"mercy me: music, art and real life" ~ jan krist

“COMMON Room” was a strange event. My friend Sandy was a little uneasy. As she found her seat she shot a dubious glance my way and asked: “Is this gonna be art? Or will this be,” here she spoke with a big voice, channeling Scarlett O'Hara, “ART!” Indeed it was going to be both. In the course of the evening we experienced sculptures carved from Spam; a sax solo by a tubby man in bathing trunks, flippers, and an inner tube; a fashion show by women dressed like the Barbies they held in their hands; and poets, musicians, dancers, and a drama troupe.

Why is it that art — accessible or not, natural and organic or contrived and deliberate — matters so much to me? It can be a mirror or a megaphone. I think I've used it as a center of gravity, along with my faith. It is an integral part of who I am and as such, it has influenced every part of my life: my marriage, motherhood, work, philosophy, faith, everything.

In my “real life” I've worked my ass off just to get by. I've wished, prayed, and begged God to help me make a living with my art, but it hasn't happened yet. So, I've glazed windows, painted apartments, taught nursery school, and served a community of senior citizens as an activity director, just to put food on the table.

Art has helped me do something more significant than make a living; it has been an essential component of my survival. It has helped me make some sense of puppy love, rejection, rebirth, death, mourning, disappointment, anger, divorce, rebuilding, love, remarriage, therapy, the arrest of my therapist for impersonating a therapist — and, if my grandmothers are any kind of a measuring stick, I've got a long way to go yet.

I got married at the age of eighteen. I had my first baby at nineteen. At twenty-three I started playing bars, coffeehouses, churches, Christian concert clubs, anywhere and everywhere. (I even played a bus to Toledo once.) I've played solo, duo, with a band, whatever the gig called for.

During those years, I was a member of a church that held a very strong belief in submission to authority. My marriage was in trouble and it was the prayerful directive of the elders that I give up music and concentrate on my relationship with my husband. Well, I wanted to please God, I wanted to be obedient, and besides, I had just been to Nashville where a Christian record company, interested enough in my music to fly me down there, decided to give me Amy Grant's first record and send me home. They said of my music, “We like it, but we don't think it's commercial enough for the masses. Go home, listen to this, and try to write more like this. Then come on back.”

I dove into the abyss of a life without the comfort of my art, striving to make my “real life” work. I surfaced about a year later — I couldn't hold my breath any longer.

During those dry days when I tried to lay down my art, I also tried to compartmentalize my life. I tried to put my religion in the center, my family to the right of that, my art somewhere off to one side (mainly because I wasn't sure if it had a place). The discovery that I eventually made, though, was that as the great philosopher Popeye was known to say, “I am what I am.” Truer words were never spoken. I am the sum total of the human and the spiritual, the genetic additions, mourned subtractions. I am human and I cannot change my DNA.

Life is not like the dairy shelf in the grocery store, with the cream over here and the skim milk over there. Life is homogenized. The cream is mixed through. When I tried to quit being an artist, I realized that even if I wasn't playing music the creative creature I am seeped out in everything I did, from the way I arranged my furniture to the way I handled my finances.

Some people try to use their art, like butter. They lubricate their faith or their political agenda with it so they can cram it down people's throats and make a Christian buck. Others I know use their art to validate or maybe even elevate themselves. I think I've been guilty of both of these behaviors at different times. At this point I think being an artist is like being a redhead, or being born with curly hair...but then I think Popeye was a sage.

When I first started playing in bars I had many Christians say things to me like: “Don't you know that the only reason they have live music in there is so that people will stay and drink more?” To which I replied, “Hey, this is the best way I know to make a living.” I wanted to make the maximum amount of money for the minimum amount of time away from home. I could be home with my children all day, put my kids to bed and be back in the saddle the next morning, tired but $100 richer. No sitters, no “Please Mommy, don't go,” and no expensive degree.

I did that soul searching thing: “I don't know what God wants me to do with this, maybe I shouldn't do anything until I hear from God.” Then I heard from him and he said, “You wicked servant, you couldn't even put that talent where it would get a little return?” And I decided to just get real, work on my art, do my best, and stop being so neurotic! If you have a gift, it's counterfeit humility to whine and moan over where and how to express it. Let it go where it will and follow along.

My marriage did fail, after twenty years. Artistic differences were not among the reasons sighted for its demise. I wasn't sure Christians could get divorced, but I discovered that Christians are allowed to fail; hell, they can't help it. They can even remain valuable to the true work of God's kingdom. Sometimes it seems that there are two kingdoms of God here on earth. There's the one we are actually part of and the one we try to project for the benefit of other people. Because of some of the teachings I had listened to, I thought the world around us needed to think that we, “the kingdom,” had lives that were clean and full and happy, and if they, the heathen, saw the difference between their lives and ours they would follow God as we followed God. Life would then be swell for them too. But when the name-it-and-claim-it doesn't pay off the bill collectors or the victim's role loses its noble disguise...or your marriage fails, you find yourself dancing cheek to cheek with the cold cement. As trite as it may sound, I think it is easier to look up when you are lying on the ground. God showed me in that place that failure is human and human is what I am. Whether our lives look “sinned in” or not, they are and that is why we need a savior. The redemptive work of God isn't always a miracle of preservation, sometimes it's the miracle of our survival or that of our faith, or the trust and gratitude that rises in our spirit even though the worst thing has happened though we prayed we would be spared. I personally find it a lot easier to live in a “Velveteen” kingdom where people are real.

I wear a truckload of hats. Not only am I an artist, I am a mother and a cog in the music industry machine. All of these roles have an impact on my children.

As an artist, I have nurtured creativity and imagination in my children. I've tried to encourage each of them as they “let 'er rip.” When my daughter Amon was two she was pretending that my bed was a boat and my blue carpet, the ocean. She dove in, or should I say “onto,” the “water” and knocked herself silly. She completely expected a soft splash. I guess I may have encouraged her use of imagination and creativity a little too much. My son Ian is highly creative in finding ways out of sticky situations. When he was twelve he was picking on his brother Michael so much that I threatened to get Michael some judo lessons. Ian said, “Ha, it would do you no good. I already know judo, tae kwon do, jujitsu, karate, and five other Japanese words!” Michael is a wonderful visual artist. At four years of age he was worried that we would not have a Christmas tree. It was only one week before Christmas and we still had no tree. He talked about it all morning and then after an hour in his room, he came into the living room and announced: “Mom, we don't have to worry about the tree any more.” He then took me into the dining room where he had taped a large piece of paper to a chair and stood the chair in the window where the tree would eventually stand. On that paper he had drawn a tall thin evergreen and on its sparse branches were stickers. I loved that little tree. I still have it. He got his real tree the next day.

It was interesting to see my kids each go through the same process of revelation. Each, until about the age of nine, thought that there was nothing unusual about what their mother did for part of a living. Then in visiting other homes and meeting other moms they found that there were some peculiar markings on their lives, and I don't mean these freckles we're all “blessed” with. They came to the realization that not all moms write music and make records. Enter the late teen years when my daughter began introducing me by saying, “This is my mom. You know...Jan Krist?”

As an industrial cog, I divvy up my time and devote it to different aspects of my life. I spend time on recordings, industry conventions, time on the phone, making bookings, and playing music at home or away. My kids have traveled with me or stayed with their dad. They have waited and waited for me to finish talking to people after a concert. When Michael was five or six years old he started to practice setting up displays of CDs and cassettes. He would come to a concert and he and Ian, my older son, would set up displays and run the sales table. Having a mom who is a musician is a bit like owning a family business. They have no choice, they get dragged into it to one degree or another.

I often wish things could slow down enough so I could be more on top of the details of our lives. Somehow those details just have to fit into the cracks between the facets of who I am. On the other hand, my children have benefited from these facets of my life in unique ways. They all learned to use a microphone early in life and all three play an instrument. Amon's first CD is due out in the spring on “Tooth and Nail” records. (Her band's name is VELOUR 100).

Art and Motherhood go well together. Industry and Motherhood are a difficult combo.

If a tree falls in the forest....Would a work of art still be a work of art whether or not any one saw it? Is a piece of music a thing of beauty even if no one hears it but the composer?

Art seems to need interaction with an audience. I think it is just as valid if no one hears it or sees it, but if it has no exchange with an audience we miss out on the metaphysical experience of art. Also when it is a thing of beauty or a thought-provoking piece of work, it deserves an audience, and the greater the work, the larger the audience it deserves. (Unfortunately what a work deserves and what it gets don't always correspond.)

I love playing to a concert audience — an audience that has laid out their hard-earned cash specifically to hear me play as opposed to an audience that has come to lay out hard-earned cash on beer and coincidentally hears me play. Concerts seem to unfold in a mystical way and, on a good night, when I'm giving to the audience and they give back to me, it seems as if they are listening so intensely that their souls lean outside their bodies and my soul is aloft in the music, and God's Spirit mingles with ours. There in the thick darkness and half light, we all touch.

I don't just want to be an artist, I want to share my art with other people. I want to communicate. So if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears, it still falls. It just didn't have a cosmic moment of alchemy. And if I only sang to the cat, I don't know if I would work this hard to refine my skills. A great painting in the basement is still a great painting, but it should be seen. It's as if artists, poets and the rest have a responsibility to disclose their work to the critical community around them. It can help give them direction or have a sharpening effect on their work. It can, of course, have a devastating effect when that community rejects the art. I've been through that and have learned that you can't let the yahoos get you down. Once, after I had played to an audience of 3,000 that rose to its feet and called for an encore, a critic from the daily paper panned me the next morning. He called my music the F-word: folk. You tell me. The critics I play for now are the ones that buy my records and come to my concerts. I have to say, though, that when my work has gotten favorable reviews in print it has meant a lot to me. No one likes to be trashed.

I feel detached from my art when I am not currently involved in the creative process. I know I'm still a creative person, that I use those skills all the time in everyday life. Still, I feel a little lost when I'm not involved in writing or performing. Tonight my husband, Alan Finkbeiner, is out in our studio working with a young band. They are putting bass on a demo. Alan played drums for the session and they've been trying to get to the tracking for the last month. I went out there for a moment to listen for tones. Alan has great ears (cute ones, too). He knows how to get the tones round and warm, edgy and thick, whatever it takes. I feel a little lost when he's working with his music. He gets a little lost when I'm working on my music if he is not involved. He loses his identity if he's not making music and I struggle with that too.

I do the shopping, the cleaning, the Mommy stuff, the forty-hours-a-week-so-we-can-know-we're-going-to-have-X-amount-of-dollars-to-pay-the-bills thing. Alan works fifty hours a week selling sound systems, keyboards, and guitars. We crave time to work on our music. I read an interview with a local musician in the paper. She said in the interview that real musicians are out there gigging. “They don't get day jobs, they pursue their passion.” Spare me. I know that she doesn't have children to support. She is naive about the inner workings of the lives around her. Most real musicians I know are plumbers, hairdressers, house painters, art packers, even psychologists. You do what ever you have to keep your family clothed, warm, and healthy. What you do nine to five is not what you are. It's never that simple. People are a tornado of interests, traits, responsibilities, disabilities, and abilities.

I play a lot of gigs, but not as many as I used to because now the financial reward has to pay not only me, but my manager and my agent as well (though my long-suffering manager has deferred his percentage of the pie until I am actually living above the poverty line). At times I feel absolutely glazed over by how much is riding on me. I have a new CD coming out this spring, I need to be writing for the next one, and then there's all the responsibilities of the home and family. Still, when I'm not playing for or with other people, a huge piece of the landscape is missing. It's as if the interaction I have with the audience is the end goal of my art. (This is why playing bars can be so hard. You have to work pretty hard to win the audience over. They may be unfamiliar with you as an artist and the focus of their evening is cutting loose with a friend or a group of friends. They may see you as a facilitator and ask you to sing “Margaritaville” or “American Pie.” Lately I have reveled in the fact that even when I play a bar, many in the audience are familiar with my music and they listen.)

In working with other musicians, things often “fall together” in a serendipitous fashion. It's deceiving though, because if you added up the hours spent on dry scales and exercises, and stacked them next to those miracle moments, you would wonder if it were worth it. Why do people do this? We are a driven lot. Some of us have genius. Some of us are mediocre students with incredible tenacity. When you have a genius with tenacity, you end up with a monster talent, but you may not become a star. You might, but being a star has little to do with being an artist. I heard someone say that we should all work hard and do our best to develop as artists. Some of us will enrich our families. Some of us will enrich our communities and some the nation and the world. We have no way of knowing just whose lives we will have the opportunity to affect with our art; that is not the point. The point is doing your art, doing the best art you can, and not letting age or time or money be the voice that steers you. Just do the best you can today.

Sometimes our lives take on such velocity that we can't take time to even consider doing our art. Sometimes it takes on the velocity and singular drive of a freight train, hurling us in a direction we'd rather not go.

Last month I spent nearly all my time trying to meet the needs of my family. My husband's body betrayed him and he lost thirty pounds in about two weeks. He didn't want to admit he was sick, but he shut down one compartment of his life after another until, finally, he couldn't even go to work. After being home for a week he had to admit he was sick. He still didn't want to see a doctor. “It's not that serious,” he said. “Not a bad inscription for your grave stone,” I shot back. I took him in to my doctor, then his, then the hospital. He was finally resting, and I went into full tilt. From my side of the hospital bed, the world took on a frantic pace. Hospital, work, hospital, home, work, home, hospital. Each day a new combination of the same things, with a little trip to the grocery or the bank or the school thrown in to relieve the monotony. (It reminded me of a menu at a fast food restaurant: burger fry coke, big burger, big fry, big coke, burger with cheese, etc.)

A close friend of mine has spent much of the past eight months in the hospital-home-work loop. Her father has cancer and they are still in the heat of the fight. She is a writer, an editor by trade. She hasn't had time to work on anything fun for months. I know that when life cuts her some slack she will do some art therapy. She'll work on a poem, or a book. She'll tap away at the inequity of life; the depth of her own pain will come to the surface. Maybe then she can touch the face of grief.

Runaway train. Hopefully it won't become a train wreck. I hate the lack of control we have over our lives in times like these. When I can give my self the gift of time, I paint in big strokes, bold colors, write free verse around the edges, or I scribble on the backs of envelopes, or bank slips, and agonize over progressions and imagery in the middle of the night. I lose a little sleep, but it gives me an illusion of having some control for a few minutes. It's a wall to bounce off of. Life can be crazy. Art helps keep me sane, sort of.

I played a concert at a local bookstore (the national chain variety). I worked at my day job until 4 p.m. and then came home and lay on the bed for a few minutes. I had a pinched nerve in my neck that was killing me. I had skipped lunch and by the time I got going and took my son Michael to his dad's for the weekend, I was running a half hour behind. We skipped dinner trying to hurry up and get there. Terry, my guitarist, had the sound system and we didn't want him to have to set up alone again. He has taken on the responsibility of hauling the system since Alan got sick. (Alan's road to recovery is turning into a longer, more winding one than we were ready to resign ourselves to.) When we arrived at the gig we found that the booking agent had not arranged for a break, so I did a two-hour concert. The store wanted me to give them forty percent of the money collected from CD sales, so I decided not to sell anything. I pay the record company about one-third of the cost of a CD, my manager gets a percentage, and by the time I would have paid the bookstore, I would have made only a buck or two on the sale. Once you get to a place where you are on a little label and you've had a little success, people think there's money to be made here. Hey! There are a lot of mouths to feed from the hide of that sacred little cash cow (that would be the art, not the artist).

When I was manufacturing and selling my own tapes and CDs, I probably made more money. My music is in the hands of more people now. It's gone further geographically than it would have under my own efforts, but when I was with my last record company, the only money I ever made was what I got from the initial lease agreement.

After a series of conflicts and misunderstandings, the record company accused me of demonizing them. At the risk of perpetuating that myth here I would like to offer a little advice. Every artist needs a good manager and a great entertainment lawyer to look at anything they are considering signing. Little clauses have big ramifications: you could be giving up your publishing, you could be signing an agreement with a company that leaves you with all the obligations and them with all the money. Christian or not, the industry is set up to make money off your art. The industry is a machine. You might feel grateful just to be on a label, but don't think you can let your guard down. Remember, language can be twisted. Never, never sign anything with a morals clause. Trust me.

There were some good things about my last record company. They put my music into the hands of a lot of people and my A&R representative believed in the music I made. He pressed the company to let me do my music my way. I will always be grateful to him for that.

Last summer I did some touring. The places I played were great. The people treated me wonderfully. I spent a week with my manager in there somewhere and we did some recording. The care he extended to the details surrounding our recording time was exhaustive. He spoiled me with kindness and took care of every need. When I got back home though, I found I was so grateful for the normal things about life. I was feeling more normal with every towel I folded. I love being home. I love it when I have time to work at making my house a home. I love opening the curtains in the morning when the house is gray and quiet, seeing the color of the room warm to the light of the day.

When I've been gone I come home to the aftermath of male bonding. You know the routine. The elder male feeds the young males simple foods, so as not to waste time cooking, which might be better spent elsewhere. Dishes are not scraped but they are removed from tables and stacked in the kitchen in the sink or on a counter. After a meal, various body function noises are exchanged as the males, young and old, retire to the living room to watch television. Their used clothing is left in scented piles throughout the habitat in order to “mark” the familial territory, thereby establishing boundaries for other packs of males who may stop by to share in the bonding frenzy. I think if I were gone too long I would have to hire someone to clean before I came back home.

The typical road stint for me right now is a three-to-four-day weekend. I'm usually working my day job and getting my child care in order up to the last possible moment. I drive to the airport and usually get there about twenty-five to thirty minutes before the plane is scheduled for takeoff. I park, take a shuttle, go directly to the gate. I have a guitar and a very hefty little suitcase loaded with product and clothing. The zippered compartment on my gig bag is loaded with magazines, a curling iron, makeup, and a nightgown. I hate waiting for the airlines to unload the luggage and I dread what I might find out on that conveyor belt, so I try to pack small, fitting everything into my two allotted carry-on bags. Also, because so many airlines take little care with instruments, I fight like a mama lion to keep my guitars with me. At Detroit's Metropolitan Airport anyone could walk away with your guitar and no one would know the difference.

Anyway, someone usually picks me up at the arrival gate and often, there is a drive to the city where I'll be playing. Sometimes I get to relax a little, but usually I end up changing clothes in the dressing room or bathroom and saying a quick prayer. Then I sing, sleep, travel, and do it again. The care and kindness of the people that host me as I travel is amazing. They take me to dinner, to the hotel, carry my stuff. They are almost always intensely gracious. They spoil me with attention. When I come home I am smacked in the face by the “oh yeah, you,” of my children and friends. (My husband has been a little more passionate about my return.) It's a weird sway to balance and I wonder about the people out there who never really have to come home and do the dishes. The ones who get taken home in a limo and never have to land because their publicist has convinced even them that they are ethereal beings. On the other hand, if I had to go on the road without the kindness people have heaped on me, I might not be capable of handling the stress that comes with the paths that I've been down.

As I said at the beginning, I see life as being homogenized. I don't do Christian music. I am a Christian. I think that my faith is an integral part of how I see the world around me, just as being a mom factors into the creative equation. So I write from that perspective.

I know there are Christians out there who sincerely believe the only thing Christians should sing about is Jesus and there are plenty of “Christian record companies” ready to make a buck off of this attitude. Once someone said to me: “Jan, if you would only mention the name of Jesus a little in your songs, we could all make some money.” True, but I'd rather keep my art the way I believe God meant it to be and maintain some personal integrity. We are all a bunch of mess-ups, but God doesn't let us stay there. He wants the soul of our life, the soul of our love. He wants the soul of our art, he wants our souls. Once we've given him our souls, he doesn't need to write his name across the face of everything we do. He's written his name across our hearts — that's deep enough for me.

Faith is the anchor of our souls. It's not easy to live in this world. If it were, we wouldn't need hope. Life has not been effortless. Through my twenty-year marriage, a divorce and a subsequent remarriage, God has proven himself to be the most reliable friend.

Creativity is a gift, one that wound it's way through my DNA into my chemical makeup. I have red hair, brown eyes, freckles, a knack for music, creativity, straight teeth, and big feet. I lucked out in the genetic lotto. I got a gift, yes, that came from God, through family lines. I have been tenacious in the development of that gift. Tenacity is another gift, but I don't think God gives us songs. I believe he gives us insight. You can do whatever you want with that. Paint it out, sing it out, dance it out. This whole area of art and faith, it can be so divisive. You'd think we could all just get off each other's collective case.

I went to play at a coffeehouse owned by a friend of mine who is a Christian. A week or so after the gig he called to talk. “I get your music Jan. I sense God in it. Do you think, though, that you could explain it a little to the audience? When you left some people said they thought this was a Christian coffeehouse, and they wanted to know why I had ‘secular music' being played.” He is an old friend who has supported my music for years. I told him that if I came again I wouldn't do a thing different. I love to worship in church or with other believers, but I don't write worship music. I have been touched by songs of faith which impacted my life, by hymns, but I don't write hymns. It would be disingenuous for me to frost my art with “Christianese” simply because that's what someone else wants to hear. Who knows, I might be inspired at some point to write a hymn, but if it's not something that I honestly feel driven to do, it's not real. Honesty is a basic. Art should be free from the 'made to order' commercialism that commands the McAir waves that surround us.

I guess you have to temper art with a little McCommercialism if you're gonna make a McBuck, and with a little McGod-talk if you want to make a Christian buck, or maybe you can do what is honest for you and somehow there will be a place for it. You might even make some dough.

That is what I'm betting the farm on. And my new record company is betting on that too.

I've had to separate myself from the business of music and just concentrate on the art. If I get immersed in the business it can be counterproductive. I can't afford to be naive though. Finding a balance is tricky.

I believe I'm here because God has put me here. I believe I've made a lot of mistakes getting here.

The word I love most in the English language is mercy. We need it. We need to give it. Mercy is a major theme in my music, along with hope.

I am a human; I guess we all are.