GARDEN VALLEY, Texas (AP) - Christian singer-songwriter Keith Green never shirked an opportunity to share his vision.
Offered a chance to provide an aerial tour of the wooded East Texas pasture that was home to his Last Days Ministries, he didn't hesitate.
The overloaded, twin-engine Cessna crashed less than 30 seconds after takeoff, killing all 12 aboard. The dead included Green, 28, two of his young children, pilot Don Burmeister and missionaries John and DeDe Smalley and their six children.
That was 25 years ago. Now Green's work is about to be rediscovered.
EMI/Sparrow Records is painstakingly going through recordings saved by his wife, Melody. An ITunes release with music never before heard by the public is planned for August. More material will be released next year, said Bryan Ward, director of artist development with EMI Christian Music Group.
The July 28, 1982, accident doused one of the brightest lights in the Jesus Movement, a youthful Christian counterculture. The bushy-haired evangelist with a distinctive tenor voice was posthumously inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame.
Green sold between 560,000 and one million records, Ward said, although exact numbers are difficult to determine. Green gave away many records, and sales were tallied differently then.
Melody Green, who co-wrote “There Is a Redeemer” and other songs, said advances in sound quality-enhancing technology make the timing right to release more of her late husband's work.
“I have kept every little thing that Keith's done,” she said.
Green's emotional lyrics exude spiritual discovery, while his boisterous attack on piano keys brings to mind Elton John.
Admirers included Bob Dylan, who played harmonica on Green's “So You Wanna Go Back to Egypt” album.
“I think he was one of the best songwriters of the modern era of Christian music,” said John Styll, president of the Gospel Music Association in Nashville, Tenn. “It was vulnerable and transparent and absolutely not contrived.”
Others agree that Keith Green was an original.
“He was intense about everything - everything from his music to his spiritual journey to where you could get the best cheeseburger with grilled onions and a chocolate malt,” said Randy Stonehill, who wrote “Your Love Broke Through” with Green and Todd Fishkind.
Green's compassion was so deep that he invited street people to stay in his home, which grew to become a Christian commune with seven homes and 70 people. “My life was radically changed by that experience,” said Jerry Bryant, the commune's first pastor.
Yet Green could also offend the flock with his blunt “no compromise” approach to faith. “Christians don't like to talk about hypocrisy any more than turkeys like to talk about Thanksgiving,” Green often said.
He groused about being celebrated for his music, considering himself simply an instrument of God. Giving him credit, Green said, was like praising a pencil for producing a poem.
He was critical of the “industry” of Christian music, which grew explosively after his death.
At the peak of his career, he became convinced that ministry should not cost money. He talked his way out of a record contract so he could give his music away for “whatever you can afford.”
Green earned a recording contract at age 11 with Decca Records. Time magazine called the Sheepshead Bay, N.Y., native a “pre-pubescent dreamboat” who “croons in a voice trembling with conviction.”
But when child stardom didn't happen, Green, who had a Jewish background but grew up reading the New Testament, turned to drugs and to an intense spiritual quest.
He embraced Christianity in the 1970s.
“The thing is, he could be abrasive because quite often his spiritual zeal got ahead of his biblical understanding or his personal maturity,” said Stonehill. But he also described Green as deeply relieved “to see where hope lived.”
Eventually, the Greens' work grew to include a newsletter, and their organization was called Last Days Ministries.
The couple moved from California to tiny Garden Valley, east of Dallas, in 1979, where they were near evangelists such as Leonard Ravenhill and David Wilkerson (“The Cross and the Switchblade”).
In the 25 years since her husband's death, Melody Green, now 60, has suffered a stroke, been through a painful divorce and spoken around the world. She lives in Kansas City and is overhauling the ministry's website - technology not available when her husband was alive.
In 1996, she sold the Texas property to Teen Mania, founded by Ron Luce. The modern campus, which includes a television studio, has a dormitory named in memory of Green.
The singer was inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame in 2001. Tribute albums have rolled out, and many Christian artists sing his songs.
But the void created by his death still seems unfilled.
“I keep having people tell me how no one has really taken that place. Everyone thought, 'Well, God will raise someone else up to be similar and do something like that.' I thought that,” Melody Green said. “He was just a unique person with amazing talent and with an amazing heart for God.”
On the Net:
http://www.keithgreen.com/
Offered a chance to provide an aerial tour of the wooded East Texas pasture that was home to his Last Days Ministries, he didn't hesitate.The overloaded, twin-engine Cessna crashed less than 30 seconds after takeoff, killing all 12 aboard. The dead included Green, 28, two of his young children, pilot Don Burmeister and missionaries John and DeDe Smalley and their six children.
That was 25 years ago. Now Green's work is about to be rediscovered.
EMI/Sparrow Records is painstakingly going through recordings saved by his wife, Melody. An ITunes release with music never before heard by the public is planned for August. More material will be released next year, said Bryan Ward, director of artist development with EMI Christian Music Group.
The July 28, 1982, accident doused one of the brightest lights in the Jesus Movement, a youthful Christian counterculture. The bushy-haired evangelist with a distinctive tenor voice was posthumously inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame.
Green sold between 560,000 and one million records, Ward said, although exact numbers are difficult to determine. Green gave away many records, and sales were tallied differently then.
Melody Green, who co-wrote “There Is a Redeemer” and other songs, said advances in sound quality-enhancing technology make the timing right to release more of her late husband's work.
“I have kept every little thing that Keith's done,” she said.
Green's emotional lyrics exude spiritual discovery, while his boisterous attack on piano keys brings to mind Elton John.
Admirers included Bob Dylan, who played harmonica on Green's “So You Wanna Go Back to Egypt” album.
“I think he was one of the best songwriters of the modern era of Christian music,” said John Styll, president of the Gospel Music Association in Nashville, Tenn. “It was vulnerable and transparent and absolutely not contrived.”
Others agree that Keith Green was an original.
“He was intense about everything - everything from his music to his spiritual journey to where you could get the best cheeseburger with grilled onions and a chocolate malt,” said Randy Stonehill, who wrote “Your Love Broke Through” with Green and Todd Fishkind.
Green's compassion was so deep that he invited street people to stay in his home, which grew to become a Christian commune with seven homes and 70 people. “My life was radically changed by that experience,” said Jerry Bryant, the commune's first pastor.
Yet Green could also offend the flock with his blunt “no compromise” approach to faith. “Christians don't like to talk about hypocrisy any more than turkeys like to talk about Thanksgiving,” Green often said.
He groused about being celebrated for his music, considering himself simply an instrument of God. Giving him credit, Green said, was like praising a pencil for producing a poem.
He was critical of the “industry” of Christian music, which grew explosively after his death.
At the peak of his career, he became convinced that ministry should not cost money. He talked his way out of a record contract so he could give his music away for “whatever you can afford.”
Green earned a recording contract at age 11 with Decca Records. Time magazine called the Sheepshead Bay, N.Y., native a “pre-pubescent dreamboat” who “croons in a voice trembling with conviction.”
But when child stardom didn't happen, Green, who had a Jewish background but grew up reading the New Testament, turned to drugs and to an intense spiritual quest.
He embraced Christianity in the 1970s.
“The thing is, he could be abrasive because quite often his spiritual zeal got ahead of his biblical understanding or his personal maturity,” said Stonehill. But he also described Green as deeply relieved “to see where hope lived.”
Eventually, the Greens' work grew to include a newsletter, and their organization was called Last Days Ministries.
The couple moved from California to tiny Garden Valley, east of Dallas, in 1979, where they were near evangelists such as Leonard Ravenhill and David Wilkerson (“The Cross and the Switchblade”).
In the 25 years since her husband's death, Melody Green, now 60, has suffered a stroke, been through a painful divorce and spoken around the world. She lives in Kansas City and is overhauling the ministry's website - technology not available when her husband was alive.
In 1996, she sold the Texas property to Teen Mania, founded by Ron Luce. The modern campus, which includes a television studio, has a dormitory named in memory of Green.
The singer was inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame in 2001. Tribute albums have rolled out, and many Christian artists sing his songs.
But the void created by his death still seems unfilled.
“I keep having people tell me how no one has really taken that place. Everyone thought, 'Well, God will raise someone else up to be similar and do something like that.' I thought that,” Melody Green said. “He was just a unique person with amazing talent and with an amazing heart for God.”
On the Net:
http://www.keithgreen.com/
Source : Prince George Citizen.com
No comments:
Post a Comment