CD Review: Abide With Me--Piano and Praise

I've always enjoyed piano music and praise songs. My husband often plays piano while I sing praise and worship songs along. I was thankful to be given an opportunity to review Abide with Me--Piano and Praise featuring Phillip Keveren. The songs in this CD include:

•A New Hallelujah
•Here I Am to Worship
•Abide with Me
•Be Thou My Vision
•I Love to Tell the Story
•The Lord's My Shepherd
•We Gather Together
•Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah
•God of Wonders
•Praise to the Lord, the Almighty
•O Worship the King
•Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart
•O Love that Wilt Not Let Me Go
•Holy, Holy, Holy
•For the Beauty of the Earth

I enjoyed listening to this CD, a collection of 15 instrumental praise music/hymns. Mr. Phillip Keveren, a 50-year-old Christian musician, recorded this album on the Yamaha C7 grand piano. His arrangements are unique and encompass both classical style and jazz style. My favorites include Abide with Me, Be Thou My Vision, I Love to Tell the Story, The Lord's My Shepherd, O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go, and For the Beauty of the Earth. This CD is relaxing and worshipful; it will help you meditate upon God's love, power, and promises. It's great for a lullaby or background music, too.

Visit Discovery House Music's website at http://www.dhp.org/music/ .

~ I received a free copy of this CD from Discovery House for an exchange of my honest review. The opinions are my own.

CD Review: Amazing Grace--Celtic Hymns & Blessings

I love hymns and I love Celtic music; therefore, I was so excited to be given the opportunity to review Amazing Grace: Celtic Hymns & Blessings CD, produced by David Huntsinger for Discovery House Music.  The songs in this CD include:

• Amazing Grace
• Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing (instrumental only)
• Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah (instrumental only)
• Circle Me, O Lord
• Joy in the Kingdom (instrumental only)
• Londonderry Prayer
• The Sheltering/O God, Our Help in Ages Past (instrumental only)
• What a Blessed Gift/The Gathering of the Saints
• Showers of Blessing (instrumental only)
• Dwell in the Shadow (Selah)
• What a Blessed Gift/Simple Gifts (instrumental only)
• We're Marching to Zion
• Lord of All Mercy/Be Thou My Vision (acappella)
• Amazing Grace (instrumental only)

My husband and I enjoyed listening to this CD. He'd prefer them all to be instrumental only, while I like both instrumental and songs with lyrics. As you can see from the list above, half are instrumental and the other half are songs with lyrics. Good balance, I think :). Some of these songs have been my favorite hymns: Be Thou My Vision, Amazing Grace, and Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing. The fun, fast-tempo tunes of Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah and Joy in the Kingdom just made me want to dance (actually, I did dance :)). The voices are pleasantly beautiful and soothing. The music is fantastic; I especially love the sounds of mountain dulcimer, Irish whistles, and highland bagpipes. The lyrics are all wonderful (I only wish the lyrics were included in the leaflet). I was surprisingly pleased with the added verses to Be Thou My Vision by Janet McMahan and David Huntsinger. Each song has a tidbit or a Bible verse that goes with it in the leaflet. This CD will help you relax and ponder God's amazing grace, abundant blessings, and awesome power/ protection. This is the kind of CD I can listen to over and over again.

Visit Discovery House Music's website at http://www.dhp.org/music/ .

~ I received a free copy of the Amazing Grace--Celtic Hymns and Blessings CD from Discovery House for an exchange of my honest review. The opinions are my own.