This blog is dedicated to the amateur or beginner musician with music written in a simple and easy to read Alpha Notes format and with Chords for the left hand. This is to assist those with little or hardly at all note reading skills. This is a blog that shows all the chords in Alpha Notes format too which you can find the notes for the chords in one of the blogs. Please feel free to leave a comment or any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Enjoy!
"Lost - But Still He Loves You" is written by John Willard Peterson (November 1, 1921 – September 20, 2006) was a songwriter who had a major influence on evangelicalChristian music in the 1950s through the 1970s. He wrote over 1000 songs, and 35 cantatas.
In 1953, he graduated from the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago and shortly thereafter settled in Pennsylvania to continue his songwriting career. He then moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where for over ten years he was President and Editor-in-Chief of Singspiration, a sacred music publishing company. While there, he compiled and edited a hymnal called "Great Hymns of the Faith", (c) 1961. He also served on the board of Gospel Films, Inc. of Muskegon, Michigan.
He also had direct contact with popular Christian musicians of the day such as Bill Pearce and Dick Anthony. He resided in Scottsdale, Arizona, where he continued to write music. Peterson died September 20, 2006, aged 84, following a bout with prostate cancer.
Some of his more popular song titles include "It Took a Miracle", "Over the Sunset Mountains", "Heaven Came Down", "So Send I You", "Springs of Living Water", "Jesus is Coming Again", "Surely Goodness and Mercy", "This is the day that the Lord hath made" and "O Glorious Love". His cantatas include Night of Miracles and Down From His Glory.
"How Long Has It Been?" was written by Mosie Lister. In Southern Gospel music circles, Mosie Lister (1921-2015) was a legend. A Baptist minister, he was best known for writing the Gospel songs “Where No One Stands Alone”, “Till the Storm Passes By”, “Then I Met the Master” and “How Long Has It Been?”
Mosie was born into a musical family in Georgia, but he disappointed his family when it appeared he was tone-deaf. They instructed him in the violin, and he gradually learned to distinguish pitches. But, he wanted to do more than just tell the difference between pitches; he wanted to write songs.
Mosie came to fame as he worked with – and sang with – southern gospel quartets… arranging, writing, singing, and producing.
Mosie was concerned about so many people who had drifted away from the Lord. Once upon a time, they had told God they loved Him… but they hadn’t given God much thought in recent years. He thought about writing a song asking the question: “How long since you really prayed?”
He later said, “All of a sudden I realized this was what I needed to say. I just started writing as fast as I could.” In 10 minutes he had it finished. Within 5 more years, more than a million copies of this song in sheet music had been sold.
George Beverly Shea, Billy Graham’s soloist, often closed his concerts by singing this song.
To download the easy alphanotes and chords, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics:
How long has it been since you talked with the Lord and told Him your heart’s hidden secrets? How long since you prayed? How long since you stayed on your knees till the light shone through?
How long has it been since your mind felt at ease? How long since your heart knew no burden? Can you call Him your friend? How long has it been since you knew that He cared for you?
How long has it been since you knelt by your bed and prayed to the Lord up in Heaven? How long since you knew that He’d answer you and would keep you the long night through?
How long has it been since you woke with the dawn and felt this day is worth living? Can you call Him your friend? How long has it been since you knew that He cared for you?
"This Love Is Mine!" is written by John W. Peterson and Alfred B. Smith. John Willard Peterson (November 1, 1921 – September 20, 2006) was a songwriter who had a major influence on evangelicalChristian music in the 1950s through the 1970s. He wrote over 1000 songs, and 35 cantatas.
In 1953, he graduated from the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago and shortly thereafter settled in Pennsylvania to continue his songwriting career. He then moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where for over ten years he was President and Editor-in-Chief of Singspiration, a sacred music publishing company. While there, he compiled and edited a hymnal called "Great Hymns of the Faith", (c) 1961. He also served on the board of Gospel Films, Inc. of Muskegon, Michigan.
He also had direct contact with popular Christian musicians of the day such as Bill Pearce and Dick Anthony. He resided in Scottsdale, Arizona, where he continued to write music. Peterson died September 20, 2006, aged 84, following a bout with prostate cancer.
Some of his more popular song titles include "It Took a Miracle", "Over the Sunset Mountains", "Heaven Came Down", "So Send I You", "Springs of Living Water", "Jesus is Coming Again", "Surely Goodness and Mercy", "This is the day that the Lord hath made" and "O Glorious Love". His cantatas include Night of Miracles and Down From His Glory.
Used pseudonym B. C. Laurelton ---------- In 1930, he began playing on radio broadcasts in Jersey City, New Jersey, on "The Old Fashioned Gospel Hour." After meeting Wendell P. Loveless, Alfred enrolled at the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago and became a member of the WMBI staff. During service as Minister of Music at The Church of the Open Door in Philadelphia, he taught at The Philadelphia School of the Bible in the fall of 1938. During that year, he wrote "For God So Loved the World" after visiting the ninety-four year-old hymn writer George C. Stebbins. Smith met Billy Graham when they were both students at Wheaton College. During their long collaboration, they founded Singspiration in 1941. After graduating from Wheaton, Smith, Graham, and George Beverly Shea started "Youth for Christ" in Chicago.
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics:
1. We may sound the depths of all the might oceans; We may tell the distance to the farthest star. But the mighty love of God cannot be measured. Its dimensions are so high, so deep, so far!
CHORUS
This love is mine, I cannot comprehend it! This love revealed through Christ, my Lord divine. When on the tree He died for me. God's wondrous, glorious, mighty love, This love is mine
2. I behold His love in every golden sunset; I can see it in the beauty of a flower! And I feel it in my heart since Jesus touched me, And redeemed me by His wonder-working power
CHORUS
3. And some day "I'll thank Him face to face in glory When with all the millions at His feet I fall. And through countless ages there I'll live rejoicing Sing forever at the wonder of it all!
"My God and I" is a hymn which describes the close relationship which one who loves Christ can have as both the Father and the Son come unto him and make Their abode with him is “My God and I” (#93 inHymns for Worship Revised, #A inSacred Selections for the Church). The text and tune were first published in 1935 and attributed to I. B. Sergei. However, it was generally believed that this was a pseudonym. It is now known that the author and composers’ real name was Austris August Wihtol, who was born on Jan. 24, 1889, in Riga, Latvia, one of six children, and grew up a Lutheran. After receiving most of his education in Russia, he came to the United States and performed in concert extensively with the Latvian Singers, which he founded upon his arrival. In his youth, he had composed operas, symphonies, and other major works, but in his later years he devoted his time mainly to practical choral music. His first wife died in childbirth. In 1932, he met his second wife Elly, who had been born in the Netherlands and was an opera singer, when he was in California practicing with his Latvian chorus for a performance. She attended the Wiltshire Christian Church. They lived in Chicago from 1933 to 1944 and had one daughter named Charlotte, who died in 1988.
Wihtol actually composed the song “My God and I” over a thirty-year period. In fact, searching for the “perfect” arrangement, he produced hundreds of versions, including even an opera, before completing the present arrangement in 1932 at Glendale, CA. Not sure that this was still the masterpiece he wanted, he signed it with the pen name “I. B. Sergei.” Ten years later, he was browsing through a bookstore in Chicago and noticed a hymnbook with his hymn, which he had never released to anyone, in it. After he successfully defended his claims against copyright infringement, things went well for the Wihtols and their publishing business, which they established after returning to Glendale, CA, or moved with them, until the mid 1960s when Austris developed Alzheimer’s disease. The copyright was renewed in 1963 by Wihtol and then assigned to Singspiration Inc., at that time a division of Zondervan, in 1970. It is now owned by New Spring Inc. and administered by the Brentwood-Benson Publishing Co. of Nashville, TN.
In a booklet The Writing of “My God and I,” Wihtol said that the original inspiration for the hymn came from his youth back in his homeland of Latvia. “The concept of ‘go in the field together…’ began when I was a boy about seven years old. In our family there were two places of environment, the home and the field….The fields were a place of beauty and happiness.” Additional inspiration came a few years later when he met an orphan girl about sixteen years old named “Happy Anna,” who had escaped from a cruel, dirty orphanage, traveled about like a Gypsy, and would sing every day to the Riga harbor workers at noon to earn her meals. She was called “Happy” because in spite of her uncertainty of daily life, she had a constant smile and a cheerful attitude. Wihtol wrote, “Happy Anna brought to me a new conception of God…a God that is with me when I do the best acts of my life.” Wihtol died of a heart attack in Glendale on Apr. 3, 1974, at the age of 85, and Elly died in 1996.
Among hymnbooks published by members of the Lord’s church for use in churches of Christ, the song was added to the inside front cover of the 1956 Sacred Selections sometime in the 1970s and has appeared in the 1973 edition of the 1971 Songs of the Church, the 1990 Songs of the Church 21st C. Ed., and the 1994 Songs of Faith and Praise all edited by Alton H. Howard; the 1977 Special Sacred Selections edited by Ellis J. Crum; the 1978 Hymns of Praise edited by Reuel Lemmons; the 1978/1983 Church Gospel Songs and Hymns edited by V. E. Howard; the 1992 Praise for the Lord edited by John P. Wiegand; the 2007 Sacred Songs of the Church edited by William D. Jeffcoat; and the 2009 Favorite Songs of the Church and the 2010 Songs for Worship and Praise both edited by Robert J. Taylor Jr.; in addition to Hymns for Worship.
The song expresses the closeness of the kind of personal relationship that God wants to have with His people.
You may have noticed that in stanzas 1 and 2, lines two and four rhyme, but in stanza 3, the corresponding lines do not rhyme (friends should and do/unendingly). Of course, hymns don’t have to rhyme to be scriptural, and I’ve even read of some modern hymn writers who lash out and rail against “the strictures of rhyming,” but the fact is that rhyme is a general characteristic of English poetry, including hymn poetry. Why Wihtol didn’t rhyme the stanza is beyond me. It seems that he could have written, “And good friends we shall be….Go on unendingly.” But that is really neither here nor there. There was a time when this hymn was criticized for being “too personal,” but today most people see nothing wrong with a hymn expressing the concept of a personal relationship with the Lord. With regard to my own soul’s salvation and hope of heaven, the two most important beings are “My God and I.”
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics:
My God and I go in the fields together, We walk and talk as good friends should and do; We clasp our hands, our voices ring with laughter, My God and I walk through the meadow's hue.
He tells me of the years that went before me, When heavenly plans were made for me to be; When all was but a dream of dim conception, To come to life, earth's verdant glory see.
My God and I will go for aye together, We'll walk and talk as good friends should and do; This earth will pass, and with it common trifles, But God and I will go unendingly.
"Wayfaring Stranger" (also known as "Poor Wayfaring Stranger" or "I Am a Poor Wayfaring Stranger"),Roud3339, is a well-known American folk and gospel song likely originating in the early 19th centuryabout a plaintive soul on the journey through life. As with mostfolk songs, many variations of the lyrics exist and many versions of this song have been published over time by popular singers, often being linked to times of hardship and notable experiences in the singers' lives, such as the case withBurl Ives'autobiography.
According to the book The Makers of the Sacred Harp, by David Warren Steel and Richard H. Hulan, the lyrics were published in 1858 in Joseph Bever's Christian Songster, which was a collection of popular hymns and spiritual songs of the time. This may or may not have been the first time the song appeared in English print, and the songwriter is unknown. Steel and Hulan suggest the song was derived from an 1816 German-language hymn, "Ich bin ein Gast auf Erden" by Isaac Niswander.
During and for several years after the American Civil War, the lyrics were known as the Libby Prison Hymn. This was because the words had been inscribed by a dying Union soldier incarcerated in Libby Prison, a warehouse converted to a notorious Confederate prison in Richmond, Virginia known for its adverse conditions and high death rate. It had been believed that the dying soldier had authored the song to comfort a disabled soldier, but this was not the case since it had been published several years before the Civil War in 1858, before Libby Prison was put into service (1862).
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics:
I am a poor wayfaring stranger
A-travelling through this world of woe
But there's no sickness, no toil or danger
In that bright world to which I go
I'm going there to see my 1.father (2.mother, 3.Saviour)
I'm going there, no more to roam
I'm just a-going over Jordan
I'm just a-going over home
(Repeat)
Alternative lyrics:
I am a poor wayfaring stranger
I'm travelling through this world of woe
Yet there's no sickness, toil nor danger
In that bright land to which I go
I'm going there to see my father
I'm going there, no more to roam
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home
I know dark clouds will gather round me
I know my way is rough and steep
But golden fields lie just before me
Where God's redeemed shall ever sleep
I'm going home to see my mother
And all my loved ones who've gone on
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home
Repeat verse one and chorus
"All My Life" is written by Ralph Carmichael (born May 27, 1927) is an American composer and arranger of both secular pop music and contemporary Christian music, being regarded as one of the pioneers of the latter genre as well as the father of contemporary Christian music.
Carmichael was born in Quincy, Illinois, the son of a Pentecostal minister, who allowed his son to play the violin and listen to the radio. "I was captivated by the chordal explosions I heard on the radio. I felt a sadness that we didn't have that in our church. Our church orchestra sounded weak and terrible by comparison. It was embarrassing. Why? Why did we have to settle? Why couldn't we use those gorgeous rhythms, sweeping strings, the brass, the stirring chords? That started to control everything I did."
As a teenager he played violin with the San Jose Civic Symphony. At 17 he enrolled at Southern California Bible College, now Vanguard University, to become a preacher like his father, grandfather, three uncles and five cousins. He started a campus men's quartet, ensembles and mixed groups of all kinds, blending jazz and classical music techniques with gospel songs and hymns. His musical "experiments" proved instantly controversial. His bands were unwelcome at many churches, and he was not allowed to store the baritone saxophone on campus because of its worldly associations with big band music.
After college, reaction to his band was mixed from the Christian community. One church made them hide the drums behind a curtain; a pastor in Oakland stopped the band mid-song because the music sounded too worldly. After a performance at a men's fellowship in Pasadena, however, Carmichael's band was invited to audition for television. This program drew so much mail from Christians that the station asked for more shows.
In 1951, he was invited to score a film for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association; in all he wrote the musical score for twenty of their films. For BGEA, he made the funky urban soundtrack for the 1970 film The Cross and the Switchblade. By the late 1950s, secular producers had taken notice of Carmichael's radio and film work. He was invited to assist the composer at the television sitcom I Love Lucy and was soon arranging music for that show as well as Bonanza and The Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Show and for singer Rosemary Clooney. In 1958, Carmichael was hired by producer Jack H. Harris to score his science fiction film, The Blob. With the success of the film, Carmichael was brought back to score Harris' follow-up film, 4D Man. He arranged and composed music for a Bing Crosby Christmas special television program, which prompted his denomination to strongly suggest he not apply for renewal of his ordination. He also composed and conducted the theme music for the 1965 sitcom, My Mother the Car.
His big break came at the end of the 1950s, when his work came to the attention of Capitol Records, who asked him to provide the arrangements for an album of mainly sacred Christmas songs by one of the label's biggest stars, Nat King Cole. The result, The Magic of Christmas, was released for the 1960 festive season, by which time Capitol had already set Carmichael to work with Cole on more secular albums.
Carmichael duly became Cole's most regularly utilized arranger from then until the singer's death in early 1965, their first mainstream pop collaboration being The Touch of Your Lips (also 1960), an album of romantic ballads backed by lush strings, and their final team-up being Cole's last album, L-O-V-E, with jazzy big band arrangements, recorded in December 1964, only two months before Cole succumbed to the lung cancer which was already in its advanced stages.
It is in the field of Christian music that Carmichael has been most prolific. In particular, his experiments in pop-rock style in the 1960s and 1970s have brought him recognition as the "Father of Contemporary Christian Music". He founded Light Records in order to widen the audience for the music of the Jesus People.[4] He was subject to controversy from within the church, being called a heretic for his use of guitars in worship and his adaptations of Gospel songs to big band stylings.
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics:
All my life, through the good or bad of life Whether I should gain or loose, still I Choose To live my life, every moment all for Thee Walking oh so close to Thee While I'm learning every day come what may To trust in Thee Take away the doubt that hides Thy perfect will Give me faith instead and with Thy Spirit fill Then all my days, be the guardian of my ways And I'll know the glory of all Thy Love for all my days.
I’ve Got Peace Like a River is an African-American spiritual. Spirituals began on the fields and the slaves would sing to pass the time of day. It was also a great way to pass messages along and share the gospel.
This song uses water “as a simile” to describe peace, joy and love.
Hymnary.org says “This spiritual compares the peace of God to a placidly flowing river, the joy of Christ to a merrily bubbling fountain, and the love of God to a deep, wide ocean.”
The earliest appearance in a hymnal appears to be in 1975. This was really a surprise, as I thought it would be much earlier.
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
1 I've got peace like a river, I've got peace like a river, I've got peace like a river in my soul. I've got peace like a river, I've got peace like a river, I've got peace like a river in my soul.
2 I've got love like a river, I've got love like a river, I've got love like a river in my soul. I've got love like a river, I've got love like a river, I've got love like a river in my soul
3 I've got joy like a river, I've got joy like a river, I've got joy like a river in my soul. I've got joy like a river, I've got joy like a river, I've got joy like a river in my soul.
"Just a Wayward Lamb" or "Soy la triste oveja" was written by Juan Ramon.Juan Ramón(born asEllery Guy Rech; 13 January 1940 – 30 July 2020) was an Argentine singer and actor.
Juan Ramón died of pneumonia in Buenos Aires on 30 July 2020.
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics:
Just a wayward lamb wand'ring from the fold,
Out upon the mountains so lonely and cold;
"Come and follow Me," hear the Shepherd's plea,
"Safely on my shoulders I'll carry thee home.
I will lead in pastures, meadows green and fair,
If you follow Me I will guard thee with care;
Listen to My leading I will guide thee home,
Live with me forever, no longer to roam."
And with tears He led me gently to His side.
Jesus, the Good Shepherd, died upon the tree,
Suffered untold torment for sheep just like me.
He became the Lamb when He took my place.
O what boundless mercy, what infinite grace!
Now I’ve found contentment in His love divine,
Safe in the fold with the ninety and nine.
Thus I fear no evil, for He’ll guide me home,
Happy in His presence, no longer to roam.
Goodness, love and mercy always shall be mine.
"Just as I Am" is a well-known hymn, written by Charlotte Elliott in 1835, first appearing in the Christian Remembrancer, of which Elliott became the editor in 1836. The final verse is taken from Elliott's Hours of Sorrow Cheered and Comforted (1836).
John Brownliedescribed the hymn's story in his bookThe Hymns and Hymn Writers of the Church Hymnary:Charlotte's brother, the Rev. H. V. Elliott planned to hold a charity bazaar designed to give, at a nominal cost, a high education to the daughters of clergymen supported bySt Mary Church:
The night before the bazaar she was kept wakeful by distressing thoughts of her apparent uselessness; and these thoughts passed by a transition easy to imagine into a spiritual conflict, till she questioned the reality of her whole spiritual life, and wondered whether it were anything better after all than an illusion of the emotions, an illusion ready to be sorrowfully dispelled. The next day, the busy day of the bazaar, she lay upon her sofa in that most pleasant boudoir set apart for her in Westfield Lodge, ever a dear resort to her friends." The troubles of the night came back upon her with such force that she felt they must be met and conquered in the grace of God. She gathered up in her soul the great certainties, not of her emotions, but of her salvation: her Lord, His power, His promise. And taking pen and paper from the table she deliberately set down in writing, for her own comfort, "the formulae of her faith." Hers was a heart which always tended to express its depths in verse. So in verse she restated to herself the Gospel of pardon, peace, and heaven. "Probably without difficulty or long pause" she wrote the hymn, getting comfort by thus definitely "recollecting" the eternity of the Rock beneath her feet. There, then, always, not only for some past moment, but " even now " she was accepted in the Beloved "Just as I am".
Billy Graham converted to Christianity in 1934 in a revival meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, led by evangelist Mordecai Ham hearing the altar call song "Just as I Am". This song became an altar call song in the Billy Graham crusades in the latter half of the twentieth century. Graham used the title of the hymn as the title of his 1997 book - Just as I Am: The Autobiography of Billy Graham.Michael W. Smith sang the song in a tribute to Graham at the 44th GMA Dove Awards.
To download the easy alphanotes and chords sheet music, look here. Enjoy!
Lyrics
Just as I am, without one plea But that Thy blood was shed for me And that Thou bid'st me come to Thee O Lamb of God, I come! I come
Just as I am, though tossed about With many a conflict, many a doubt Fighting and fears within without O Lamb of God, I come, I come
Just as I am, and waiting not to rid my soul of one dark blot to thee whose blood can cleanse each spot O Lamb of God, I come, I come
Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind Sight, riches, healing of the mind Yea, all I need, in Thee to find O Lamb of God, I come, I come!
Just as I am, Thou wilt receive Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve Because Thy promise I believe O Lamb of God, I come, I come
Because Thy promise I believe O Lamb of God, I come, I come
