3rd August, 2007

NILS VON KALM

Album:Choir of Hard Knocks
Artist: Various
Label: ABC, 2007

Enhanced: No

In a word: Real

"Let this music remind us of our brokenness and that the Lord of Glory came down to put His arms around us and embrace us in our own hurt and tell us that He loves us."

The Choir of Hard Knocks has become known through a documentary on ABC TV, and more recently a 60 Minutes story which showed the journey that this group of disadvantaged and homeless people have been on over the last year or so.

This is music of the broken, for the broken. As such, it inspires, moves and transcends the coldness of much of everyday life. The people in this choir are talented and determined, but I'm sure the last thing they would want from the rest of us is to feel sorry for them.

What makes this music so powerful is that the songs on it are sung with heart and they tell the stories of the actual people in the choir. They are real. They are positive songs, they are songs of faith, and they are songs of doubt and confusion.

A personal favourite of mine is the Leonard Cohen classic, Hallelujah, a song which states that "our love is not a victory march, it's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah". Indeed it is. These are people who have known all about coldness and brokenness. I believe this is the sort of choir that Jesus would be part of. A broken and contrite spirit He does not despise. All we have to offer Him is brokenness and strife, but He is making something beautiful of these peoples' lives.

Let this music remind us of our brokenness and that the Lord of Glory came down to put His arms around us and embrace us in our own hurt and tell us that He loves us.