Copious Notes

Steven Curtis Champan. Photo courtesy of Sparrow Records.

Steven Curtis Chapman opens his new album singing, “Heaven is the face of a little girl,” and you know he’s going to go there.

Beauty Will Rise is Chapman’s first new album since the tragic death of his 5-year-old adopted daughter Maria Sue Chunxi in May 2008. The proverbial “they” say great pain often yields great art, and this album certainly reinforces that point, in part by making it clear that Chapman would give everything, including his great songs, to have his little girl give him another hug and syrup kiss.

But the Chapman does not wallow in despair on this album. A palpable sense of loss pervades the entire record, but there is also an open window to the soul of a man who is finding a way to move on and whose faith has been strengthened through every parent’s nightmare.

On Just Have to Wait, he talks to Maria, telling her how he looks forward to seeing her again and how the family is doing — even dealing with the aftermath of her death. There is striking five-song set of expressions of faith beginning with Our God is Control and concluding with Jesus Will Meet You There – “When you think you’ve hit the bottom, and the bottom gives way . . . “

Instrumentally, this is Chapman’s most unadorned, elemental recording in years, beautifully employing cello, dulcimer and other bits of acoustic comfort. We hear him in full command of his craft, all the better to articulate tough emotions that could easily become saccharine and cloying in a lesser artist’s hands.

This record will never be an easy listen. It will never be separated from the sorrow that was its catalyst. But it is a journey you are richer for taking, from those difficult first words to the final moments when the voices of a children’s chorus rise in Spring is Coming.

Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman on stage at Rupp Arena Sunday, April 26, 2009. Photo by Rich Copley | LexGo.

When you get a ticket to a concert featuring Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman, there are moments you hope for.

Like, the pair riffing on each other’s gargantuan catalogues. After Chapman finished his first-half solo set at Rupp Arena Sunday night, Smith came out and said, “You know, you didn’t sing one of my favorite songs. May I?” and launched into the Chapman classic, The Great Adventure.

Smith in the opening number, Blessed be the Name of the Lord.

Chapman complimented Smith saying, “You should do an album of Steven Curtis Chapman songs,” and then returned the favor singing Smith’s Place in this World.

They were moments that remind you iconic artists are fully capable of appreciating other iconic artists’ work. They can also razz each other like guys standing around the grill on Saturday afternoon.

In one of several age-related jokes, 46-year-old Chapman lauded 51-year-old Smith for “blazing a trail,” for him. “So I blazed a trail?” Smith replied. “At least I wasn’t clogging in Opryland,” he said, referring to one of Chapman’s pre-contemporary-Christian-music superstar gigs.

It was an evening of good humor and deep appreciation for the singers, and basically a two-fer for the audience that was nowhere near as big as the dual-headliner bill deserved. Rupp, in it’s 5,000-ish seat Heart of Rupp Arena configuration, looked to be about half full. Maybe Christian stars shouldn’t compete with regularly-scheduled church activities, because the Lexington crowd is usually much more supportive of Christian pop.

The crowd that did turn out got to see Smith and Chapman together and in individual sets, which were strikingly different.

Smith had the most cohesive musical presentation of the pair. Taking the stage on his own in the second half, he offered a few blasts from the past, including Secret Ambition from the 1988 release i2Eye and Go West Young Man from the album of the same name. He also played The Giving from his 2000 instrumental album, Freedom, which sounded surprisingly good without an acoustic piano or orchestra.

But Smith’s recent focus has been worship music, and once he launched into a set from his current A New Hallelujah album and his Worship efforts, Smith was deep into his own element. And while some of us may lament a dearth of his greatest hits in Smith’s recent shows, he is a compelling worship leader.

Chapman sings Yours, a song he said had taken on new meaning since the death of his daughter.

Chapman’s set was an all-too-modest greatest hits set. What was striking was, it is difficult to remember a Christian artist with as focused a testimony as Chapman currently has. Most everyone in the house knew that last May 21, Chapman’s 5-year-old adoptive daughter Maria Sue Chunxi Chapman was killed in a tragic accident at the family’s home.

Any question as to whether Chapman would address his loss was quickly answered when he introduced his 2007 hit, Yours. He said the tragedy forced him to reconsider the implications of the lyrics about turning everything over to God, and later in the set said he had a new perspective on a lot of his music. He also said he thought he would never be able to sing Cinderella, a song he wrote for his daughters, again. But he did at his first concert back on stage last July, and performed it last night, beautifully isolating the final line in the song about a dad having to let go of his little girls as they grow up: “I know the truth is the dance will go on.”

Chapman actually shared his testimony about Maria, the third child he and his wife adopted from China, in a great little song arc, concluding with God is God, a song about trusting the almighty from his 2001 album Declaration.

Chapman and Smith combined for a tidy three hour show, including an intermission and pitch for Chapman’s Show Hope charity which supports orphan children. They both addressed their Kentucky connections, Chapman talking about his Paducah home and brief stint as a pre-med student at Georgetown College and native West Virginian Smith talking about his Rupp Arena memories, including concerts there when he was Amy Grant’s keyboard player.

The sweetest moments between the two though were not so much when they bantered or played each other’s tunes, but when they were simply there for each other. Smith told the crowd the original set list did not include Chapman’s I Will be Here, and he would have refused to tour without Chapman including it, before he played keyboard’s for Chapman’s rendition of the classic.

And half way through Smith’s Friends, Chapman strode out to sing the chorus, and Smith deferred to him for the final line, “A lifetime’s not too long to live as friends.”

With the United Tour, Rupp Arena will host two of the icons of Christian rock.

Michael W. Smith

Steven Curtis Chapman and Michael W. Smith are global superstars of the genre. But you could also see a Central Kentucky gig for them as a homecoming, or close-to-homecoming.

Chapman grew up in Paducah and started his college career at Georgetown College before moving to Nashville. Smith grew up in Kenova, W.Va., outside Huntington, and one of his earliest Christian rock experiences was attending the Ichthus Festival in Wilmore, back when it was at the campground in town.

In 2005, Smith told the Herald-Leader that he was already writing songs and dreaming of being the next Elton John when he came to Wilmore to see artists such as Andrae Crouch. He left thinking, “I want to do that.”

Chapman came to Georgetown in 1981 because it was the thing to do.

Steven Curtis Chapman.

“Every good Baptist kid in Paducah wants to go to Georgetown College,” Chapman, who was a pre-med student, told the Herald-Leader in 1998. “There are professors there that probably still shake their heads at the idea of me being pre-med.”

Clearly, there were other plans for Chapman, ones that looked a lot like Smith’s.

Between them, Smith and Chapman have eight Grammy Awards, 99 Dove Awards (including three more Thursday, Chapman winning artist of the year) and 80 No. 1 songs. They are responsible for some of the biggest hits in Christian and even mainstream music. How many graduates have shared their last moments together to the tune of Smith’s Friends? How many weddings have included Chapman’s I Will Be Here?

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Julian Drive are keyboardist Shaun Bennett, Guitarist Jesse Triplett, guitarist and vocalist Shane Bowers and bassist James Nitz. Photo courtesy of Inpop Records.

Review: Julian Drive, My Coming Day

Athens, Ga. It’s a town that has an almost mythic reputation in rock ‘n’ roll as the birthplace of Hall of Famers R.E.M. and The B-52’s and current acts such as Of Montreal and Widespread Panic. So when Julian Drive’s CD rolled in with a press kit mentioning Athens was home for the band, it was attention grabbing. Is this group going to carry the Athenian spirit into Christian rock?

Well, here’s the good news about Julian Drive’s debut, My Coming Day: the youth group band had longtime Christian music producer Lynn Nichols, who’s guided Phil Keaggy and Switchfoot, to name a few, on board for this project, and he brings out a sleek, professional sound in Julian Drive. No doubt, these guys are ready for radio.

Maybe too ready.

The problem is Julian Drive sounds too much like what you hear on radio already. As the opening track, From Your Hands, plays, its way to easy to recall Tenth Avenue North’s Love is Here, in both the tune’s mood and use of crucifixion imagery. And that continues through most of the album, with songs easily recalling themes and moods we’ve heard before. It isn’t until track seven, Unplug, that we seem to get something individual out of the group, and there’s an inspired cover in Hoobastank’s The Reason.

What Julian Drive needs next time around is something of its own to say. Part of the magic of those Athens bands was they truly broke molds and offered music unlike anything music fans were hearing at the times they debuted. Julian Drive probably does not have that in them. After all, these guys were born out of a rural Clarke County church, not the eclectic downtown clubs near the University of Georgia. But any substantial act needs its own voice, and that is something Julian Drive still seems to be looking for.

Coming our way: The big Michael W. Smith-Steven Curtis Chapman United Tour is back on the road and will hit Lexington at 7 p.m. April 26. Tickets go on sale at 10 a.m. Saturday for the show.

More Aussies: Newboys and Rebecca St. James have already demonstrated the power of Australian artists to become big stars in American Christian rock. The editors at Billboard magazine have looked into the crystal ball and seen Revive may be the next band from down under to top our charts. The band’s first album, Chorus of the Saints, drops March 10, and they’ll be hitting the road with Third Day and Brandon Heath. Revive is signed to Third Day’s Consuming Fire Productions. If you’d like a preview of what the new disc may hold, Revive’s 2007 release, Trafalgar Street, is available on CD and at Napster and iTunes.

Home movies: Fireproof, the latest hit from Alex and Stephen Kendrick and Albany, Ga.’s — we have a little Georgia theme today, don’t we — Sherwood Baptist Church is out on DVD today. In the film, Kirk Cameron plays a firefighter whose marriage is crumbling and he is challenged to try “The Love Dare,” which you may also recognize as the title of a best-selling book from last fall.

New music: One of the big new releases today is CompassionArt, a set of 15 new songs by Christian music stars including Michael W. Smith, Amy Grant, Steven Curtis Chapman and others. All the proceeds from the disc, organized by Delirious frontman Martin Smith, go to fighting poverty around the world. We had a chance to talk to Smith last week and will post that interview sometime in the next week.