Thomas & Fish
01. Sing!
02. The Greatest Gift
03. Whom Are You Seeking?
04. In That Day
05. Sinner's Prayer
06. To Worship You
07. One Little Child
08. Joseph's Dream
09. One Starry Night (The Manger Scene)
10. Behold The Lamb Of God (version 2)
11. Be Still
12. Open My Eyes, Lord
13. Living The Christian Life
14. Prodigal Song
15. Where Else Shall We Go?
16. May God Bless And Keep You
Instruments, Recording, and Words & Music by james madison thomas
Vocals by joe fish
Back in the 80's, I worked at Lefter's Music Shop on Central Avenue
in St. Pete. Joseph F. Fish was the owner / manager. He became probably
one of the best friends I've ever had. Joe was a mentor to me and provided
a lot of encouragement and help as I came to my identity in Christ.
Joe would come over weekly. I would play and record the songs
I was working on, and he would interpret and vocalize them. What a
treasure Guiseppe Piscatore turned out to be.
My only regret is that I didn't have the equipment then that I have now.
I still marvel at the technology that evolved, where a studio–quality recording can be done at home. I had a Yamaha MT–44 4-track Cassette Recorder that I used
for years. So our efforts are decidely Low–Fi, but there is something about Joe's singing and the simplicity of the arrangements that makes me think the Holy Spirit was involved.
I picked these songs in 2017 and "remastered" them.They might be a little bit better than the originals,
with some of the tape hiss removed, but they're still rough.
It's okay, they take me back to a very good place.
This group of songs spans 1984 through the 1990's sometime, with the exceptions of tracks 10 and 15, which were recorded when the Thomases were still at the mobile home. That would be before 2018. Many years earlier, Joe had some health problems that affected his voice, and he didn't sing for a time, so he doesn't like these later renderings very much. But the original cassette master of
"Behold The Lamb Of God" from all those years ago is just too noisy for me to live with. I didn't want to leave the song out, so we attempted re-rercording it. Joe and I hadn't even seen each other in years.
I don't want to use the word "magic" about a moment, but whatever that is, is often lost when trying to duplicate it.
Tracks 8, 9, and 10
are a triptych,
written years
apart, entitled
"Christmas Card".
I may well have sent it
to you one of these
Christmases past.