Jubal Lee in Notingham – Chapter 1
Like musical notes that have forgotten how to sing in harmony, we bellow discord and shout one another down. While we easily hear the din produced by others, we are often deaf to our own.
If a singer of music appeared on the scene, would we welcome his songs — or silence him? That is the premise of Jubal Lee in Notingham.
Chapter 1 — The Cloud
Once there was a city named Notingham. Not Nottingham, where Robin Hood lived, but Notingham, where Notes lived. However, the Notes could not sing or make music of any kind. They only produced a dreadful racket worse than a choir of yowling cats. What did they call their constant complaints, lies, and curses? They called it “din.”
The landscape of Notingham has three distinct features. In the Eastern sky is an oddly-shaped cloud that never moves. Dominating the west is Mount Crescendo, a foreboding active volcano, the place where criminals are exiled, a sentence meaning certain death. Finally, a ten-banded bow spans the sky between Mount Crescendo and the mysterious cloud.
The Notes did not have the slightest idea what these landmarks signified, until early one morning they were aroused from their sleep by a dreadful sound they had never heard before.
On the edge of the city a Note named Jubal Lee was singing. To our ears he sang beautifully. But to the Notes his voice rasped their ears, like fingernails on a blackboard. Many of them simply put a pillow over their heads and went back to sleep, but others wondered what in the world was going on. So, they gathered to hear Jubal sing:
Awake! Awake!
Break out in song!
Awake! Awake,
All Notingham!
That cloud in the sky, What is its name?
Why does it always stay the same?
Other clouds blow and rain and snow.
Why does the great cloud remain just so?
The notes answered him, “Old fairy tales said the cloud was the palace of a king.”
Jubal responded in song:
Your answer is right.
A King does live there,
And he is the Father of Song.
I’ll tell you his name,
For you never could guess:
He’s King Grazioso,
Our musical Highness.
The Notes questioned, “Even if there is such a king, why would he care about us?”
Jubal Lee crooned,
What you make you care about.
The King made us Notes
Just the way we are
And for a purpose.
The Notes pondered Jubal’s words. Then they argued, “No way, our lives have no purpose, except making din and more din.”
Jubal sang:
Din may be all you hear.
Din may be all you do.
But King Grazioso who lives up there
Has a more noble purpose for you.
He made you for music.
He made you for song.
Long ago you wrote and played for him
Melodies and harmonies,
Love songs and symphonies.
Merriness, dancing and laughter
Filled, not only Notingham,
But all the world.
You even wrote down your songs
Drawing Note people on paper.
So you called the writing ‘noting’.
“Noting?” the Notes howled. “What a tall tale you tell. If it’s true, why isn’t it so now?”
Jubal Lee explained: “Foolishly you listened to that liar Pandemonium, who hissed that your musical genius flowed from your own brilliance. So you hosted a musical extravaganza to glorify yourselves. But your concert of self-praise was drowned out by the booming voice of King Grazioso declaring:
"Due to your dissonant arrogance,
Your music will be heard no more,
The gaiety of your tunes is stilled,
Your joyful harmonies silenced.”
As that decree echoed over hill and dale,
All the Notes began to wail.
They quarreled and cursed
And fussed and fumed,
Till all their days were fully consumed
With the din, the din, the din,
The din of their pride.
You foolish notes, (Jubal Lee concluded)
You were made for noting.
But your mouths belch bedlam.
You spew out nonsense with your lips,
And claim there is no King
Who hears your din.
So ended the first song of Jubal Lee. And what was the response of the Notes? Some of them said, “I don’t believe in noting.” Others were heavy-hearted all day long, and for the very first time the din troubled their ears.
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Evite shared with many of us at a concert about a deaf man buying all her records. The fact was that he only could hear her records. God sends the Good News to people that would hear but not understand.
There is music all around if we would only listen and understand.