Brandon's Music

It’s been a few weeks since I posted here, but that’s mainly because I’ve been busy being creative in another direction. Over the years, I’ve written a small amount of original music, originally instrumental only, but then in the mid 2000s I started writing music with lyrics.

Never being much of a good singer, I never had recordings of that music that I was really proud to share around. I presented some of it at church, where as worship leader I had the ability to draw from my own library of praise and worship choruses that I’d written. But I never posted much of it, since honestly its quality wasn’t great.

With the advent of generative AI music tools, however, we’ve reached a point where I could upload my own recordings and the associated lyrics and chords, and get back some really high-quality recordings, with AI-generated vocals that vastly exceed my own ability. Finally, these are good enough that I’m actually happy to share them, in the hope that others will be blessed.

I’ve got to admit one thing, however. I wrote all these praise songs while camped squarely in evangelical theology, and some of the things I wrote I can no longer whole-heartedly endorse as my own theology. I thought about it for a while, and concluded that there’s nothing really objectionable to me – it’s just immature, from my current perspective. And I know that most of my former friends and my family still live in that theological world, and would be blessed by this music. If it draws them closer to God, I’m okay with it. And it really does represent part of my theological journey – partly because some of these songs come from a season where, looking back in retrospect, I was beginning to question some of the things I grew up believing. So even these still fairly evangelical songs do represent my growth process. And this entire blog is basically that: a documentation of my journey. I don’t even still fully agree with some early blog posts you’ll find here. And I’m fine with that.

You can see the first few offerings on my YouTube channel “Original Music” playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_ZaKulWuGU&list=PL9Ul79w-MZ06Gc945yUVxlBFxICYPcIs1

I’d love to hear what you think. Leave a comment here, or on the videos themselves.

I wrote this song during the aftermath of the BLM protests, as I was thinking about how the church was failing at its mission to expand the Kingdom here on earth, and I took my main lyrical cues from the Lord’s Prayer.
“As In Heaven”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owxJH4yorQQ

This song is just a straight-up worship song, based on Isaiah 61:10. I’d been in love with the language in that scripture for years, and decided I really needed to set it to music.
“I Delight Greatly In The Lord”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECIET48UZK8

I wrote this song as my theology began to change in 2020 and 2021, watching the world crumble around the twin bombshells of COVID and BLM. Literally everything was shaking for me, and this was my response.
“Shaken”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_ZaKulWuGU

I wrote this song right after George Floyd’s murder, and as I was watching the American church’s quite disappointing response. I deliberately structured it as a protest song, with a march cadence. Suno did an amazing job capturing the vibe I was hoping to get. Content warning: this video contains some actual footage from the George Floyd incident.
“I Will Not Be Silent”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrqJMZhAdlo

This is just an instrumental song I wrote a couple decades ago, which Suno did wonderfully at capturing the essence. I never would have made it that style – although it perfectly matches my chords and melody and flairs. It was a song in a period of spiritual dryness for me – hence the title “Desert” – but this rendition makes it feel almost joyful, despite the dark thoughts I had while writing it. And you know what? I’m just fine with that change.
“Desert”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vCsgaHBvlw