All the right notes

Michele Marr

Fans of Marty Goetz say that on stage he exudes warmth, humility and

charm. Often, they describe the singer-songwriter as a modern-day

psalmist.

Goetz just hopes his music is a source of peace and an

instrument of healing.

On Sunday night he will bring his music to Christ Presbyterian

Church where he has played to sold-out audiences several times

before.

“He sings in a piano man-style with a great voice and with a great

sense of humor,” said Gary Watkins, senior pastor of the church.

“Marty and his wife grew up in the Jewish community and came to

understand that Jesus, in Hebrew, Yeshua, is the Messiah of Israel.

He is a Jewish believer and a lot of his songs are about the

fulfillment of the promises of the Hebrew Scriptures that are

realized in the Messiah, Jesus.”

At the age of 13, at Temple on the Heights in Cleveland for his

bar mitzvah, Goetz sang from the Torah with a voice that later was

described as cantor-like. At the time, he was ready to leave God

behind but he was prepared for music to always be part of his life.

Goetz studied piano from an early age and continued to play

through junior high school. But it was by playing electric organ in

rock and roll bands that he developed a knack for playing by ear.

While majoring in English at Carnegie Mellon University he began

to play in cabaret shows and to write his own songs, though he never

truly intended music to become his livelihood and career.

“I was just hacking around but it ended up that’s what God wanted

me to do,” Goetz said. “He hasn’t given me anything else.”

While in college, he and a friend put together a two-man act

called “Bert and Marty.” The two friends worked together through

college and later in New York and again in the Borscht Belt in the

Catskill Mountains where the duo won an award for the best new act.

“We thought we’d be together for a long time but Bert and Marty

split up when Bert became a born-again Christian and Marty, being

from a Jewish background, didn’t like that,” Goetz said.

He packed up and moved to Los Angeles to get away from the

influence of Bert and his friends, but Christians continued to come

into his life. And Goetz started to read the Bible.

“I had no desire to accept it,” Goetz said. “I was reading it to

have some basis to reject it, to not simply reject it on the basis of

my cultural upbringing.”

Then one night, alone the balcony of a friend’s home overlooking

Sunset Boulevard, he noticed a telephone pole illuminated by the

city’s lights. To Goetz it looked a lot like a cross.

“I felt I was being invited to faith, invited to believe,” he

said. “I felt I was being called to believe in Jesus.”

Within the year he was performing with Debby Boone and in 1991 he

was a featured performer at Billy Graham’s Rally in Central Park.

Goetz has played at the Crystal Cathedral, at Jack Hayford’s

Church On the Way and at the Harvest Crusades. He has performed on

the Trinity Broadcasting Network in Costa Mesa and the Jewish Voice

Broadcast. He was the worship leader for the Jerusalem 3000 World

Prayer Congress.

“I really care about people remembering that Jesus is Jewish and

he still is calling Jewish people to believe in him,” Goetz said.

“Through the music I play and the things I say, I’m a witness to that

fact.”

He has recorded several albums and soundtracks for a number of

videos. For his albums, Goetz plays with orchestras and other

accompaniment but on stage, he said, “It’s just I and the pie-ano.”

Cricket Robinson, a member of Christ Presbyterian Church, said

Goetz’s performances, which intertwines his Jewish heritage with his

faith in Jesus as the Messiah, always leave her feeling as though she

has spent time with a dear, close friend.

“He makes me laugh and cry and he helps me see God,” she said.

* MICHELE MARR is a freelance writer from Huntington Beach. She

can be reached at michele@soulfoodfiles.com.