COM 213 Media History Recording/Musical Artist Paper

This assignnment will consist of two parts - a recorded media history story and a paper on an influential early CCM artist/band.

Media History Recording

Students will complete a group project that extends our look at media history. Students will select an "untold story" about a significant contributor to media history. This can be a person(s), a company, or a technology. For example, a group could look at Mark Zuckerberg or Microsoft or 8K television. Students will record, either in audio or video form, a 5 minute story telling the history of their subject. Subjects must be approved by the instructor. The idea is to tell a story that we didn't have the time to cover during the media history portion but is still significant for understanding where the media came from and why it is the way it is today. The story should connect to at least one of the concepts from the key concepts list.

Musical Artist Paper

Students will complete a three page paper on their selected artist/band. The paper should consist of two parts. First, tell me about the artist/band - who are they? what contributions did they make to the CCM field (and possibly beyond)? what was their career like? etc. In other words, a biography of the band/artist. Second, select one song by the artist/band and analyze it. Tell me about the song's structure/instrumentation, lyrics and influence. I will post a document a few weeks into the semester listing the artists/bands you can choose from. The paper should be sourced/cited/referenced just like any other paper that uses material other than your own. You may use whatever format (ex. APA, MLA etc.) you wish.

ex. of a song analysis

Larry Norman - The Outlaw

"The Outlaw" was released in 1972 on the album "Only Visiting This Planet." In various surveys conducted by CCM Magazine "Only Visiting This Planet" has been consistently ranked as one of the top 3 best/most influential albums in CCM history. Like The Beatles "Yesterday" the song has a simple melody, simple instrumentation (mostly acoustic guitar) and simple lyrics - yet it is profoundly moving. In the early 1970s Jesus music was a new phenomenon. Blending rock music with Christian lyrics was too controversial for the church and too Christian to be played on secular radio stations. As a result, songs such as "The Outlaw" were never heard on the radio or ranked on Billboard charts. Instead, artists such as Larry Norman would take to the streets and play music for the hippies on the East and West coasts. Christian hippies became known as "Jesus People" and Larry Norman became their first musical prophet. The simple instrumentation allowed Jesus People to quickly learn the song and play it on their own thus spreading the song across the country. The song itself asks the most profound question anyone in this life has to answer - who is Jesus Christ? The song proposes five options; outlaw, poet, sorcerer, politician and Son of God. This is reminiscent of C. S. Lewis' approach to the same question. Lewis proposed that Jesus was either liar, lunatic or Lord. Neither Lewis or Norman offer "good man" as an alternative. Thus, the listener is challenged to make a choice and none of the choices are safe.