Sunday, July 02, 2006

Songs of Praise

We had a Songs of Praise evening at church today - 10 of us each chose their favourite hymn or worship song, and introduced it, explaining why they had chosen that particular piece. We then sang them, with organ or electronic keyboard accompaniment.

Really a strangely moving night - very personal, intimate accounts came out, of people's interior - and exterior come to that - journeys with the Lord, and how these songs had illustrated, ornamented and fed their own pilgrimages.

If anyone feels like doing something different one evening, I can highly recommend the exercise. The BBC Songs of Praise website illustrates the programme that gave rise to the idea, in case anyone's unfamiliar with it, but it's basically very simple and straightforward. You need to announce it, of course, a few weeks in advance, so people have time to think, and musicians have time to practice!

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