Prom Praise Wonder 2025: A review

The venue was the Royal Albert Hall.

The ornate frieze encircling the hall’s roof bears the immortal words: “Thine, O Lord, is the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty; for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is Thine. The wise and their works are in the hand of God."

It was, for that reason alone, the perfect setting for a concert focusing on the greatness of the universe and the glory of its Creator. But while the magnificent auditorium was not far off full, I was puzzled that the audience was largely passive. It was also mainly white, the lack of diversity within a huge Christian congregation in the heart of Kensington especially noticeable in a borough which has twice the proportion of residents from Mixed / Chinese / Other Ethnic groups compared to London, and four times the national rate.

All Souls Orchestra is undoubtedly an accomplished amateur orchestra, but the venue is far better suited to a professional orchestra. It could never be expected to achieve the thunderous volume and intensity of a symphony orchestra; or keep perfectly in tune and timing (most notably lacking in the orchestra’s rendition of ET’s ‘The Flying Theme’.)

That said, its accompaniment to the congregational singing was superb, but – even with the choir – it was tricky knowing when we were expected to start singing the next verse.

I was deeply moved in places. Listening to the crew of Apollo 8 read Genesis 1 from space in 1968; and - especially for Prom Praise - US Christian astronaut Butch Wilmore who recently returned to earth, reading Psalm 19.

In his two-part message, evangelist Glen Scrivener touched my intellect but not my heart. Part one strayed little beyond the abstract (which could be forgiven having introduced his talk with an impressive recitation of John Dryden’s A Song for St. Cecilia’s Day). Expanding on Jesus and His coming to earth, in simple terms, would have been immeasurably more valuable than his repetition of “heavenly harmony”, “cacophony” and “something from nothing”.

The second part, marginally less vague but still heavy on the poetic, was an opportunity lost. What, I thought, was the intention? The concert programme certainly inferred that this was a largely evangelistic event, but had I been new to the gospel I’d have been mystified.

Singer-songwriter Ellie Limebear (a new name to me) sang beautifully of Jesus the Friend, but I'll never understand the compulsion of soloists to crescendo to an inharmonious shout.

An item from spoken word artist StreetHymns on the glory of God in the skies (‘Orchestrated’) was gripping and dynamic. But it (as with other songs) would have meant so much more to me had the words been available.

Particularly moving was American musician Andrew Peterson leading us in singing Is He Worthy?. What greater joy can a believer have in expressing pure Scripture in song - with beautiful accompaniment and the author himself?

My companion for the night was Sarah Perry, amateur astronomer, accomplished pianist and author of Enlightenment - a novel about faith, love and astronomy, reviewed by Evangelicals Now in December 2024. (Full disclosure - we're sisters).

For us both, the undisputed triumph of the night was a Korean arrangement of John Newton's Amazing Grace, performed by internationally known soprano Youngmi Kim and accompanied by the Vancouver Zion Mission Choir. A male contingent of the choir sang Arirang, a moving and traditional Korean song, between the verses perennially so similar to us. On the last note, Sarah and I turned to each other and smiled in delight.

Throughout the evening, there was at times a bewildering lack of audience participation. We seemed strangely unmoved, at least tangibly. Few raised their hands in praise as we sang; an isolated audible ‘amen’ followed Glen’s prayer; and the corporate singing hardly raised the roof.

I wondered if it tried to be too many things: a music concert? A classical music concert? An evangelistic event? I think the organisers need to work that one out and build on it.

Yet in true British tradition, the best was left to last: a rousing rendition of How Great Thou Art with which the audience was much more engaged and joyful. This time, a woman in front of us sang energetically and movingly in sign language.

And as the final note faded, we slipped out into the warm spring night and looked up at the darkening expanse that continued to echo praises to its Maker.

For a response to this review setting out a different point of view, see this.