Music Before the Money

Whether you are a Christian or Jew the story of Jonah and the whale is part of human story-telling. Jonah was also an important prophet in Islam and is known by his Arabic name, Yunus. But is this just a story or is it a lesson on life?

The Story of Jonah

In short, God orders Jonah to be a prophet in Ninevah, a town that he knows is a tough crowd for his act. So Jonah thinks he can fool God by disguising himself and going the opposite direction, to Joppa where he catches a ship to Tarshish. God brings on a storm which threatens to sink the ship and Jonah admits to the crew that he is to blame. He also says that if he is thrown overboard the storm will stop so the sailors comply and the ship is saved. Jonah is then swallowed by a large fish, or whale and while in its belly Jonah prays to God and asks forgiveness. As a result Jonah is spat out on dry land.

This is not the end of the story for Jonah has a few more hair-raising experiences but his experience on the water partallels what people go through when they resist their life’s purpose. How many times have we taken our dreams and stuffed them into a trunk, one which is then buried in a deep hole lest it haunt us?

A Calling Denied

Jonah resisted his calling and was tortured for it by God. When we resist our own callings similar maladies (without the whale) may acost us. I was meant to be a writer and performer and everytime I tried to stray from it, for whatever reason, I sometimes went through periods of funk and mild vertigo. Because it’s hard to leave a comfortable setting to face your own version of Ninevah. But if you don’t those around you may suffer like the sailors on Jonah’s boat, not wanting to cast you into the sea but not wanting to watch someone waste your talent.

Like most stories a lot can be read into Jonah’s odessey. But like the story of the talents Jesus tells wasting a talent or a calling can have far greater detriment to a life than sucking it up and following the voice within.

“Sailing heart-ships
thru broken harbors
Out on the waves in the night.”

- Neil Young Tell me Why

This is another guy I tried to copy note-for-note on the guitar. An there was no better album to play over and over to get the licks than After the Goldrush.

Woodstock

Neil was one of those rare players who easily switched from electric to acoustic guitar and back again without breaking a sweat. Not to say that other musicians couldn’t do it - Stephen Stills, etc. - but Young could do a whole night in either medium. He was as convincing a rocker as he was a protester or writer of love songs.

With Stills his band Buffalo Springfield is still regarded as one the best breakthrough bands of the ’60’s in that, like The Beatles, they never stayed in one genre. Their “best of” album Restrospective shows this. There is the boppy Sit Down I Think I Love You from the earlier days and then For What It’s Worth, the classic protest song which saw them into immortality.

Young tried many styles.

One of my favorite albums was Neil Young and the Shocking Pinks, a rock-a-billy project from 1983 where he harkens back to the early ’60’s with Betty Lou’s Got a New Pair of Shoes and Kinda Fonda Wanda.

Young is responsible for the “Grunge” era, guys with lumber shirts but I’ve listened to Nirvana and the like and wasn’t impressed. I guess because I’m old and I’ve seen it before.

Favorite song?

That’s easy. I’ll give you 1,2,3:

1. Long May You Run
2. Cowgirl in the Sand
3. Tell Me Why