Tony Cummings grilled Martin Wroe and Martin Evans about Europe's biggest Christian arts festival GREENBELT.

MW: OK, well, if you look at the history books, or the history papers, you'll find that there was perpetual tension between the Deo Gloria Trust and the people who actually ran Greenbelt because Kenneth Frampton - who was one of the original financial backers, you're right, his primary aim was evangelism. And the people who were organising Greenbelt at the time felt that if that aim became too paramount the whole idea of it being an arts festival would be lost. I've been to so-called arts festivals, or they often call them 'Christian music festivals' in the States and in Europe where evangelism is paramount. They don't feel like arts festivals they feel like somebody's trying to get at you all the time. And they're not very colourful; they're a bit bland.

ME: The qualifying mode of Greenbelt is that it's an arts festival, primarily done by Christians. Now that doesn't
mean that other things won't take place like evangelism, like people socialising or whatever. But the qualifying mode, its definition, is that it's an arts festival.

MW: Because that's the truth, Greenbelt acts as a bridge between Christians and the wider society. We know that large numbers of people come to Greenbelt who aren't Christians, usually with Christian friends, usually in the context of a youth group or some pals from university or whatever. And they're not threatened by what's going on.

You say 'not threatened' but someone else might say 'not challenged.

ME: They're challenged. We're all challenged, all weekend.

But are they challenged with the gospel and the need to turn in repentance from their sin and turn to Christ? A perception that is around is that Greenbelt is unhappy with clear, unequivocable proclamation of the gospel. For instance Larry Norman said on Greenbelt Radio in 1989 that speaking too much about Jesus from mainstage is frowned upon by the organising committee.

MW: We don't ban anybody. Larry said that that goes on, but in that respect he's mistaken.

ME: We don't say to anybody this is what you can and can't say while you're on mainstage. However, the purpose of a mainstage performance is to play music. It's what the mainstage is there for. So, yeah, I wouldn't want people to talk too much about Jesus, particularly if it's boring - there's different ways to talk about Jesus.

MW: I wouldn't want them to talk too much about anything. Some people criticised Bruce Cockburn last year for talking too much about acid rain!

Isn't there a danger of a pendulum-swing here? The thing that was going on in the early 70s where it was all 'Jesus died for me at Calvary' banality, you've rejected as lousy art. Fair enough. But hasn't the pendulum now swung where it's easier to get approval from the committee if you don't sing explicitly about your faith than if you do?

MW: What you're doing at the moment Tony is discussing music, which is only one facet of the festival.
ME: We have over 300 seminar sessions. These are all sessions designed to help out how to be a better Christian, how to make the world better as Christians. There's nothing hidden or covert about them. I think that Greenbelt is extremely explicit in the totality of its communication.

In the totality...but less so from mainstage because that's not the best place for it?

MW: It's really not deliberate. There will be some contributors who're quite upfront. And if they can pull it off and keep the audience that's up to them...

Tell me a little about the decision-making process before extending an invitation to an artist to come play Greenbelt. What happens to all the tapes you're sent?

MW: Each one is logged then sent to a member of the Artists Collective. They make a report back. In a sense it doesn't matter who the tape is from. If there's something in the music and the lyrics that catches us then we'll pursue it. For example this year in the heavy metal tent there's a band called Seventh Seal from Sweden that nobody's heard of. Have you heard of them?

Nope.

ME: John Pac (of Edge/Kingsway) hadn't heard of them either - a totally unknown band. We have this heavy metal sub group who take home all the tapes and come back with their recommendations. They came back and played Seventh Seal to the group, and we all said 'good stuff. We didn't know who they were and we tracked them down in Sweden, so they're coming this year.

MW: Another example, Russ Taff had been turned down on a number of occasions, even though his record company had lobbied for him quite hard over a couple of years.

It seems astonishing that you should have turned him down.

MW: Well it may have been availability, it may have been the cost, it may have been a whole range of things. It may have been his American manager saying we want twenty million pounds. Who knows, I can't remember. Sometimes managers are a bit unrealistic - we are a Christian charity. But anyway, this year we were sent a video. Everybody was knocked out and we said we'll do what we can to get him, and this time we managed to pull it off.

Another thorny topic. Why isn't contemporary Christian music, or CCM if you like, played between sets at Greenbelt. It seems to me here's a superb opportunity to expose 30,000 people to alt that is best in CCM yet you play Top 50, pop and rock oldies, that kind of stuff, effectively stuff that they know.

MW: It's really down to the disc jockeys to decide how to entertain the crowd who are getting increasingly impatient of the long gaps between the acts. It's a nice idea to think here's a chance to showcase up and coming talent among the Christian scene or whatever but the DJs have got to play a lot of popular music as well as a few CCM tracks to keep the crowd on their side. You've got to mix and match.

Isn't it true to say that though Greenbelt makes money out of CCM - you take a cut, don't you, of every album sold at the festival and you clearly rely on Word (UK) to fill large parts of your programme - you show more commitment to artists in the "real world", going for a Top 50 hit or whatever.

MW: No, we don't think like that. We support acts on the basis of whether we like them period. We're not under anybody's sway. Nobody can ring us up and say "you must book so and so'. Particularly from America, we do get agents and managers ringing us up and saying you must have our act. They seem to think that Greenbelt is some kind of trade fair for the contemporary Christian music industry here.

But if Greenbelt's not that, isn't it a platform for the things that a group of very privileged people, namely you and your committee, really like?

MW: Well, there's 25 of us ok? And we're open to letters. And most years we have a survey at the festival asking who wants what at Greenbelt and usually in the top three it's U2, Cliff, Alarm. So we try and get them. Last year we processed a few thousand answers. We're trying to find out all the time what our audience want.

To return to my original point, I've heard at least one Greenbelt committee member make disparaging remarks about the Church subculture. This seems incongruous to me as you're making money out of the subculture and couldn't survive without it.

ME: It seems to me the crucial point is whether an artist is performing or writing stuff that is good and alive and dynamic. Now there clearly is subjective judgement there. Now for instance Randy Stonehill, Randy is playing this year, late night Big Top all to himself 11 to 12.30. A serious significant time. It will be packed, 4 or 5,000 people there. Now that decision to invite Randy was based on his latest album and a feeling that Randy Stonehill is really doing good stuff now. Now maybe he had a lull for a period. We're not saying "Randy, he's an old has-been'. It's not like that. It's just that an artist goes through times when his music's hot and when his music's not so hot. And the fact is Randy's back doing some good stuff and we asked him. Now whether he's subculture, or any culture doesn't make a blind bit of difference. It's whether the record has got it or not.