In our first installment of looking at the real, raw creative process, we discovered that Christian radio listeners liked the idea of the Thanksgiving piece but Abraham Lincoln’s words were just too big, too 19th Century, too hard to follow in 2018.
And, to complete the picture, the song we used, Cindy Morgan’s How Could I Ask For More, just didn’t move them, largely because it was unfamiliar. Or, at least didn’t in combination with Lincoln’s words. It hasn’t been played for a long time at most stations.
Here’s our original script, basically Lincoln’s Thanksgiving Proclamation woven with the music.
The year was 1863 . . . the words from President Abraham Lincoln . . . “I invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November as a Day of Thanksgiving and Prayer to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.
Our next thought was to paraphrase Lincoln instead. Giving it a new vibe.
Here’s the new take.
Abraham Lincoln is one of our most loved and revered Presidents. As the Civil War was raging, he took the time to issue a proclamation creating an annual day to pause and to give thanks. It is the Thanksgiving Proclamation of 1863—and since that long ago time, we in the United States have set aside a day every November to lift up hearts of thankfulness. Hearts that unite to remember our blessings, those we love and the freedoms we are privileged to share. Lincoln’s character and his foresight is a witness to us yet today. So this year, once again, may we give thanks with grateful hearts.
And here’s what the new piece sounds like with How Could I Ask For More.
What will our listener tell us about this variation? What do you think?
