Changing Union
Album Credits and Lyrics
Chris Moore / Changing Union
(Release date February 14, 2025)
Produced by Tim O’Brien
Engineered and mixed by Sean Sullivan
Recorded at The Tractor Shed, Goodlettsville, TN
Mastered by Mike Monseur at Axis Audio, Nashville, TN
Personnel:
Chris Moore: mandolin, octave mandolin, lead vocals
Tim O’Brien: guitar, harmony vocals
Brittany Haas: fiddle
Allison DeGroot: banjo
Samson Grisman: bass
Odessa Settles: harmony vocals
LISTENING TO LISTENING
Listening to listening,
The blue hum of a star
Are we what the seas have borne,
Bound for another shore?
Opening to opening
A cloud’s taste of the sky
By grace or by contingency
To die before we die
No need to follow
What’s left of the plum tree’s leaves
Whose mind abides in heartwood
Will come to bloom in ease
Notioning a notion
In the pastures of the mind
Horse and rider ‘round the sun
Momentum of the shrine
Looking in at looking out
Black midnight to white noon
Eye to eye from sky to ground
Still pond becomes the moon
No need to follow
What’s left of the plum tree’s leaves
Whose mind abides in heartwood
Will come to bloom in ease
Words by Sabine Miller and Chris Moore
Music by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
ORCHARD
Here in the orchard we’ll find a way
We will find, we will find our true reflection
Here in the orchard we’ll find a way
We will find, we will find our true reflection
On a lost ship I sailed into the bay
Pulled an oar up the tidal riverway
Heard a bell in the forest call my name
And I knew things would never be the same
Climbed a hill through a sleeping giant’s dream
Speckled peak, sugar maple, mountain stream
Spinning leaves fell in crimson and in gold
I could feel a deeper story being told
At the clearing like some paradise revealed
Brilliant apple trees adorned a sloping field
Rubies strung between the shoulders of the sky
Baldwin, Rome, Blue Pearmain, and Northern Spy
As I made my way around a twisting limb
I began to sing an ancient, wordless hymn
Every particle then joined the vocal band
And our melody could see…
Words and music by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
CHANGING UNION
See the brilliant colors shine
Taste the feast, drink the wine
All will be revealed in time
We sing hallelu
Put your thinkin’ mind to rest
As the robin builds her nest
Ride along the breaking crest
Of the changing Union
Know the engine of intent
Celebrate the ornament
Give the higher aim consent
We sing hallelu
Put your thinking mind to rest
As the robin builds her nest
Ride along the breaking crest
Of the changing Union
Words and music by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
SISTER
Situations will collide
We travel on a rocky ride
And everyone gets lost along the way
In the basement on the shelf
Just waiting for the searching self
A little book climbed out from yesterday
From the pages of her pen
A spirit spoke so clearly then
In words of sympathetic purity
A call to turn away from hate
To open up compassion’s gate
And come to live the way we ought to be
I want to feel the connection
I want to live what is true
Sister, now, as the ages are rolling
And your memory has faded from view
Know that I stood alone in a tempest
When I found a valley refuge here with you
I found a valley refuge here with you
Hands to work and heart to God
You labored hard and onward trod
You saw your gifts as gifts to give away
Suited to a compromise
Your roots were deep, your spirit wise
You’d never break but always bend and sway
Keyed into the atmosphere
A song that even rain could hear
You found the light in every living thing
An instrument of perfect love
Your melody a flying dove
Sent on so others in your voice might sing
I want to feel the connection
I want to live what is true
Sister, now, as the ages are rolling
And your memory has faded from view
Know that I stood alone in a tempest
When I found a valley refuge here with you
I found a valley refuge here with you
Words and music by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
SHAKER MARCH
Traditional Shaker tune by Alonzo Hollister 1848 (Hancock, MA)
Arrangement by Chris Moore / Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
WHERE IS THE GEM
Where is the gem that earth doth claim
Or diamond sparkling bright
That can compare in brilliancy
To those who’re in the light
Such souls will shine in higher sphere
Far brighter than the sun
They do excel in glory here
As a heavenly course they run
Traditional Shaker tune by Anna White 1860s (New York)
Arrangement by Chris Moore / Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
LIVING IN BETWEEN
We are living in between
As drops of rain before the ground
Where tones combine beyond the tongue
And thoughts are woven from the sound
O what a precious currency
Is courage of the ancient kind
Surrendering each last defense
Until the tangled heart unwinds
Until the tangled heart unwinds
We are living in between
As drops of rain before the ground
Where tones combine beyond the tongue
And thoughts are woven from the sound
’Tis in this way within a song
A door has opened through the sun
A passageway to nothing more
Than separation left undone
Than separation left undone
We are living in between
As drops of rain before the ground
Where tones combine beyond the tongue
And thoughts are woven from the sound
Words and music by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
GOLDEN THIMBLE
Golden thimble tucked away
In a box of yesterday
Would you tell me if you could
What went down in the old pine wood?
Cries of the newborn, crackling fire
Fiddles and voices and steel on the wire
Dead on the table, kiss at the door
Black iron skillet hungry for more
There, simplicity, she’s dreaming
Floating out on the lotus lake
You said that once was now the future
So tell me why can’t you let me make my own mistake?
Out in the morning with the chickens and dogs
Dad’s at the river and he’s driving the logs
The radio plays our heavenly souls
You and mama sit there sewing up holes
Words by Chris Moore
Music by Chris Moore and John McGann
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
SHAKER STEP TUNES
Thee traditional Shaker dance tunes 1840s
Arrangement by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
Bright Angels Descend
Bright angels descend
I feel their presence
I know they’re near us
They’ve come with a blessing of comfort and love
How sweet is their message
How pure is their language
Forgive one another
And dwell in pure love
Traditional Shaker tune by Mary Ann Gillespie 1880s (Maine)
Arrangement by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
Dive In The Lucky
There’s a lily pad prophet on a crystal pond
Singin’ his song of the great beyond
You can tell by the fire in his ancient tune
Everything is music underneath the moon
Whispers cracking through the rustling trees
Ears wide open in the evening breeze
I can hear you sister, can you hear me too?
Find my trail in the morning dew
Come on brother come along let go
Down to the ground lay it down so low
Lay your trouble by the riverside
Dive in the lucky, yodel-ladie-i
Drop on down from the hemlock ridge
Gathering steam at the millstone bridge
Canada Geese in a big wide V
Point the way to the briny sea
Field mouse dancing in the willow shade
Time slows down in the flowing jade
You can hear his cackle, he can hear you too
The rise and the fall the passing through
Come on brother come along let go
Down to the ground lay it down so low
Lay your trouble by the riverside
Dive in the lucky, yodel-ladie-i
Eyes dead set on a distant dream
Blind to the fortune of the current stream
Turn that tune to the one you know
And dive in the lucky of the river flow
Come on brother come along let go
Down to the ground lay it down so low
Lay your trouble by the riverside
Dive in the lucky, yodel-ladie-i
Words and music by Chris Moore and Joe K. Walsh
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP
Holding The Light
Gather up whatever is
glittering in the gutter,
whatever has tumbled
in the waves or fallen
in flames out of the sky,
for it’s not only our
hearts that are broken,
but the heart
of the world as well.
Stitch it back together.
Make a place where
the day speaks to the night
and the earth speaks to the sky.
Whether we created God
or God created us
it all comes down to this:
In our imperfect world
we are meant to repair
and stitch together
what beauty there is, stitch it
with compassion and wire.
See how everything
we have made gathers
the light inside itself
and overflows? A blessing.
Words by Stuart Kestenbaum
Music by Chris Moore
Luminous Bloom Music, ASCAP