Christian rock pioneer recalls early days

By Barb Arland-Fye

QUAD CITY TIMES

When Dave Meumann performed Christian rock music as a teen-ager in the late 1970’s with the band, Alpha, some Quad-City congregations wanted nothing to do with it.

“We were controversial because Christian rock was at that time a controversial art for and method of relating gospel ideas,” the 38-year-old Meumann said. He is still deeply committed to music ministry.

Today the music is hip and accepted, he said, mainly because of the diversity of people who call themselves Christians and who are comfortable expressing their faith in the secular world.

It was never his intention to blaze trails, he said.

Dave Meumann

He was just a teen-ager who believed God blessed him with musical talent and led him to friends with similar talents and a shard Christian faith.

One of those friends, Dan McCollam, now a youth pastor in California, “was very influential as far as drawing us to church activities. We really started to see there are cool things to do in church besides sitting in a pew,” said Meumann, the music director at Christ United Methodist Church in East Moline.

“I truly began to see that music is a gift from God. There are things that can be conveyed and told through music that the spoken word can’t come close to,” he added.

Meumann recorded his first Christian music album, featuring light rock and ballads, in 1993. He began performing the music in churches, festivals, coffeehouses and for benefit concerts with his wife, Carrie. They have released a second album, “Bridges.”

Q: In the last ‘70s, some congregations thought the music Alpha performed was too worldly, you said. But you believe it also brought young people to God who had never before taken an interest in church. How did you work at gaining broader acceptance of your music?

A: We focused on the churches that would accept us out of respect for the churches that weren’t ready. I think it actually became bigger than the church. It became a community awareness. We started to do events outside of the church, like in the LeClaire Park band shell. We focused on reaching that community of the unchurched. That really was the focus of the ministry, bringing young people and adults to Christ.

Q: Why did you leave the group after a few years?

A: I think that what happened is that boys turned into men and had other interests. After that point, I started getting mainly into the secular (music) world after high school. It put food on the table more than Christian music did.

Q: But you weren’t satisfied. Why?

A: I truly felt that God had given me this musical talent to use for his purpose. So, I would say, probably around 1986, I really decided to recommit my faith to God and start striving to work toward Christian music being a vocation. It’s been a long road.

Q: What was so special about the year 1986?

A: I guess one of the things that head put me on sabbatical (from Christian music) was the death of my mother in 1982. I took that really hard. I really pulled away from the church at the time. I was pretty young, and it took me a good three or four years of being away from God to come back to my senses.

Q: At what point did Carrie join you in music ministry?

A: I had her sing background on a couple of songs in the first album. Then she started going to concerts with me, sitting in the audience, and then it just kind of happened. We started working together… I started feeling her talent and her heart were so much enhancing our ministry performances that we both totally agreed that we had to do this together as a joint effort. I don’t know what I’d do without her with me…. It’s kind of a love story made even more beautiful.

Q: How does your music ministry influence your children, who are 17, 15 and 7?

A: I think our children, and just our family n general, have been brought closer to God.

Q: How does music influence your faith?

A: It’s a wonderful think to put what’s in your heart into a song, and you’ll find that all of the songs on our latest CD, especially, somewhat relate to the experiences we’ve had in life.

Q: For example?

A: I was stranded in a snow-bank in northern Iowa all by myself. I had this totally helpless situation, and I had no help around me. I just started to pray. It hit me like a ton of bricks that God is always present. There is no time in the 24 hours of the day that he’s not present with us. I didn’t have any pencil or paper, but when I got out of the drift, I started singing this song over and over again all the way back to the Quad-Cities. I raced into the house, grabbed my keyboard and recorded it. Now, no matter how many times Carrie sings that song, it draws me closer to my Lord.

Q: You said a song that Carrie composed, “Lonely Man,” challenges your faith. How?

A: It really gives you a picture of someone who’s really at the end of his rope. He goes to work, he keeps to himself, nobody talks to him, nobody knows who he is…. (The song) challenges us to take a look at our witness, at our willingness with people who perhaps aren’t very desirable to share it with.

Q: How do you respond to the challenge?

A: Sometimes, we need to be God’s hands, and we also need to be the arms that embrace people in times of need.

Q: You said you don’t always respond to challenges the way you think you should. You see yourself more like Peter, Jesus’ disciple who had plenty of flaws. Why?

A: The Bible shows so many times the non-spiritual, human side of people. Yet Peter was such an influential person in the Bible that, even with his faults, God used him to be a wonderful asset to his kingdom. Looking at that, (I know there’s) hope for me.

Editor’s note: Dave Meumann and his wife, Carrie, will perform in concert at 7 pm March 24 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Davenport.

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