And it strikes me that music is a big part of what makes the world as wonderful as it is.
This video certainly illustrates that point (sincere thanks to Marian, a friend from college days, for sharing it with me).
Choir! Choir! Choir! specializes in assembling massive numbers of strangers for the experience of singing and making music together. And what fun they have; you can see the joy level going through the roof!
What I think is that we all need to be singing with other humans. Who knows? It just might be what saves the world.
When I see videos like this, and feel the powerful energy they capture, I am convinced that a big part of why music is so powerful is because it reminds us of the truth that we are made for unity.
We truly are one.
The video above is of Jacob Collier conducting the audience in an amazing 3-part-harmony encore, at the end of his homecoming DJESSE World Tour show in June 2022.
I first heard a video of him conducting his “Audience Choir” in Singapore. Even the comments are inspiring: 🎶 It’s not the voices that move me. It’s the unity for me…….. Big Chills!!! 🎶 It’s hard to express clearly, but there’s something bigger here. It’s almost spiritual. It’s something about enough people coming together in one cause and there being enough good in all voices to fill in and uplift everyone else’s voices to a place of beauty. Perhaps this is how God hears us. When you step far enough back from the world you begin to see and hear the cohesive beauty rather than the minute chaos. 🎶 What a beautiful moment of perfect harmony among humanity. If it can be done here in this room, we can do it everywhere. Imagine.
And then there’s the group Choir! Choir! Choir!, which started in Toronto in 2011 as a weekly drop-in singing event. Participants got a lyric sheet at the door, “DaBu” (AKA Daveed Goldman and Nobu Adilman) taught the vocal arrangement, and a video was recorded.
Hundreds, even thousands, of strangers coming together to sing — I can only imagine what a high it must be.
By the way, even though I picked a video almost at random, I managed to choose a performance that Choir! Choir! Choir! did in collaboration with supporters of the Canadian Cancer Society. Serendipity strikes again!
Another inspiring comment: 🎶 This is beautiful. What’s more beautiful is the diversity of people… young, old, kids, races all together for one purpose. It’s the proof that music brings people together and heals. Thank God for music and for artists and talented people.
Reflecting on all this brought to mind a song we used to sing when I attended Unity church in San Francisco. I couldn’t locate a recording, but here are the lyrics (as best as I can recall after so many years): We are one, we are one, I am you, you are me, we are one. And in that unity we can live in harmony And peace will come, cause we are one.
It’s thrilling to me to see music developing in the direction of not just musical, but human harmony.
