Stochastic Worship

Category: playlists

  • A Suite for Good Friday

    A Suite for Good Friday

    Good Friday? If you don’t know how the story ends, it’s the most horrific time. The one person who you thought could change the world has been arrested, tried in a kangaroo court and executed in the cruelest way imaginable.

    But let’s spare a thought for the real victims of the story – or so they would portray themselves. A religious and political establishment who correctly identified the Author of Righteousness as an existential threat to their comfortable status quo.

    What if you looked at the events of Holy Week from their eyes? After their attempts to discredit Jesus have resulted in further exposing themselves as corrupt and foolish; they find a suitable patsy who will betray Him. They feel that their problem is dead and buried…

    Then, all heaven breaks loose!

    Here’s a short playlist of four songs telling the story of the Passion from their viewpoint. Because, truth be told, if we were in their position, we would have done the same.

  • The Playlists

    The Playlists

    One of the reasons why I began working on this site was to help organise the curated playlists of AI-generated worship music I’ve been working on.

    Here’s a link to an ever-expanding set of my playlists on Suno.

    I’ve tried to categorise them as:

    • Books of the Bible
    • Chants
    • The Church Year
    • People
    • Stories
    • Books
    • Themes

    Feel free to explore them: remix, experiment with your own ideas and comment on or like any individual songs or playlists while you are there.

  • Happy Holy Week

    Happy Holy Week

    Yes, there’s a playlist!

    We begin this week with Palm Sunday, but beneath all the rejoicing that the king is here, there’s a deeper, darker undercurrent. We know Jesus has to die.

    To a corrupt establishment, it’s a necessary political expedience. They tell us we cannot afford the luxury of a populist iconoclast who, if left unchecked, would overturn their comfortable status quo.

    It’s worth exploring musically.

  • Chants

    Chants

    I have a playlist, of course. And I’m not the only person at Suno using their tools to do this.

    There’s a rich tradition of using short, repetitive songs to focus the mind on who you’re singing to – from the Jesus Prayer uttered in the Egyptian deserts sixteen centuries ago to Taize-style worship in churches today.

    It’s a style which has often been parodied. I came across one based on Graham Kendrick’s Jesus Put This Song Into Our Hearts back in the 1980s. It’s still doing the rounds now in a slightly altered form:

    This is a modern Christian worship song,
    This is a modern Christian worship song,
    This is a modern Christian worship song,

    [change key and repeat]

    But it resonates with something deep inside us. We long for union with the God who created us, who loved us so much that He took on human form to live among us. Not just to show us how to live but to satisfy the demands of a Divine justice system that demanded our death and eternal separation from our Creator because of our rebellion against Him. Only through Him can we find the power to subdue the inward struggle to be less than we were designed to be.

    And so, we call out to Him.

    One of the experimental chants I’ve been working on is called Cry To The Lord:

    [Chorus]
    Jesus Christ
    Son of David
    have mercy on me
    a sinner

    Jesus Christ
    Son of David
    have mercy on me
    a sinner

    [Verse 1]
    I love the Lord
    he heard my prayer
    and saved me from
    the devil’s snare

    [Chorus]
    Jesus Christ
    Son of David
    have mercy on me
    a sinner

    Jesus Christ
    Son of David
    have mercy on me
    a sinner

    [Verse 2]
    Cry to the Lord
    He’ll hear your voice
    and in His love
    you will rejoice

    [Chorus]
    Jesus Christ
    Son of David
    have mercy on me
    a sinner

    Jesus Christ
    Son of David
    have mercy on me
    a sinner

    It’s simple enough. Similar in structure to the Jesus Prayer, but more resonant of Bartimaeus’ cry in the 10th chapter of Mark’s Gospel. Like him, we’re blind. Searching for the One who can transform our sinful reality into one where His glorious presence shines through to give us joy.