Last night I was writing a responsive liturgy for one of our Baptist communities. It’s intended to invite all those who work and serve within the church to rededicate their gifts of time, energy and ability – and to seek the blessing and strength of God. While all this was happening I was listening to Christian Forshaw’s CD, Sanctuary. I first heard this during advent two years ago, sitting outside Parcel Force while Sheila collected our mail, with Classic FM on. The track that was played was ‘Let all mortal flesh keep silence’.
I sat transfixed. It was one of those brief interludes when something other than the music is heard, but which can only be heard through the music. It was as if the Holy Spirit pulled up the blinds, and left me with my eyes screwed up against early streaming sunlight. And that moment was recpatured last night, as again this stunning piece of music simply opened my eyes – the eyes of my mind, the eyes of my imagination, the eyes of my soul – whatever part of us it is that needs to be opened in order to see the glory and beauty of what always lies beyond our senses.
Christian Forshaw is the Professor of Saxophone at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. One of his great passions and current interests is music as an experience of purity and intensity, particularly as music within the context of worship.
‘I first began working with the church organ in 1995. I was intrigued by the way the saxophone could sit within the sound of the organ, but could also add a far more expressive dimension. The sound of the organ is static once the key is pressed, whereas the sound of the saxophone is ever changing and moving.’
On this disc the combination of human voice, church organ and saxophone make possible enormous variety and subtlety of mood, of pace, of sound. There are episodes of rumbustuous joy and passages of gentle, persuasive assurance; at times I find the invitation to worship which is inherent in this music, an irresistible grace, and at other times the longing and yearning conveyed in tones ranging from the shrill to the plaintive, is more reminsicent of the flickering sun and shadows of the Psalms at their most poetic and disturbing.
The rendering of Come Down O Love Divine, ends with a passage of saxophonic improvisation that expresses my spiritual longing more authentically than any words I could ever write. This is a track of the most sublime sacred music – by which I mean music that makes the sacred not only plausible but audible, not only imaginable but desirable with that desire that is fuelled by the eternity that God has put in our hearts.
The CD can be found on the Quartz website here. You order it from them as it isn’t easily available in High St megastores. (Which makes me feel unreasonably and sniffily superior!)
Leave a Reply to Jason Goroncy Cancel reply