Ancient and Modern : When is church music 'Good'?
"Is that something by 'Snow Patrol'?" asked my partner Jeremy. It was a reasonable enough question. He knows that I like 'Snow Patrol' and the song to which I was listening on 'You Tube' did indeed sound as if it could be one of their songs. It was in fact something by 'Hillsong Worship'! It wasn't the first time Jeremy had been caught out like this. Months earlier he'd walked into the room when I was playing Matt Redman's '10,000 Reasons' and he'd said how much he liked it and asked what band it was. "Gosh, you mean it's religious music?" was the response when I enlightened him. My taste in music nowadays is quite catholic, but Jeremy's knowledge and love of contemporary music is far more exhaustive than mine. Like most people, he knows what he likes, and whilst he doesn't have the benefit of my musical training, he can quickly distinguish a good song from 'pop trash' and we can usually...