Amidst talk this week of the 9-11 anniversary, and bad economic news, and the health-care \u201ccrisis\u201d in the US, I actually wonder whether Americans know what \u201chard times\u201d are. I have been through some difficult patches, but I cannot say that I have known Hard Times in the sense that every previous generation in history, virtually everywhere in the world, has experienced.<\/p>\n
I have been sad, but not in sorrow. I have been in debt, but never destitute. I have had regrets, but never grief. How many of us can share such relatively comfortable testimony? In my case, to whatever extent I rightly judge my insulation, it is largely due to my standing as a Christian \u2013 receiving joy that passes understanding \u2014 but we also have to credit modern life, in America, with its technology, medicine, and general prosperity.<\/p>\n
Hard Times come in America, but somehow all the wars and crises have the lengths of TV mini-series, and if not, the public grows impatient. The public has a sound-bite mentality. We used to face our challenges; but now we are distracted with the modern equivalents of the Romans\u2019 \u201cbread and circuses\u201d \u2014 pop entertainment, push-button gratification.<\/p>\n
In many ways this indicates that we are not advancing as a culture. I\u2019m not sure we are \u201cgoing backwards,\u201d either, because that might actually be beneficial. Giuseppi Verdi (yes, the composer otherwise known as Joe Green) once said, Torniamo all\u2019antico: Sara un progresso<\/em> \u2014 \u201cWe turn to the past in order to move forward.\u201d<\/p>\n I got thinking of Hard Times in America when I pulled an elegant old volume off my bookshelf. Folk Songs<\/em> was published in 1860, before the Civil War. This book is leather-bound, all edges gilt, pages as supple as when it was printed, a joy to hold. The \u201cfolk songs\u201d of its title refers not to early-day coffee houses, but to poems and songs of the people, in contradistinction to epic verse or heroic sagas; the way the German word Volk<\/em> refers to the shared-group spirit of the masses.<\/p>\n Many of the titles are charming: \u201cThe Age of Wisdom,\u201d \u201cMy Child,\u201d \u201cBaby\u2019s Shoes,\u201d \u201cThe Flower of Beauty,\u201d \u201cThe First Snow-Fall\u201d\u2026 However, such sweet titles mask preoccupations with children dying in snow drifts, lovers deserting, husbands lost at sea, fatal illness, mourning for decades, unfaithful friends. No need to guess the themes other titles from the index:\u201dTommy\u2019s Dead,\u201d \u201cThe Murdered Traveller,\u201d and \u201cOde To a Dead Body.\u201d<\/p>\n It reminded me that people 150 years ago were not gloomy pessimists: they were not. But Hard Times were a part of life, and therefore part of poetry and song. On the frontier, life could be snuffed out in a moment. In the imminent Civil War, roughly every third household was affected by death, maiming, split families, or hideous disruption; yet anti-war movements never gained traction; life went on. Abraham Lincoln almost lost his mind over an unhappy love affair; his wife likely did lose her mind when her favorite son died in the White House. Theodore Roosevelt\u2019s young wife (in childbirth) and mother (of salmonella) died on the same day in the same house. Hard Times.<\/p>\n Also before the Civil War, a composer named Stephen Foster wrote a song called Hard Times<\/em>. He is barely recalled today, sometimes as a caricature, but he might be America\u2019s greatest composer. He wrote My Old Kentucky Home; I Dream of Jeannie With the Light Brown Hair; Old Black Joe; Carry Me Back to Ol\u2019 Virginia; Way Down Upon the Swanee River \/ Old Folks At Home; Oh, Susanna; Camptown Races; Beautiful Dreamer<\/em> \u2026 and Hard Times, Come Again No More.<\/em> This last song has been resurrected lately to a certain repute, or at least utility. In some circles it has become an anthem for charities and lamentation of poverty. Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, even the Squirrel Nut Zippers, have sung it. It has taken on the air of a secular anthem. But in fact, although Stephen Foster did not embed a Gospel message in the lyrics, he had written many hymns in his life, and \u2014 if we can turn back our minds to the world of 150 years ago \u2014 it is clear that the Hard Times he wrote of were the world\u2019s trials, to be relieved in heaven. It is clear that the \u201ccabin,\u201d and its door, in the song are metaphors.<\/p>\n Here is a memorable video to evoke the reality of life\u2019s Hard Times, the promise heaven holds, and the beauty of Stephen Foster\u2019s music to you. The seven singers are from the amazing project of a few years ago, \u201cThe Transatlantic Sessions\u201d \u2014 singers and musicians from America (US and Canada), Ireland, and Scotland singing old and new \u201cfolkish\u201d songs in a living-room setting.<\/p>\n (By the way, they are, left to right, Rod Paterson, Scotland; Karen Matheson, Scotland \u2014 hear her incredible soprano harmony on the left channel; Mary Black, Ireland; Emmylou Harris, US; Rufus Wainwright, his mother Kate McGarrigle, and her sister Anna McGarrigle on the button accordian, all Canadians. The other musicians are fiddler Jay Ungar \u2014 he wrote the haunting \u201cAshokan\u2019s Farewell: tune of the PBS \u201cCivil War\u201d series \u2014 and his wife Molly Mason on the bass; and the project’s shepherds Shetland fiddler Aly Bain, and American dobro player Jerry Douglas.)<\/p>\n Listen to the wonderful performance, the amazing music, and the important reminder that we should keep Hard Times in perspective\u2026 but also that God provides a joyful relief from life\u2019s disappointments when they come. By and by, they will \u201ccome no more.\u201d<\/p>\n