SUSAN WERNER: The Gospel Truth

Susan Werner

The Gospel Truth

© 2007 Susan Werner (837101302616)

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A socially conscious, contemporary gospel album, it balances the faithful and the agnostic in one collection of Susan Werner originals. The infectious joy of gospel music with lyrics almost anybody can agree with - and sing along to.

tracks

1 (Why Is Your) Heaven So Small
2 Help Somebody
3 Forgiveness
4 Did Trouble Me
5 Sunday Mornings
6 Our Father (The New, Revised Edition)
7 Lost My Religion
8 Don't Explain It Away
9 I Will Have My Portion
10 Probably Not
11 Together

notes

Inspiration for “The Gospel Truth”
In the summer of 2006, as if the muse was tugging on her heartstrings, singer-songwriter Susan Werner attended the Chicago Gospel Music Festival in her adopted hometown for the first time. The overwhelming, ecstatic energy of the event prompted her friend Kenni to remark, “Wow, is there a way you can get all this joy, but without the Jesus?” This honest question sparked a remarkable creative odyssey that led Werner to pews in over 20 churches across the United States in search of The Gospel Truth, a groundbreaking independent collection that may just be the world’s first agnostic gospel recording.

Tapping fearlessly into the zeitgeist of contemporary American religious culture, the eleven songs on The Gospel Truth are both heartfelt and incisive, biting yet optimistic, drawing from Werner’s own personal spiritual questions to engage the Christian community at large. Addressing those tough universal doubts that fundamentalists surely have but wish to God they could verbalize; Werner seeks common ground with her traditional religious counterparts in finding solutions to the issues that divide America.

Fresh off the success of I Can’t Be New, her critically acclaimed 2004 collection of all-original compositions done in the Great American Songbook style, Werner’s road to truth is paved by both witty observations of Christian culture and, musically, an ongoing love for classic gospel, country and bluegrass traditions. Just as she immersed herself in the songs of Gershwin, Cole Porter, et al and the classic interpretations by Julie London as part of her creative process on I Can’t Be New, Werner this time was tireless in mining inspiration from legendary and contemporary country, gospel and bluegrass artists, from familiar names like The Carter Family and The Stanley Brothers, to the lesser known Claire Lynch and Fern Jones (the co-called Patsy Cline of gospel).

“Someone suggested I do a blues album for my next project, and while toying with the idea, I came across the music of Blind Willie Johnson, a bluesman from the 1920’s whose music went beyond ‘my baby done left me’ and into what you might call gospel blues. I liked his sense of transcendence, the spirit of conveying something beyond his own heartbreak. Then I attended the Chicago gospel festival and the energy of the music, the choirs was unlike anything I’d ever experienced.”

“The Most American of Americana Projects”
A farm girl, raised in a large Catholic family in rural Iowa, Werner spent years caught in the spiritual middle between a healthy religious skepticism and a true appreciation for all that Christianity means to millions of people in the United States. “For me, The Gospel Truth is the most American of Americana projects,” she says. “My personal doubts aside, religion gives us much of our energy as a nation, and is a source, I think, of the beautiful naiveté we have about truly being a force of good in the world. It’s part of the American personality. And I don’t necessarily feel I have to get right with God, but I figure we have to somehow get all right with God because God’s not leaving American life anytime soon.

“People all over the world want to give meaning to their life’s journey and engage in a larger sense of purpose,” Werner adds. “Here, in the United States, it seems that churches are the default setting—the first place you look for that sense of purpose. Overall, these songs convey my belief that doubt and faith can reside side by side in a good person. And, I guess I’d reached a time in life where I wanted to have this conversation with myself; to keep what my church going parents got right while moving into what was true and right for me. And, while I’m not absolutely sure we encounter God through church music, I do know that church music is very revealing of us as human beings. And that’s what The Gospel Truth is really all about.”

The Songs on “The Gospel Truth”
Werner’s first step in getting at that truth is “(Why Is Your) Heaven So Small,” a pointed barb at the hypocrisy of narrow-minded “one way to heaven” religiosity. Producer Glenn Barratt sets Werner’s Appalachian gospel melody amidst groove driven drums and sitars, which takes the song, as the singer sees it, “from Kentucky to Katmandu.” Werner mines the Bible’s important passages on social justice in the sing-along hand clapping rouser “Help Somebody,” while on the soul searching, choir-backed ballad “Forgiveness,” she questions loving one’s enemies when they so cruelly use religion as justification for discrimination and oppression. And Werner’s neo-traditional bluegrass composition “Did Trouble Me” affirms the importance of conscience in a well-lived life.

The introspective ballad “Sunday Mornings” takes Werner (and no doubt, thousands of listeners) back to their childhood memories of attending church with their families, and to a time, not necessarily a better time, when strict, church approved gender roles ruled the day. “Our Father, The New Revised Edition” offers comic relief in the form of a direct prayer to God to deliver us from self-righteous people who think they speak for Him. Werner then dishes up a New Orleans styled shuffle for “Lost My Religion,” a kind of backslider’s lament. Yet despite her doubts, Werner gives herself over to the evocative ballad “Don’t Explain It Away” (a nod to the possibilities of mystical transcendence) and to the sing-along “I Will Have My Portion,” a song that perfectly captures Werner’s desire to have all the joy without the Jesus. The Gospel Truth closes with the truly “agnostic gospel” of the frank and humorous “Probably Not” and the hopeful “Together,” which imagines the kind of peaceful world God would want (if there is a God – a question Werner leaves unanswered).

Susan Werner’s Background
Susan Werner made her first public performance at age five, playing guitar and singing (where else?) at church. She began playing piano when she was 11, and after earning a degree in voice from the University of Iowa, she completed her graduate studies at Temple University in Philadelphia, where she performed in recitals and operas. While she’ll still on occasion perform “Madame Butterfly” to close any one of the 125 club dates she does annually throughout the U.S. and Canada, she opted to forgo a career as an opera singer and dedicated herself to songwriting, performing at coffeehouses from Washington D.C. to Boston.

Werner launched her recording career with the self-released Midwestern Saturday Night in 1993, which was followed by Live At Tin Angel in 1994. The second album impressed executives at Private Music/BMG, which released her major label debut Last Of The Good Straight Girls in 1995. She also received critical accolades for her subsequent recordings Time Between Trains (VelVel, 1998) and New Non-Fiction (Indie, 2001). She has toured the nation with acts such as Richard Thomson, Keb Mo and Joan Armatrading, and was featured in a 1998 Peter, Paul and Mary PBS special as one of the best of the next generation of folk songwriters.

Independent Spirit
From her folk/pop beginnings, to the songbook flavored I Can’t Be New and now The Gospel Truth, Werner relishes the challenges of being a creative free spirit and says she’s in an exciting new phase of doing themed projects. “I’m consciously choosing to do that now,” she says, “not only because these types of projects challenge and interest me so much but because in a vast marketplace of ideas, I’ve found that it’s good to give the audience a clear concept and a specific point of reference where we can engage each other.”

“The music industry loves to pigeonhole recording artists,” Werner adds, “but I like to see myself as having more of a painter’s career, giving myself the freedom to try entirely new things, to incorporate new colors, new language into my songs.” And with The Gospel Truth, she says, “I am trying to simply convey the reality of being a skeptic in a landscape of believers, what it’s like to sit there in the pew, and to see what feelings, what songs, show up. Some of these tunes are uncertain and distrusting, for sure, but some of these seem more beautiful and true than I’d ever written in any other style on any other project. And I had to go back to church to get them. Who knew?”

reviews

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  • Gospel Truths
    author: Crystal Ross

    Susan Werner is in my top 2 singer songwriters, this album makes me laugh and cry and wish everyone could hear it - it would make the world a better place.

  • Yeah, she's on it
    author: willie carmichael

    Susan Werner kills me. This is a great, great album for those of us who think maybe, possibly, it's hard to tell, but perhaps there is really more out there than disappointment and cheeseburgers. When I grow up I wanna be as smart and funny as Susan

  • Gospel Truth
    author: Veronica Sweeney

    Great collection. So much deep and sensible wisdom. Only one I wasn't nuts about was Sunday Morning. But really fine for this 50 year old listener. My twenty-something kid don't have the life experience yet but tuned in cuz mom was playing it. Love this artist!

  • Brave, intelligent sorley needed strain of Gospel that is truly inspiring
    author: Gina Darnell

    The Gospel truth is the best CD I have heard in years. Authenic, inspiring, and truly comforting. I don't have to be converted to any religion to enjoy these songs. I think the whole concept of this album is ingenious. Susan Werner's use of voice penatrates the social fabric of this country as well as promote healing to who ever listens. It doesn't matter that she doesn't belt it out like some gospel divas. Its her intention that rings so cleary and intellegently through out this CD. And I think she sounds pretty good.

  • author: flying furlanis noplacespecial.org

    This is our first encounter with susan werners' music and we love it especially since we have a venue that matches it. Can't wait to hear all of your other music. Wishing it could be here. Thanks for the inspiring sounds. the flying furlanis noplacespecial.org

  • I adore Susan Werner, but I was disappointed with this album.
    author: Lisa

    Susan's voice is lovely and she writes beautifully, but this didn't feel like a gospel album to me. I felt as though she needed to let it out a few stops. It sounded restrained and I wished her voice could have reflected the passion of the songs more. This will, however, in no way affect me from buying her other cd's in the future and going to see her in concert every chance I get. I actually feel like she cheated herself on this album, she didn't dig down deep enough to the anger, passion, and soul in gospel muscic.

  • EXCELLENT
    author: REV. ANDREW RANHOSKY

    THIS LITTLE LADY HAS IT ALL TOGETHER AND SHOULD GO FAR WITH HER MUSIC AND THAT'S FOR SURE!!!!!

  • touched my soul
    author: Sr. Grace Boys

    susan's songs of gospel truth touched my soul and resonated deeply with the challenges of faith and church today.

  • Love IT!
    author: M Krings

    We can stop listening to this, and when I'm not hearing it a little voice between my ears is wispering Susan's lyrics to me. My husband keeps talking about wanting to book her for his church.

  • author: Kellie Lin

    Chicago based songwriter Susan Werner is known nationwide for her spirited, and often hilarious, live performances. While previous albums showcase Werner's considerable writing chops, THE GOSPEL TRUTH succeeds in also capturing the dynamic performance energy & presence that have long set her apart. Beneath Werner's stunning vocals Grammy Award-winning Producer/Engineer Glen Barratt paints a folkie new-grass back drop that hums with organic warmth and Gospel power. While some songs make light, ("Our Father Revisited" - "Lord lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from those who think they're you"), others go much deeper into the complexities of faith & social responsibility. Notable stops on the journey include the bluesy call to action, "Help Somebody," the rich piano ballad “Forgiveness”, (“How do you love those who never will love you?”) and the conscience driven "(My Lord) Did Trouble Me." But don’t think that Werner is preachy, pushy, or overly sentimental. Nope. She’s just real. Part of her greatest charm is her ability to so succinctly state what so many of us are feeling and thinking. I love this record because it sounds fantastic, but mostly because I can relate to it. It will be a favorite from here on out! I agree that just about anyone, wherever they may live in the religious spectrum, can get behind this record. WOW!

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