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Home > Praise and Thanks Volume II |
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Youtuber Reverend? (23,000 views coming soon…)
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Youtuber Reverend? (23,000 views coming soon…)
Last night, one of the sisters who were studying the Bible with me at my apartment expressed mild frustration understanding some of the lyrics of the hymns I had written. (This was on the Composer KilSang Kwon and Hymns by HeungGu Lee Solo / Chorus Albums 1 and 2)
So I gave her my Youtube link so that she can listen to the entirely of the album with the lyrics attached. Then she jokingly said “You had become a Youtuber reverend?” and I had laughed a bit at that.
As I am writing this, I really still do not fully understand what it means.
About 6 years ago, I had a discussion with Deacon H about uploading the entire 130 or so of the hymns that was composed by Elder Kil Sang Kwon. The deacon had experience in uploading his own mission trip video. He has taught my staff member kindly how to upload the hymns with a background picture that would be very fitting to that particular hymn.
After that, my staff had spent a good part of the year or so uploading diligently in Youtube. After having uploaded all 130 hymns, I had uploaded the ones done by the Young Nak Presbyterian Church’s composer committees’ choir pieces as well (7 in total). Some of the hymns in the 130 selection was sang in solo, some were in chorus so in actuality there are 151 total without the duplicates.
I had told the deacon that one day when the view count hits 10,000 I would serve him lunch as a celebration and that did happen. Then I had promised once again when the view hit 20,000 we would have celebratory lunch once again and bid farewell. It had been about 3 years if I remembered correctly.
The reason why I had uploaded them on Youtube was because there was so many limits with how many CDs can be distributed to people continuously. To print out 400 copies of 14 albums’ worth of hymn was costly, and since the amount it would be distributed would be severely limited as well. Many people would expect to have new hymns always. So in order to solve this issue, I had decided to upload to Youtube then let people know, share and to praise God in the utmost in one heartbeat.
Each hymn has visitors counted. Upon further research, I had noticed there was a huge discrepancy in which hymns had more viewers and which one had less views. It is so hard to keep track of which one is popular and which isn’t. It is not what kind of hymn that was composed, if this is a video or not, how famous or popular the soloist / choir singing is, instead it depends on if the person had taken the hymn as if it was their own and sang with true effort that shines.
In one particular well known soloist who had sang with immeasurable effort had about 2,400 viewers in total. Seven of the hymns done by the Seoul Young Nak Church composers’ committee despite being uploaded late had about 3,000 viewers. Amazing!
Last September 8th, there was a memorial event for Elder Kwon in Los Angeles to celebrate his works as a composer. In the 1st part they sang children’s songs and song lied. In the 2nd half of the event many of my hymns were sung in solo or choir forms. Thankfully this time around there is an actual video footage which was edited and uploaded to Youtube.
However, one thing was easily noted that the popularity of views on this (as a video opposed to slideshow with pictures following the lyrics) had climbed much faster in average. I think it is because in reality the persons and the unity of the choirs that sang with passion felt more live with the viewers.
Another guess is, many of the populace tends to steer away from hymns like “Only If I Died Worldly”, “Growth in Sharing”, “The Thing I Shall Do All My Life”, “Explorer New Lands” and “Witness of Revive” which all emphasize on the works of workers in Christ and of faith.
Even if the 6 years go by, “New Land, New World!” had only 15 viewers in total. Another interest of leading young adults into Christ and the hymn dedicated for that, “Oh, The Youthful Called by Christ” had only 15 viewers total, despite it being sung by a rather famous soloist. Very curious!
Whenever I send in mails or read, I tend to open Youtube and look up other praise songs to listen to. Ones in particular of India’s Bible Society’s “Besy Choir” and “Fountainview Academy” which is mostly American high school. Also I listen to some very traditional choir of hymns that are in hymnbooks. One amazing thing is, despite some of their videos only being a year or less, they have over 600,000 views in total. One thing is they sang with extreme profession, clothing, filming, and music and so on – it is not a fixed position but moving smoothly and natural are some of the reasons. It is profession in faith, and to show what true passion is like in the videos.
I believe that the amount of people that view Elder Kwon’s composed praise songs are very handful and limited. Mostly Koreans probably, and in the elderly population as most young adults tends to enjoy C.C.M. But despite that 23,000 people had come and gone to praise God in utmost high as this chance, I give thanks to God, to the staff member who had helped and deacon H for this chance.
One final strange thing was, many of the English praise songs tend to have a lot of comments below. But Elder Kwon’s videos tend to have none. Even the hymns with over 2,400 views have only had about 5 likes in total. One of the very few commented video was the very first hymn I had written, “Inspire Me” which was his first ever composed hymn with me. Many churches and soloists have sung this because of Youtube video. That video was the only one had a comment written by a pastor who had expressed their feelings on this hymn.
I do not care about comments daily. I just need to glorify by God!
I only point this out as there is a vast difference in culture. Our feelings and thoughts tend to be expressed outwardly rarely. During my daughter’s graduation, the “A Cappella” had a very impressive performance. Many had attended for their children’s graduation, but others may have come to witness the performance. I remember after the event, the students had given out copies of their C.D. to many people in gracious amounts to this day.
Many people had come to congratulate and express their gratitude towards their outstanding performance.
Next Wednesday (30th) I will be serving Deacon H lunch. I will give him my thanks for all the guidance to this point. I also give thanks to God for the 23,000 or so viewers, to commemorate the ones who had done the praise - to have a deep conversation about this channel one day and end this memoir.
Hallelujah, Praise the Lord!
(Jan. 21, 2019) |
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Youtuber Reverend? (23,000 views coming soon…)
Reverend Billy Graham’s Gospel Crusade to Korea (2)