Raising their voice in gratitude: Messiah Men's choir

Posted at 7:21 PM on October 17, 2011 by Marianne Combs (0 Comments)
Filed under: Culture, Music

Some radio stories are fine to simply read on the web - you're not missing too much by skipping out on the audio.

This is not one of those stories.

Messiah's Men
Image courtesy of the artists

From the first notes of harmonizing by Messiah's Men, Dan Olson's portrait of the Liberian men's choir had me hooked. Their stories are filled with tragedy (all of them having lost family to the Liberian civil war) and yet their music is filled with joy. Olson's explains it well:

Singing is their therapy -- a way to cope with the memory of smelling death, tasting death, being close to dead.

They tell audiences that the singers' survival stories prove there is always hope in desperate times, says choir member Trokon Guar.

"You'll get to see the positive-ness of hope, and the transformation it has brought into our lives," he said.

But again, don't just be satisfied with reading the script - give it a listen:

You can visit Messiah's Men's website here.

Services

• Hourly Newscast
• HD Radio
• iPhone App / Mobile
• E-mail newsletters
• RSS feeds
• Podcasts
• Submit your photos
• Videos
• Weather
• Most e-mailed stories