Where is all the Easter music?

At Christmas time, we are inundated with Christmas songs on the radio, the supermarkets, the mall, even walking downtown.  There seems to be so much Christmas music that we start hearing it well before Thanksgiving.  Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Christmas music and I am glad we have so much of it, but it does make me pause for a moment to wonder where all the Easter music is.  After all, aren’t Christmas and Easter a little related?

Wouldn’t it be nice to hear some Easter music being played as we make our way through this Holy Week?  I wouldn’t even mind hearing Irving Berlin’s “Easter Parade” or even “Peter Cottontail”.  If we can hear “Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer” and “Frosty the Snowman”, then how about some of these popular Easter songs?  I kind of like them!

Can you name many other “popular” Easter songs?  I think there is a void of good Easter songs for whatever reason.  We need some good songwriters to come up with some more Easter songs.  Then again, maybe there is a void of good songwriters these days too!

The best Easter music I believe comes from the sacred repertoire of songs, such as hymnals and church songbooks.  After all, this is what Easter really is all about.  Probably the top two of all time would be “Christ, the Lord is Risen Today” and “Up from the Grave He Arose”.  There are numerous other great hymns that come to mind and if you attend a church service this Sunday, I hope you hear and get to sing some of them.

There are also some really good contemporary Christian songs that have been written in the past couple decades. I guess my point is that we should be hearing this music throughout the season.  I understand that as we travel through Holy Week, there is certainly a series of events that lead up to Easter Sunday and much of the music helps lead us through that trip.

I guess we have left Easter up to the churches and have given up Christmas to Secularism.  If that is the case, then perhaps it isn’t all that bad that Easter is celebrated in the way that it is; however, it doesn’t bode well for Christmas.

I invite you to celebrate Easter this Sunday by attending a church service. I am sure you will experience some wonderful Easter music. You may not hear Judy Garland or Bing Crosby sing “Easter Parade” or Gene Autry sing “Peter Cottontail”, but you should hear about the miracle of Jesus’ resurrection.  And after all, that’s what is most important about this holiday!

FINÉ.