Songs

This song came about because I was looking over some old songwriting notes I’d made, especially concentrating on the songs that had never really worked very well. I found one that was based on Psalm 91, and remembered that I had loved the idea of God as our refuge. I’d been watching some films about the plight of refugees around the world, and was a bit depressed at how they often tend to get a rough run even after they’ve escaped whatever it is that they’re fleeing from, often ending up in horrible camps with dreadful conditions.

I pretty much threw out the old song, but kept messing around with this idea of God being the ultimate resting place, where we don’t have to run away any longer. I then found another old song that focussed on the word ‘hosanna’, which means ’save us’ or ’save now’ in Hebrew. Because we often associate the word with Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem (just before he was arrested and crucified!), we sometimes forget what it means, and just use it as a general word of praise, when I think it’s actually a desperate cry for help.

I started to put together the chorus, just based on this cry, so I wanted to use a chord pattern that would hopefully evoke a feeling of desperation, yet also a glimpse of hope.

That turned out to be a bit beyond my limited musical ability, so I just used the chords that I ended up with.

The first verse is based around the second verse of Psalm 91, while the rest of the song is more the ‘vibe’, rather than straight Scriptural references. I used the bridge section of the song to really build on the ‘hope’ theme, giving a positive response to God’s goodness, “shouting His praise aloud”, backed with an ascending chord pattern, which always makes me pretty happy.

Here’s a chord chart in G, I usually play it with a capo on 4th fret (key of B) which tends to work quite well: hosanna-psalm-91-g.pdf

MP3 Demo