Reviewed by Jennifer Brooker

If you really can't teach your band how to play standards from the Songs of Fellowship hymnbook just from looking at the score - or remembering them from the countless times you have sung them at big worship events - this is an invaluable church resource. Twenty classics from the back catalogue; among them some sizzling performances (uncredited), notably by Noel Richards and friends ("Behold The Lord" and "Jubilee Song", listed here by its opening line "We Have Called On You, Lord") and what I think must be The Cutting Edge Band (Delirious? in a previous incarnation: "(Oh) I Could Sing Unending Songs"). If you try using it as a worship album in its own right you are liable to find stylistic lurches - like Dave Bilbrough one moment, traditional Welsh hymnody the next - as unpleasant as missing gear when changing down from fifth to fourth on the motorway: send it straight into second gear and the engine of your liberated worship practically leaps out of the bonnet.

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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