“Changing our Stories: emergent praise and worship”

Nic Paton's collection “Stories” will refresh the listener and inspire congregations seeking to express the good news in a multicultural and post-Christian society. The collection offers the listener a generous helping of devotional salt with which to season private and public worship. Even the untrained and uninformed listener will note the extensive range of Christian musical traditions, from the middle ages to contemporary Christian popular music. Far from being an attempt at a politically correct and contrived musical syncretism, the finished product successfully weaves the various forms and elements into new forms that are intelligible, aesthetically pleasing and practicable (in worship). Paton's music is sincere and credible because there is a spontaneous quality to the singing that makes these songs “real” expressions of worship and not the products of gratuitous innovation.

In seeking to praise and worship, Paton has not broken with tradition so much as he has created an interface between old and new, western and non-western. Hopefully Paton will make arrangements of these songs available to congregations. His selection of praise and worship songs includes: “Be Still”, “Aumen” and “Circle”. “Be Still” and “Aumen” (“Amen” and “Aum”) combine meditation and praise and worship in a way that would appeal to a post-modern congregation. The repetitive nature of the songs, far from being irritating, allows them to simultaneously function as mantras and songs of praise. “Circle” employs its own interpretation of the metaphysical poetic “conceit”, a tradition also explored in “Held”, by using mathematical observations as metaphors for the nature of God.

The meditation songs “Held” and “Vine” push the boundaries of the meditation genre. The austere and somewhat haunting mood in “Held” is carried by the minor key in which it is written. It recalls the “memento mori” (“remember death”) poetic tradition. As a meditation on the finite nature of all created things, however, it offers a more optimistic perspective on the meaning of life in the face of inevitable death. All things return to God and so the end is actually the (source) of the beginning. “Vine” opens to music that recalls “Deep Forest”, a sound that could be both Asian and South American. It is precisely this global sound, one that eludes absolute classification, that gives Paton's music both its “otherness” and familiarity. “Vine” transforms the vine metaphor introduced at the Last Supper so that it becomes a “web” spun by the Holy Spirit that encompasses not only the body of Christ but all of humanity and creation. This shift is captured in the repetition of the ubuntu mantra: “A person is a person because of other people”.

The collection offers the listener an aesthetic and devotional experience that is enhanced by its missional aspect. The word “missional” is a favourite of the emergent church movement. “Story” and “Instrument” represent the emergent mission to reach out to a culturally complex world in a meaningful way. The former encourages the listener to believe that God can change the destructive way in which we frame our existence in relation to our fellows and our world. “Instrument”, the song based on the well-known prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi, gets a much needed overhaul that brings out the contrasting states of mind such as hope/despair. The recurring theme in this “Stories” is not only that God is in all but for all. It is a generous spirit that informs this collection, one that seeks to embrace all of humanity and creation and bring it into God's grand narrative of love and redemption. - C.O. Nel

In the musical world, as in the world of faith, there are many concepts and themes that are universal and speak to the common human experience. Whether the meditative incantations of Sufi acolytes, Hindu devotees, Christian believers or indeed ancestor-worshipping Africans: the intention and effect are in essence the same.

With this common foundation, ‘Story’ by The Sout Project is an inclusive musical creation which harnesses the talents of musicians whose faith is as diverse as their genres and traditions. This combination of musical forms, instruments and cultures on ‘Story’ in pursuit of a fresh take on sacred composition is perfectly illustrated by the juxtaposition of the berimbau of revered Pondo musician Madosini Manqini with electronic rhythms, with the overall effect being one which speaks to the listener regardless of their denominational leanings.

Overall the impression of this album, were the listener not informed of its background, would be of compositions that could be easily listed under ‘ambient’ or ‘meditative’ – production levels are slick, and the general feeling is one of reflection, upliftment and tranquillity; reflective and inspirational, even. At a time when faith is co-opted as the source of so much friction in our world, an opportunity to reflect on the positive parallels through this collaboration is a welcome and refreshing change.

- DJ Hedmekanik