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Gospel with a touch of Glastonbury

12:27pm Thursday 17th July 2008

While big name acts Jay-Z and Groove Armada wowed audiences at Glastonbury last month, the London Community Gospel Choir were quietly drawing a little crowd of their own to the acoustic stage.

The group have strung together an ever-increasing fan base over the years having performed at the last eight festivals and Rev Bazil Meade, one of the choir's founding members, admitted he cannot get enough of it.

"I love going to Glastonbury," he said.

"It's the other end of the acceptance region for gospel choir. People wonder what a gospel choir is doing at a festival but that's the sort of challenges we enjoy.

"We are changing the thinking of traditions and the way we can perform as gospel musicians.

"It's a good place to be as it has a spiritual element in what many would consider a world of ungodliness. But we don't go there to preach, we are just there to present music. People loved it though and were saying it was the best performance of the weekend."

Rev Meade, with the help of Lawrence Johnson, Delroy Powell and John Francis made history in 1982 when they pioneered the first concert gospel choir in Britain, and it has kept growing ever since.

"After the first concert there was such an amazing response that people just wanted to join from many different churches," he said.

"We performed on TV even before we had a name and people had not seen a British gospel choir like that before.

"It was at the time the riots were taking place so what we were doing with the gospel music was the other side of the coin."

The group have just released their tenth album, recorded live in the Jazz Cafe.

"We are putting that out on our own record label," said Rev Meade.

"It's called Keep Moving and it's a concept. It's edgier music and quite rocky in places but has the other extreme of beautiful ballads and live orchestra too."

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