Neat Music

Last week I mounted an archeological expedition - ok, I cleaned up my studio but it might as well have been the excavation of ancient artifacts for all that I remembered what had gotten stuck where. One of the things I found was the mp3 player my husband had given me aeons ago and so I spent last week searching the nooks and crannies of the internet for music to mellow out to and trying to program the darn thing. There are days technology and I aren't copescetic. I did discover that there is some really neat religious/spiritual filk out there and wanted to do my part to throw a light on it. If you're looking for filk, the virtual filksing at Prometheus Music is a great place to start for samples and sales.

One of my favorite filk writers is Ben Newman. Among the many things he writes are some neat Jewish and Pagan oriented songs; my favorites being:
Experiment 45 - a twist in perspective on Adam and Chava (Eve) getting booted out of Eden
Love Letter - re: the Covenant at Sinai
The Wrestler - Yaccov's (Jacob's) perspective on his injury from fighting with the angel
The Holy Mountain - anywhere can be sacred
Shechinah - Shechinah as the Sabbath bride (this one's supplanted Lecha Dodi in my Shabbos evening ritual)
Circle Story - it's long but is a really neat ballad of the pagan cycle of holidays

Leslie Fish is a woman of spirit and attitude who has written at least 2 spiritual songs I really like:
Avalon is Risen - the re-emergence of paganism
Earth's Fire Breathing Daughter - how a priestess deals with annoying, hypocritical neighbors

Kathy Mar sings The Word of God written by Catherine Faber about the value of science as one of the avenues to understanding God, perhaps a more valid one than the Bible.

Judging from the music of hers that I've come across, Julia Ecklar is a deeply spiritual person; my favorites of her spiritual songs are:
The Hand of God - trusting in yourself vs remaining bound by convention
Lullaby for a Weary World - caring for the earth
Holy, Holy - the holy, holy from a mass she was going to write with a sci-fi/filk theme

Various performers have recorded Catherine Madsen's The Heretic Heart which is about having faith in yourself to find your own spirituality and the courage to live it.

The pagan version of Lord of the Dance - not the celtic, Christian one but the one found here is one of my favorites as well. Unfortunately, I haven't found it as mp3 and I haven't been able to figure out how to take songs ripped from CDs and put them on the mp3 player. yet.