Behind The Song: Salt Water

Watch Part Two here

Salt Water was my first attempt at a pro-life song written in the summer of 2009. I had seen a video on Youtube of prolife activist Gianna Jessen who is remarkable not only for her courage and outspokeness but also for the fact that she herself survived a Saline abortion at 7 1/2 months that left her with Cerebral Palsy. Her story stuck in my mind and galvanised the desire to speak in defence of those had not lived to tell the tale as Gianna had done.

'Instillation abortion' is one of the less common methods used to abort babies often late term. Saline solution is injected in to the amniotic fluid turning it poisonous, burning the baby inside out.

I tried to imagine what a baby would feel in the womb, both during an unhappy pregnancy and then during abortion. I’m very aware that this makes the song difficult to listen to but I tried hard to write as sensitively as possible about what is, after all, a horrific subject.

The final verse is paraphrase of And Can It Be by Charles Wesley

Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
fast bound in sin and nature's night;
thine eye diffused a quickening ray;
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;

To echo his language was a spur of the minute decision that felt right at the time.

The song moves through five different keys, starting in the Lydian modes of E, A & G in the verse. Then E minor and E major in the chorus, returning to E minor for the coda.

The chorus chords are ones I had for a long time using them first in a song called Mark 4:14 and later an instrumental called Funeral Dirge For A Dead Ex-Girlfriend. Hopefully they’ve found a permanent home here.

Download the free mp3
Free chord sheet

Related Posts: other pro-life songs

Your Difficult Decision
First Black President



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