On Good Friday, the musicians of Pine Street Church will offer the 9th expression of this meaningful tradition of a hybrid concert/worship service. The musicians perform an entire album chosen from the “secular” ranks, and the experience is framed with narration that considers the music and lyrics through a lens of the story of the season, the Passiontide.
This year’s album is Gillian Welch's "Time (The Revelator)”. In a 2023 re-vesit Pitchfork’s Jill Mapes had the following to write about the 3rd studio release of the duo's 2001 release:
When Welch and Rawlings went into Nashville’s RCA Studio B to record Time (The Revelator) at the dawn of the new millennium, they were unwittingly working in a studio that had been the site of more than 200 Elvis Presley recordings. The lore fits the music: Here, they present intertwined tales of Elvis and Black folk hero John Henry, the Titanic’s sinking and Lincoln’s assassination, farm girls and surfer chicks, and how hard it was getting to make a living as a musician. Sometimes the two are foils, but largely Rawlings serves as the punctuation to Welch’s slightly crooked cataloging of country life. The duo would explore a full-band sound on their next LP, 2003’s Soul Journey, but within the sparse Revelator lives an entire band. Welch has likened it to a rock album without the amplification, which is apparent in all sorts of ways—namely, structures that work like rock songs, with big choruses and melodic dissonance, tension and release, lengths that run ragged like Neil Young and reference God, history, and culture like Dylan. You can hear where there should be more instruments, a place where you might stomp or slap your thigh to a rhythm that’s played instead by Rawlings’ strumming, and that’s part of the fun of these skeletal epics.
Please plan on joining us and inviting all of your friends, family and neighbors to this unique signature event of the Pine Street Church Music Program. Friday March 29th at 7:00pm.
This event is free and open to all. Any donations will go towards Pine Street Church's Off Broadway Preschool scholarship fund. Valuing and cultivating Curiosity, Creativity, and Compassion, Off Broadway Preschool is an arts and music focused preschool whose mission is to provide excellent creativity-focused education for preschool aged children. Learn more about Off Broadway Preschool HERE.