the ones I especially love - they are given Stuck In My Head status and featured on this blog, irrespective of whether its readers actually care about whose music I listen to. 

Of all my especially-loved music people, Rich Mullins must be my favoritest of favorites. The only reason I haven't mentioned him earlier is because he is dead, darn it, and I therefore haven't had a new record by him over which to enthuse for more than a decade. I remember being quite affected by his passing when it happened in the fall of '97. Several months after, I was in Manhattan visiting my friend Edwin (hi, Dwin!) and chanced upon a magazine featuring a tribute to his (Mullins', not Edwin's) life. I bought it, and a large pastry from a Au Bon Pain and sat down by myself in a corner to read, weep and mourn. 

Oddly, I didn't discover Mullins on my own. Way back in the old days, I had a friend named Marcus who'd randomly call people up on the phone and share songs. And by "share songs", I mean "played the entire things on his music player into the phone receiver and made you listen and then give your opinion." Sometimes these phone calls could go on for quite a while. Anyway, one afternoon, Marcus called me and shared this song by this chap called Rich Mullins. He was amazing, said Marcus. 

And yes, he was. Still is, 15 years later. So many other artists have done covers of his work and even more name him as their inspiration for their own. And Bebo Norman, another favorite music person, whose music is poetically poignant in the same way Mullins' is, even sounds a little like him. There have been times when, in the car, I have a Bebo Norman CD on and I find myself thinking, "Whoa. Sounded like Mullins for a while there. Dang, I miss Mullins." And the hairs on the back of my neck would stand a bit and I'd catch that feeling of longing for home, a theme that appeared quite a bit in both their work.

Anyway, here is a live recording of one of my favoritest of all of Mullins' songs, played on the dulcimer. How a person can play a flawless rhythm and still sing so many words at the same time is beyond me. This is the studio-recorded album version of that same song (which was what Marcus played over the phone to me years ago (thank you, Marcus!) but minus the nature video). Enjoy.

Stuck in my head: Bebo Norman

How I love this. Enjoy! Oddly, this man makes me think of - and miss- Rich Mullins even more than I already do.

More Stuff To Dance To

Suddenly remembered this: it was probably one of my two all-time favorite songs we danced to when I was coordinator of our church's Dance Ministry back in the very old days. The other favorite song was Keith Green's Asleep in the Light/The Sheep and The Goats, which we did in mime.

It was a good thing I wasn't the only one allowed to pick songs to choreograph, or else they'd all be RnB pieces. We weren't really into the Jewish tamborine dance thing (tried that, and decided we liked something else), as you can probably tell. Oh, Dance Min was fun. Even more enjoyable than even the dancing (and workouts) was the relationships between the girls (and the occasional boy that was hip enough to join) and the ladies who danced with us.  Such a privilege to be part of their lives for those years before I left to come to the US. And no, we weren't anorexic. We ate rather like pigs, actually- especially french fries and the Killiney Road Kopitiam's kaya toast after performances. We had our youthful metabolic rates to thank!

Stuck in Our Heads - The Girls Edition

Not really in the mood to post photos or long stories here (yet) because this is the busiest month of the year. October is when two mammoth commitments violently collide: Jenna's birthday party and Halloween, all on the same week(end). Halloween means manic costume-sewing. Jenna's birthday means manic everything. Both are very enjoyable and satisfying but a person could keel over and die from the deadlines and the intensity of the activity level around here.

So instead, here is music, which soothes the savage beast (and the distracted Mother). We've shared music many times before on this blog, but usually performed by male people. Here today is the Girls edition!

First is a blast from the past which the girls have been singing and dancing to all week. The Seekers are an Australian group from my childhood - the guys sing, too, but the lead singer, Judith Durham, is a girl. What a voice!

This is the girls' most requested bedtime song, first introduced to them by Mum in Singapore. Now I sing it to them. The second version is Kate's "favourite part" and the third verse is Jenna's.

Something a bit more modern now - if I could magically choose to have another person's singing voice, it would be Margaret Becker's. Also Helen Baylor's (her rendition of the church staple Doxology is my favouritest ever). So much soul. So wonderfully non-screamy and non-shrieky. 

Slightly amusing account: once upon a time, the youth dance team from our church in Singapore performed this other M.B. song. Yes, I co-choreographed it (shocking, I know, but I was very young then and actually had decent coordination). I wish we had a video of it. It was something else. 

Stuck in my head

Yes, again. 
I did warn you that this is a regularly-occurring phenomenon, remember?


Paul Baloche this time - circa 2009. Isn't it sad, how I'm three years behind everyone else?

These, along with all the recent Stuck In My Head tracks, are on my workout/running/biking playlist, but the kids also request them regularly at home and in the car.  

Stuck in my head

Stayed up last night to finish a tent for Bearaby. Was on the treadmill at 10 pm, then decided to "sew a little bit" while cooling down. Next thing I knew, it was 3 am and DC Talk had sung 38 songs on the music player. Had to take a shower at 330 am. How did this happen? Why do I do this? Apart from sheer stupidity, I mean? Because I love Jenna, was my truthful but somewhat irrational answer.

Completely irrelevant, new music (i.e. from yet another singing person) is now ricocheting off the walls of my brain. Not sure if this will be good running music without actually trying it out (i.e. must buy the CD first) but for now it is lovely and we are all enjoying it. Here are two tracks to enjoy:

Stuck in my head -Newsboys edition

Yes, I know Hillsongs did it first. But not like this version. It's the first non-Kevin-Max song to get stuck in my head in over two weeks, which is saying something. Slightly related, the girls now all sing DC Talk and it's solo-variations thereof (TobyMac, Kevin Max and Michael Tait). I get a kick hearing Kate go, 


I wanna be in the light, as You are in the light- 
I wanna shine like the stars in the heavens! 
O Lord be my light, and be my salvation; 
All I want is to be in the light!


Adding this to the Music page in the sidebar.

Stuck in my head

Hello all!

A bit quiet on the blogging front. Lots of photos and videoclips to share but no time to actual get to them. Some updates first!

Jenna and Kate are done with preschool for the year. Wednesday was their last day - they watched a puppet show by their teachers, then the kids performed some of their favourite songs for the parents. This was followed by ice cream (yes, at 1030 in the morning!) and playing on the school playground one more time before saying goodbye. This was Jenna's last year in preschool but I was not quite the emotional softie this time around I was when Emily graduated in 2010. The first time is always hardest, I think. Kate will return for her final year (and ours, as a family) in the fall. I'm not looking forward to saying goodbye at the end of that year. But it is a while away yet.

Another consequence of school being done (for the younger girls anyway) is that I no longer have to do the 8 school runs per day, two and a half days a week. I felt so liberated yesterday that I volunteered to put up all the screens in our windows. Finally, some time to contribute to the house! Most days during the school term, it was a challenge just to get dinner on the table at the end of the day. And now I'm excited to  be able to do housework. Perspective is a funny thing.

The girls are almost done with spring swimming lessons, but we are planning to have them continue them in the summer. We are also looking at becoming regular visitors of the water park across the street. We've been looking longingly at its slides since we moved into the neighborhood, but we've always seemed to have only babies in our house. This year, though, we have girls - specifically, girls who love the water. I am excited. I get to be in an outdoor pool AT LAST. Never mind that I will be chaperoning children, not doing laps. An outdoor pool. OUTDOORS!

Jenna has two loose front teeth (bottom). She is thrilled and is already fantasizing about the loot she can expect from the tooth fairy. Emily, having walked the road before her, is full of ideas of what Jenna can ask for and getting Jenna all excited about losing her teeth.

"Maybe a Barbie horse!" says Jenna.

"More like $1." I say, practically.

"One time the tooth fairy left me a craft kit." says Emily, looking pointedly at me.

More updates later when I can share photos and videoclips (the kids call them movies).

Back to the title - I have Kevin Max stuck in my head. This does not worry me, because it's one of those strange but regular afflictions that have no adverse side effects apart from not knowing all the lyrics to the songs. The kids are used to this, and sometimes I infect them, so that, together, we are belching out random and disconnected snippets of verses and choruses in the car, the living room, the kitchen. It's quite frightening to the casual observer, but we have never attempted to hide the fact that we are noisy family, anyway. Oh, how we love music! And instruments! And jamming! But there is nothing quite as portable and enjoyable for multitasking as the human voice, so we use ours a lot while unloading the dishwasher, driving to the supermarket, and cleaning up our rooms. If I expose the girls to nothing else, they will at least get to experiment with as many genres of music as their parents have in their repertoires (and respective CD collections). Just the other day, I had to stop and grin, when I heard Kate sing Ella Fitzgerald. 

But back to Kevin Max. Long ago, there was a Christian band called DC Talk. Very cutting edge and not for everyone, especially folks who preferred the likes of Sandi Patty (also awesome). Now DC Talk had three members - two more visibly/audibly well-known than the third. It seems that, having just this week discovered that very talented individual, I'm living to regret overlooking him for the past couple of decades. Well, better late than never, and he's certainly making up for lost time by taking indefinite residence in my head.

Here's a videoclip of his cover of Bob Dylan's When He Returns:

Off to breakfast now! More soon.

Music In My Head

Needtobreathe is stuck in my head again:





Also this.


Must put these in my ipod so I can go running again. I suspect that running is my excuse to listen to music without some people surreptitiously changing it to Taylor Swift when my back is turned. Or The Wheels On The Bus.