Christmas ladies' meetings (part 1)

On Monday, Helen and Annie left the CMM office to the madness of moving, and travelled the short distance to Grenfell Baptist Church for their ladies' fellowship Christmas carol service.  Helen and Annie are regular speakers at the fellowship, and have also become a regular feature at the carol service - Annie with the key task of accompanying the carols, and also providing a couple of Christmas songs to fit into the service.  The ladies are wonderful - mostly of West Indian origin, but now of course fully Brummie.  They have a great heart for worship and praise, and support each other through this fellowship.

Barrow (not quite again)

On Sunday we visited Barrow - not Barrow-in-Furness this time, but Barrow-upon-Soar in north Leicestershire.  The Baptist church there has been a long-term supporter of CMM's work, most notably providing Simon Gudger.  Helen used to live very close to the village, and it is also Amy's home town, so it was great to visit the area.

We had originally been invited to lead a musical in a day, but a change of plan meant that we were leading the morning service.  It is always wonderful to lead worship in a church where people are keen to focus on God, and open to the Spirit.  Roger preached, Helen led worship, and Martin and Amy completed the music group.  Mark Turner, the minister there, also joined in with his guitar.

We again used the song 'Within a crib', and it went down really well.  Roger spoke about the God who comes, and God came!  A number of people were really touched, and the ministry team was busy at the end.

After the service we had an amazing lunch with Mark Turner and his family.  Thanks so much to all at Barrow for your hospitality and support over the years.

An evening with the sisters

On Saturday night we travelled to St. John's House in Alum Rock in Birmingham.  This is the community of the sisters of St. John the Divine, who have long supported CMM, hosting Miriam Dix for her gap year, and Helen for her first 3 years at CMM before getting married.  As a result, CMM has linked up with the sisters for a yearly advent evening, and this year Roger led the evening focusing on the advent theme of 'The God who comes'. 

It was a lovely evening - the CMM team was all 'In house' - Roger, Mary, Annie and Helen, and we led carols, songs, and the sisters joined in with the readings.  The chapel is a wonderful prayerful place to be, and there were a number of other guests alongside the sisters who all seemed to enjoy the atmosphere.

One of the songs included was 'Within a crib', which had its premiere at the evening.  Roger is beginning a collaboration with hymn lyric writer Timothy Dudley-Smith, and this was one of Roger's first tunes to his words.  Watch this space for more information on that project!

Following the advent presentation, the sisters provided some wonderful homemade mince pies.  A great way to finish the evening.

Moving house

There's major upheaval at CMM at the moment as Roger and Mary prepare to move to Lickey End in Bromsgrove.  All the shelves containing books and cds have come off the wall, and there are boxes everywhere.  Amidst all the busyness the office staff keep working!

On Tuesday evening Martin coerced some of his and Helen's friends to assist CMM's move.  Martin, Mary, Dave, Ailith and Helen all turned up with cars and alongside Roger and Mary's cars we filled 7 cars with boxes of stock.  With so many hands it didn't take too long, and much of the stock is now installed on shelves at the new house.

A Marston Green Morning

On Sunday morning, Helen braved the snow and travelled to Marston Green Free Baptist Church.  The church has been in an interregnum for a while, and they have often been visited by Geoff Rudge, one of the EBRG trustees.  This was Helen's second preaching engagement at the church, and this particular Sunday was the second in Advent, and also their toy service.

Several of the members of the congregation have been involved in the CMM choir, or attended the Churches Together in Solihull quiet day that Helen led in October, so it was great to see some familiar faces.  The main organiser was Stella Reece, who helps to lead the music at the church.

Helen had two short talks in the service - and two willing (and unwilling) volunteers in the only children present in the service, two sisters.  The older one, Raphaella, caused a smile - in the prayers of thanksgiving the congregation were asked to talk about the most beautiful thing they had seen that week, and Raphaella was heard to say 'My hair'.  To be fair, it was impressive - blonde, and she'd had it crimped that week.

The second of the two talks was similar to the service in Sandiacre the previous week.  Helen spoke about 'The God who Speaks' (it was Bible Sunday) and managed to get the congregation asking the Spirit to come, waiting, and listening for words etc.  They did really well - a couple of them even dared to share out loud what they felt God was saying.

Afterwards, one lady shared that she normally finds it hard to listen to God as her brain is so busy and she is thinking about what she has to do.  She says that in the silence at church she felt completely at peace, and a voice in her head repeating the words 'I love you'.  How wonderful.

Brian, one of the members of EBRG has been prompted by God to write a book about prophecy and hearing God speak.  Nine or ten of the congregation at the church took copies away with them.

A busy Annie Weekend (part 2)

After her trip down to Salisbury Annie was up and running on Sunday too.  This time she travelled to Eccleshall Staffordshire for The Inn Crowd in a day.  This time she had a team of soloists - Ann Steer, Richard Harvey and Amy Carter.  The local group provided the Mary and Joseph soloists.

She had an incredibly busy day - there was a really big choir, an orchestra and a group of children.

This was her text comment at the end of the day:

Excellent day. Great team.  Felt prompted to speak briefly at the performance.  Full church.  Thanks for prayers.

A busy Annie weekend (part 1)

After last weekend's CMM in two places, Annie was the one that was incredibly busy.  On Friday night she travelled down to Salisbury with Sue, ready to be up bright and early to lead Simeon in a day.

There is a large choir in Salisbury that have taken part in lots of CMM's tours, ably led by Grahame and Jennifer Chubb and Andy and Alison Larkham.  The group in Salisbury provided all the soloists for the day, and Annie says they were excellent and did a fantastic job.

These are the texts we received from Annie during the day:

Simeon going so well that I'm doing an Angel Voices taster, as that's their next project.

Wonderful day and performance.  Simeon so joyous!  Sue and I driving back now.  Snow all melted here.

A busy CMM weekend (part 2)

While Helen was having fun in Nottingham, Roger and Annie braved the threat of snow to travel up to Barrow-in-Furness.  They took with them some of the Two Sisters team - Martin, Devon, Emily, Caroline, Bill and Jonathan.

The reason for the journey up north was Sharon Collins' 50th birthday.  Sharon has been involved with CMM for a long time - she trains the Barrow Choir, trains the choir for our Grange music week, and also sings for us as a soloist.  A long time ago she asked if Roger would be willing to travel up for a kind of musical in a day to celebrate, and her musical of choice was 'Two Sisters and a Funeral'.  So this gave Roger the opportunity to schedule into his diary a kind of premiere - the first time the musical had been fully performed in public.

The team made it up to Barrow in time for lunch, and were delighted to see some old friends including Brenda, Carole (with Hannah), Betty and Rosemary - as well as all those they expected to see in Barrow.

Roger and Annie taught the choir the musical - this really was a 'musical in a day' as not one of the choir could possibly have learnt it in advance!  They also divided the choir into sectionals, so that the men could work extra hard on being baddies.

Roger was absolutely delighted with how the musical worked in a day, and he was also really pleased with the soloists.  It was Emily's first official engagement with us, and she sang really well.  Caroline, Emily and Devon performed the dramatic narrations for the first time, and were excellent.

The following morning Roger preached at the service at Sharon's church, particularly challenging them about house groups and fellowship.  Then after lunch the team travelled home, dropping Roger off at the train to travel to Penrith where he spent 24 hours with Graham Allan working on the biography.

A busy CMM weekend (part 1)

On the last weekend in November, CMM was incredibly busy, stretched to two places at once.

Helen travelled to Nottingham to lead David in a Day at Sandiacre Methodist Church.  This was a special event to celebrate the church's anniversary.  The organiser had suggested pushing the start time until after lunch, which made the day very difficult to fit in, but we managed it.  For her team on the day Helen had Felicity leading dance, and Miriam (Helen's sister) also helping out on clarinet and being generally wonderful.  It was also wonderful for Helen to have her dad in the choir, her mum in the audience and her older sister on viola.  Helen's brother-in-law Jon and niece Bethan also made a cameo appearance...

Rehearsals were hard work, but the choir of about 45 were wonderful, and picked it all up amazingly well.  Felicity had a group of about 8 dancers, who learnt two wonderful dances - firstly to 'The Lord's my shepherd' and then to the David and Goliath song.  Felicity also did two solo dances to 'I will bless the Lord' and David's lament over Saul and Jonathan.

We also had some wonderful soloists - Ruth, Miriam, Barbara, Mavis and John.  We also had some wonderful help from Nora who notebashed on the piano and then 'played the orchestra' for the performance.  Nora, amazingly, trained with Roger at Birmingham school of music.

The audience was smaller than the choir, but they joined in with the songs wherever they could and seemed very appreciative.  Despite the snow and the cold outside, it was a great event inside, and hopefully the sense of fun and fellowship was exactly what Sandiacre Methodist were looking for in their anniversary weekend.

The next morning Helen led the service at the church with her mum and second cousin Gillian supporting away.  They had a lovely singing group lead some songs at the start of the service, and Helen was able to busk away on guitar behind Nora.  The service itself went well - Helen was brave and managed to get the congregation waiting on God and asking the Spirit to come.  People seemed to appreciate this focus on 'The God who comes' - one person claimed a word of knowledge and another had a picture.

A meal for Denise

As an office we often go out together to celebrate birthdays.  This time we had lunch to celebrate Denise's birthday.  Denise has been volunteering with us for a couple of years now, as she builds up office experience in order to be let loose on the big wide world.  Denise has been an enormous help to us, and it was great to be able to celebrate with her.

We were very brave and visited a brand new buffet restaurant just down the road from Christ Church, Burney Lane.  This was brave because this pub used to have an interesting reputation...  But now it has been transformed and we had a lovely meal.  Sadly Tim couldn't make it, but the rest of us were there.

Another archive photo!

This newspaper cutting has been sent to us by Peter Cole, who used to be part of the United Christian Singers in Manchester.  Roger is talking to Eric Thorn about Saints Alive, and since then Eric has written some lyrics for Roger, a large amount of them can be found in the new Song Collection.

And the books are here!

The books arrived early on Monday morning, and Tim has been working flat out to send them to all of the people that pre-ordered.  So if you ordered, it is in the post!

We're really thrilled with them - they have a slightly different kind of spine to our old musical books, which makes them look smarter, and will hopefully enable them to stay open on a music stand a little better...

A new venture

Over the past few weeks, Helen has been in conversation with Saltley Methodist Church about a possible 9 hour a week job there.  On Tuesday this week those talks finally came to fruition.

The aim of the partnership is for Helen to work with the young people in the church, encouraging them in singing and in worship.  The long term aim is for this children's worship to infect the whole congregation with a sense of joy and fun, as Spirit-filled worship takes central place for the church.

The first Tuesday evening session was a bit of an eye-opener, as Helen taught three advent/Christmas songs to a group of 6 children, 5 of which were quite boisterous boys.  The songs did go down well though, particularly one of them which was a bit like a song from High School Musical.  The plan is to include a couple of them in the carol service on Sunday 19th December.

Drink Deep

This year we have regularly been joining up with Peter Smith and the team from Christ Church, Burney Lane, Ward End to hold regular Holy Spirit events.  So far they have mostly been renewal evenings on a Sunday evening with various speakers, but this time we went for a whole weekend of workshops and worship, culminating in a renewal evening on the Sunday evening.

There were about 50 of us in total, and we had a wonderful time.  On the Saturday Annie kicked things off with some worship and then Roger spoke on thirsting and drinking, using illustrations from Ezekiel 47 and Jesus at the feast of tabernacles.

After this first session, we broke up into 3 workshops.  Jane and Gill led a prophetic movement workshop, which really blessed those that were involved.  Brian and Sue led a 'Using the gifts' workshop, focusing on the link between the gifts and fruit of the Spirit. Helen and Alan led a 'Receiving the power of the Spirit' workshop, which included a lengthy time of silence, simply allowing people to wait and receive from God.

In the afternoon we had two more workshops - Annie and Mary led a Ministry in the power of the Spirit session, and at the same time Roger led a prophetic worship workshop.  Those that attended seem to have been really blessed by all the workshops - what a priviledge it is to be able to train people in life in the Spirit.

After these workshops we had a final session with worship led by Helen and the Peter Smith spoke.  He didn't speak for long - the emphasis was on giving people plenty of time to simply receive from the Lord.

On Sunday, CMM took part in the regular morning service for Christ Church, and Helen spoke, linking a well known healing model called 'The Circle of God's Love' with how Jesus dealt with Peter in John 21.

In the evening we held our now regular renewal evening.  Peter Smith spoke, and it was great fun.  A lot of people received ministry, and it was so good to see God at work in people's lives.

We had a fantastic music and ministry team for the weekend - including Tim on drums and Christine on flute.  It was the first time Christine had been part of a CMM team, and it was a delight to have her.

The CDs are here!

The CDs came today on a big white van - thankfully not a pallet as has happened in the past.  Big lorries have sometimes called with their driver looking very confused at our door, expecting a fork-lift truck to unload it for them...

Hopefully the books will come early next week.

They're looking good.

A bit of history...

Roger with Tim and the choir for A Grain of Mustard Seed - Chandler's Ford Methodist 1980

Roger and Mary with Tim and Andrew at Saints Alive - Chandler's Ford Methodist 1982

I've just found these photos in my inbox.  I think I put them on the Rock blog when I wrote up our Chandler's Ford production, but I thought it'd be great for everyone to see them.  If any of you have any old pictures of CMM in action, we'd love to have them - try visiting our facebook page - type in 'Christian Music Ministries' and try and find us!

Two Sisters rehearsal

The first real outing of the new musical is coming up - we're going to Barrow-in-Furness at the end of November to hold a workshop day for a 50th birthday party for one of CMM's closest supporters.  This is really a dress rehearsal - our official launch is on 5th February.

On Tuesday evening we had a rehearsal for the soloists travelling to Barrow - Emily, Martin, Devon, Caroline, Bill and Jonathan.  One of the key things to rehearse were the narrations that Alison Fuggle has written to fit between each of the songs.  Devon, Emily and Caroline did a great job seeing them for the first time, and still putting some wonderful expression into the words.

Roger and Annie will also be travelling to Barrow, and there were also some hangers-on at the rehearsal - Amy, Helen and Richard, who just came for the company!

An interesting weekend

This weekend, while not officially a CMM working weekend, has been a really interesting one.

Annie travelled along with members of her church to a weekend led by MWF (Music and Worship Foundation). The weekend was spent looking at encouraging churches in their worship - a kind of 'worshipping from the pew' session.

Roger met with a group of dancers led by Sally (formerly Jones, now Taylor) who are hoping to form a dance ministry group. There is huge enthusiasm from the group, and we look forward to seeing how God uses them in future.

Then Roger met with some long term friends of CMM, Robin and Carole. They are also beginning a ministry of their own which runs special retreats called Refocus days.

It is wonderful seeing how God is blessing and using people that have been associated with the ministry for so many years.

CMM Choir

Penny King has unfortunately stepped down as conductor of the East Birmingham CMM choir due to church and family commitments. Penny has done a wonderful job with the choir in the last 4 years, conducting performances of Mary Magdalene, A Grain of Mustard Seed, The Inn Crowd, Jail Break, Rock, From Pharaoh to Freedom and Saints Alive, Wildfire, and Rock. What a fantastic journey. We wish Penny and Peter all the best in what God has in store for them in their future ministry.

We are delighted to be able to announce that Annie will be taking over the choir from January. Their first project will be Two Sisters and a Funeral.

Two Sisters - in the post!

The last couple of weeks have been very fraught indeed here at CMM. We've been proofing and re-proofing the vocal score for the new musical, which finally went in the post last night, and we have been working extremely hard in mixing the new album.

It really has been a team effort, with Annie, Chris, Roger and Tim all involved in mixing, Helen, Nicky and Annie proofing and sorting out the score, and Andrew working hard on the various bits of artwork. We've all also had to listen to the album over and over again - Mary must be sick of it already and it hasn't come back from the duplicators yet!

Anyway, we hope to have the CDs and books back within a week or so, so all those people who have generously pre-ordered will be receiving their copies soon!

Cheltenham Male Voice Praise

On Saturday 30th October (the day after Roger had an operation on his toes) Roger was due to speak at Cheltenham Male Voice Praise. Thankfully the operation went well and didn't involve huge bandages, so Roger was able to attend and not look silly with crutches and elevating his feet!

Due to a slight miscommunication and some problems with traffic, Roger only just made it before the event started, which was very scary for the organisers, but the problems were overcome with God's help. Roger had to compare the evening - introducing the different songs, and also preaching towards the end.

The choir were excellent, and seemed to be really enjoying themselves, praising God with classics like 'I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene'.

Annie in Ipswich

While the CMM team were on the Isle of Wight, Annie travelled to Ipswich with Eddie Smith and Catherine Muggleton to lead 'Apostle in a day'.

Annie says it was an 'ambitious but very successful project with large choir, orchestra and full drama, re-written for the event by organiser Peter Miller. Very moving performance to an appreciative audience.'

Annie received a lovely email from Peter Miller after the event:

Thank you for your efforts with us doing Apostle. Those who participated really enjoyed the experience and we have had a number of emails thanking us all for the efforts put in and the great sense of fellowship that existed.

The Bethesda element of the Choir sang at both services on the following Sunday, we did Thank you, Thank you in the morning with the men singing the Paul solo parts and then the sixteen of us split into four groups of four for the round. In the evening we did Jesus has changed my life as written with Peter taking the Paul solos.

Overall a great weekend!

We hope you were not too tired after the long day!

Once again thanks for coming among us, you will always be welcome.

Rock on the Isle of Wight

For the last few years, CMM has made a regular visit to the Isle of Wight, inspired by Wight churches together, and several important connections over the years such as June, Trish and the Harley family. Brian Harley is a URC minister in Shanklin and is heavily involved with GEAR - the Group for Evangelism And Renewal in the United Reformed Church.

This time CMM travelled over to perform Rock on the island, and the team for the week consisted of the 6 principal soloists from the Rock CD - Devon Brown, Bill Carpenter, Simon Cooper, Ann Steer, Aly Ottaway and Helen, as well as native-moved-to-the-mainland Sarah Harley on violin. Sarah has only been part of a couple of CMM gigs, but she is already showing herself to be a wonderful asset to the team - amazing on violin, and with a lovely singing voice.

The team (accompanied by Barrie) arrived on the Island for a meal and a rehearsal on the Friday evening. The rehearsal was at St. John's Newport, which was to be the venue for a performance on Sunday afternoon. The choir were fantastically trained by June, and we had some amazing techies - Simon and Dave - who looked after us amazingly well.

After a night with our wonderful hosts we had a free morning and then a wonderful lunch at Trish's. As well as Barrie from the mainland, the choir were also supplemented by Mark, Cheryl and Shirley, all of whom are regulars on CMM's travels.

In the afternoon we set up and rehearsed at St. John's Sandown, and then our performance was in the evening. The church was very cold, but we warmed to our task - the choir were amazing, particularly in the lovely acoustic, and there was a big appreciative audience. People chatted for ages afterwards - it was difficult to get away!

On Sunday the team split in two - Helen took Bill, Simon and Aly to St. John's Newport for the morning service, and Roger had Devon, Ann and Sarah at Shanklin URC. The service in Newport was an early start, but it went well. Helen preached while Aly read a monologue and Bill and Simon sang 'Simon Peter, do you love me?' One of the highlights of the service came just after the lay reader Anne had spoken to the children about God's word being sweeter than honey and richer than money. Two small children came wandering slowly to the front after Anne's talk while Helen was getting up to speak. They were holding hands and looking pleadingly at Anne - in the hope that she would give them some of the chocolate money she had been holding up! Roger and team had a great time in Shanklin - there are a lot of good musicians at the church, including Verity, an adopted member of the Harley family. She is also turning into an amazing violinist, and perhaps we will be able to use her too in future.

After lunch it was time for our afternoon performance at St. John's Newport. As it was their second go, the choir were even better, and the audience this time seemed less reserved - it was a fabulous performance, and people were really blessed.

In the evening we had a lovely meal at the Harley household, before a day off on the Monday.

Huge thanks go to all those involved in inviting us and putting us up. We understand that someone became a Christian at one of the performances, which is wonderful news - praise God!

We received an email from Mary Jackson, who was inspired by the weekend:

I'm still singing along to Rock in my head all day long after last weekend on the Isle of Wight! It was wonderful - as always. I was inspired to write this poem after seeing 'just an ordinary man' take the part of Jesus.

Just an ordinary man

I saw Him standing there –

He was just an ordinary man,

Nothing to set Him apart from his friends –

Until He looked at me.

There was something different about him,

Was it the look in His eyes,

Full of love and compassion

As He looked and called me ‘My Child’.

But there was something else,

A sadness in His eyes

As if to say to me, ‘My Child,

I’m longing for you. Please come.’

And then it was that I realized

That this very ordinary man

Was no other than my Saviour –

Jesus – God’s son – come to earth as Man.

Looking forward to our next Roger Jones event on the Island in Holy Week.

Mary Jackson

Men's Supper Club

Roger is sometimes asked to speak at local events by the churches nearby, and on the evening of Wednesday 20th October he travelled the 10 minute trip to South Yardley Methodist to speak at their men's supper evening.

Roger really enjoyed his visit to them - although the men were considerably outnumbered by ladies! While he was there he found out that his old piano teacher (in her 80s) is still playing the organ at Saltley Methodist Church. He has since been in touch.

Instrumental recordings

After the soloists and backing vocals had done their stuff, Annie went into the studio to record some live instrumental bits and pieces. These live instrumentals really add to the sound and quality of the album.

The main things recorded were some strings with Heather Bradshaw (violin), Libby Golding (violin), Annie (viola) and Roger Barnett (cello) and also some guitar from Ian Price. The string sound is absolutely beautiful - particularly in Abide with me, and the guitars are always brilliant as Ian is a Christian session guitarist. His guitars particularly light up Tim's backing tracks for the 'baddie' songs. Helen also added a tiny bit of flute and trumpet - most of the flute had been added back in May when the 'Look of Love' album was being put together.

Annie and Chris have done a great job with the instrumentals - the CD has now been sent off to ICC for duplication, and we can't wait to have it back!

Another quiet day

While Roger and Annie were working hard in Bramhall, Helen was in Birmingham also working hard. She had been asked to lead a quiet day for Solihull Churches Together at St. John's House in Alum Rock, where she lived before getting married. It was great to see the sisters again and to spend time in the wonderful setting in the house and grounds.

For the last few years Solihull Churches Together had held their quiet day at a venue in Rugby, but this time they decided to stay a little closer to home, and they had a few more in attendance due to that - there were 18 at the day, which was wonderful.

Helen decided to lead the day looking at the end of the world, and focusing on what the Bible actually says. Tom Wright has written some excellent material which gathers the biblical material about the return of Jesus together, emphasising that the Christian hope finds its real basis on that, rather than only on the idea that when we die we leave our bodies behind and go to heaven. Instead, emphasising the bodily resurrection and the new heavens and new earth helps us to focus on Jesus' complete victory over sin, death and pain.

The day went down really well - there was some worship, some teaching, and loads of opportunity for people to be quiet and spend time with God.

Weekend in Bramhall

On the weekend of 15-17 October, Roger travelled to St. Michael's church in Bramhall, Stockport for a music in worship weekend called 'Psalms and Praise'. He took with him Annie, Andrew Lockwood, Amy Carter, Jaime Dawson, Val Dawson and Brenda Earnshaw. It was wonderful to be invited to Bramhall - CMM have several really good friends who live in the area, some of whom attend St. Michael's. Louise Richardson at the church has regularly trained choirs for our tour performances, and we regularly see people like Bob and Tricia Munn and Angie Wilson at our music weeks.

On the Saturday the team began by leading a plenary session called 'Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord' based on Psalm 95 - looking at using music in worship, incorporating thanksgiving, praise and more intimate worship.

Then Roger and Annie led two workshop streams, including creative worship, learning new songs, ministering in the Spirit and receiving the power of the Spirit.

The final session on the Saturday was called 'Search me O God and know my heart' based on Psalm 139.

On the Sunday Roger had to preach at two out of the three morning services - one more traditional than the other, and Annie and Amy helped in the Sunday school, teaching the kids 'Our God is a great big God' which went down like a storm with the kids and the congregation.

In the afternoon Roger and the team led one final celebration and then travelled home after a very busy weekend.

Thanks so much to Bob, Louise and all at Bramhall for inviting the CMM team.

Quiet day with Barbara Rowarth

Roger and Helen, along with a team of Deborah Wilde, Kaye Cooke and Richard Harvey were at Christ Church in Birmingham for a quiet day which was led by Barbara Rowarth ably assisted by her husband Mike. Mike and Barbara have been friends of CMM's ministry for years and years, and Barbara has led several of her quiet days for us before. One of her particular gifts is in gently leading people into God's presence through some bible teaching, and then giving people plenty of quiet time to enjoy God through visual prayer stations.

The theme of the day was the book of Ruth, and in the morning Barbara focused on the first two chapters, looking particularly at why Elimelech left the promised land with his wife and two sons, and why Naomi returned, accompanied by Ruth. She also spoke about Ruth's meeting with Boaz, and the incredible kindness he showed to her in the field.

The afternoon particularly looked at Ruth and Boaz' meeting on the threshing floor, and also Boaz's immense generosity in marrying Ruth and taking on Elimelech's property - Ruth was able to bear a son to continue Elimelech's line. This line of course continued to King David, and on to Jesus.

Barbara also offered some prayer ministry during the day, and almost all of the attendees received prayer and had a wonderful day.

It was also wonderful to work with Richard, Kaye and Debs in leading the worship for the day.

Musical in a day, Horley

On Saturday 9th October CMM found itself in two places at once. The first venue was Horley, near Gatwick, and Annie led a team there to lead Saints Alive in a day.

Annie had been invited to lead the day in celebration of St. Wilfred's Parish Church's 40th anniversary celebrations. She took with her Bill Carpenter, Ann Steer and Amy Carter.

There weren't huge numbers in the choir, but they sang really well and all enjoyed themselves. The performance was great, and it was lovely for Annie to see so many familiar faces.

Annie also took part in the morning service at the church the following day, helping to lead some of the music.

Congregational Recording Day

On Saturday 2nd November, a large choir descended on Christ Church in Birmingham for our congregational recording day. This choir was made up of over 150 singers from across the country - as far as Poole in Dorset, Middlesbrough, Taunton, Hull, Altrincham and Macclesfield.

The choir were able to hear some of the songs from the new musical for the first time, and to meet some of the soloists. Chris King came, and set up a powerful mic in the centre of the church at the front, and we managed to record some excellent singing which has been widely used across the album.

Often this recording is one of the trickiest things we do - it is impossible to have headphones for so many people, so we have to record unaccompanied, and keeping that many people in tune and in time is a difficult task.

So we were thrilled when we heard some of Chris' earliest mixes and he'd been able to use so much of what we had done on the day. The congregational sound adds a wonderful extra dimension to the recording - a fullness and richness of sound that the backing vocal group would struggle to manage alone.

Thanks to everyone who came. It was a very worthwhile day (and a lot of fun too!).

Two Sisters Soloists Recording

For two days in the middle ofSeptember, Roger went in to Chris King's recording studio to lay down the main vocals for the new album. It was a really couple of days, and we are delighted with the results.

Emily played the part of Mary, Aly the part of Martha, Martin the part of Jesus and Devon the part of Lazarus. It is fantastic to have such a young (on the whole!) cast. Some of the highlights of the recording include Emily and Martin's duet in 'Sitting at your feet', Aly singing in 'Abide with me' and Devon's work in 'Oh the deep, deep love of Jesus'.

The four main parts weren't the only soloists to record. There were also two ladies - Amy and Caroline, who came to record some extra bits and pieces. They recorded a verse each in 'Jesus comes riding in to town' as well as some parts of the opening song.

Amy and Caroline were joined by a group of men - Jonathan, Bill, Pete and Richard to record the male 'baddie' parts. There are two songs which require some priests who are upset about what Jesus is up to which have been written by Tim specially for the musical. The guys sound like a fantastic rabble - and they sang really well too!

Renewal Evening - Jonathan Conrathe

On Sunday 19th September, we held another of our Renewal Evenings - evenings where we collaborate with Christ Church, Ward End, in order to bring people into God's presence where they can learn about his love, and how his Spirit can impact our lives.

Roger led the worship with Annie, Martin Fisher, Alan Smith, Amy Carter and Katie Leaver as the music group for the event. Peter Smith led the ministry team, and also took over proceedings once Jonathan had finished speaking.

Jonathan is an excellent speaker from Mission 24 based in Wellington, Shropshire. His organisation run missions across the world and training for mission weekends in the UK.

We are really excited about the way these renewal evenings are growing, as they seem to be meeting a real hunger in East Birmingham, bringing CMM right back to its roots in terms of inviting the Spirit to come in local churches. The ministry time was particularly wonderful, with so many members of the congregation blessed by God's Holy Spirit.

Two Sisters - the recording begins!

Chris King, Annie and Tim have been working really hard on backing tracks for the new musical all year, and in September we finally got to the stage where we were able to add some live recording to the tracks.

The first thing to go down was the backing vocals. For every recording Annie hand-picks and trains a close harmony group for the CD. CMM is honoured to have some wonderful singers to work with, and it is always hard for Annie to decide who would be best for the group. This time we had Katie Leaver and Helen on soprano, Annie and Catherine Muggleton on alto, with Amy Walters recording a mixture of both parts. On bass we had Simon Gudger and Paul Edwards, and Dave Tandy and Dave Morris on tenor, with Dave Roberton recording both parts.

On the finished CD the group will provide most of the choir sound, forming the basis for any solo work to go on top, and the congregational sound to be added later. It can be incredibly hard to get the congregational sound to be in tune and in time, so the work of the backing vocals group is essential.

It was a fun couple of evenings, and the group did a wonderful job - completing all they had been asked to sing and a little bit more, providing a great basis for Roger to go into the studio the next week and record the soloists.

Rock of Ages

The day following Pharisee, Roger had a special speaking engagement. It was the 10th anniversary of the Gloucester and District Christian Choir, led by Pamela Dewick, and they held a special service at which Roger spoke.

Pamela (known affectionately as the Duchess) formed the choir in 2000 specially for the Gloucester performance of Snakes and Ladders, and they have been involved in every tour since then.

To celebrate, the choir had a weekend away together in Somerset, and it was great for Roger to meet with them at this special time.

Pharisee in Weston

Early in September Annie had been invited to Weston to help with a Pharisee in a day at Locking Castle Church. Pharisee is quite a long musical to learn in a day, but Annie managed it! She was greatly aided by some fantastic local soloists including CMM regular Kaye Cooke, and the lack of men meant that she just had to teach the soprano and alto parts.

Annie conducted the performance brilliantly, and Roger and Mary came and were part of the audience, which was lovely for the choir.

Jairus' Daughter in Sidmouth

At the start of September a CMM team consisting of Roger, Mary, Bill & Barbara, Helen and Amy travelled down to Sidholme, a Christian Guild hotel in Sidmouth, Devon. The host couple for the week were Peter and Joy Mills from Leamington, and it was great to work with them again following previous weeks at St. Ives. The hotel was totally full, and about two thirds of the guests took part in the CMM week.

The musical for the week was Jairus' Daughter. We had expected just to have a choir at this week trained by Helen, but we also had several musicians, so Amy took a small orchestra with Roger on piano, and a flute, a clarinet, a trombone and a saxophone. Jairus' Daughter is a fairly simple musical, so the guests learnt it very quickly - the choir were beautifully balanced and made a fantastic sound. They were a real pleasure to conduct as they all looked at the conductor and responded brilliantly to dynamics and expression.

As well as learning the musical, we had several other sessions during the week. Bill spoke at the Sunday morning service, Helen led the introductory evening and did the main Bible teach

ing on Monday morning. On one evening we had a Ways to Praise session looking at Psalms, Hymns and Songs, and we also gave a special preview of Two Sisters and a Funeral. All the rest of the team chipped in leading worship and epilogues. Peter and Joy lead morning prayers every day, and it seemed to grow and grow until there was nearly no space in the lounge.

The performance went fantastically well with some lovely solos from the guests. There was also quite a large audience - we had to bring in extra chairs.

By the end of the week it was clear that God was blessing and working with most of the guests, and it was a real privilege to be there to minister.

Two Sisters

Throughout the summer we have been working really hard on Roger's new musical, Two Sisters and a Funeral. The soloists for the CD have been meeting together, and the backing vocals group have also rehearsed.

Main soloists:

Jesus - Martin Fisher

Lazarus - Devon Brown

Martha - Alyson Ottaway

Mary - Emily Bray

Then there are a few other soloists:

Some women of Bethany:

Caroline Finney

Amy Carter

The 'baddies' in Jerusalem:

Bill Carpenter

Richard Harvey

Jonathan Chappell

Pete Hazelwood

Andrew and Gemma's Wedding

Friday 27th August was the second Jones family wedding of the year. This time it was Andrew's turn to tie the knot with Gemma. The bride and groom looked apicture, the groom did a great job with his funny speech, and the families had a wonderful day together - first at the church in Wolverhampton and later at the beautiful reception venue.

There was a gifted cartoonist at the reception who amused the guests throughout the day. Every now and again there would be a huge peal of laughter whenever he finished his

latest creation.

Willersley 2010

In mid August we held a music week at Willersley Castle near Matlock in Derbyshire. This was our second summer music week at Willersley, and it is a fantastic venue - brilliantly accessible in a beautiful part of the country.The Christian Guild hotel was a complete sellout, and it was wonderful to have so many taking part in the week.

The host for the week was Marion, who has hosted with us several times - usually at Abbot Hall near Grange-over-Sands. It was wonderful to have Marion with us, and she did a fantastic job - even more so when we heard that her husband John had died (aged 98) only a couple of weeks before. John was a wonderful character, and will be sadly missed.

The musical for the week was From Pharaoh to Freedom, and this time Helen was training the choir, with Annie sorting out the orchestra. We also had Phil Parkin on team who did a wonderful job accompanying. As well as Phil, Helen and Annie, the CMM team comprised of Roger and Mary, Paul Edwards and Alan Walker. It was great to have Paul over from France, and we look forward to when he comes back to the UK and we can see him more often.

The choir and the orchestra were absolutely excellent, and they produced a wonderful performance on the Friday night, and quite a number came to watch, including some friends from Sheffield. But beyond the performing, the highlights of the week came in ministry, as quite a number of people were touched by the Spirit and received prayer.

Another lovely evening occurred when a team came from a church in Nottingham to lead us in worship and share their testimonies. It was great to be encouraged by them and then for us to encourage them in turn with their future ministry.

We also held some Holy Spirit ministry workshops during the week, as well as a whole evening looking at the new musical - Two Sisters and a Funeral. Martin Fisher was working in the area, so he came to join us for that session.

A wonderful week, and we look forward to next year when we will be working on Two Sisters and a Funeral.