• Kindle My Heart & God Above, God Below review by Cory C. Engel from CelticChristianTunes.com
• Kindle My Heart review by Israel Klossfrom The Phantom Tollbooth

Kindle My Heart and God Above, God Below

Not previously being familiar with Prairie Bible College of Three Hills Alberta, Canada, I wasn't sure what to expect when initially asked to review these CDs. They are neither by well-known artists, nor from a major (or even minor) record label. When they arrived, however, any prejudices were overcome by their professional graphic design and copious liner notes.

These recordings each present 20 tracks, totaling about an hour of music per CD by the College's Fine Arts Department, along with Onora, a Dallas-based Celtic ensemble of highland pipes, hammered dulcimer, folk and concert harps, bouzouki, tinwhistle, bodhran, guitar, accordion, and other instruments. Also featured are the vocals of Fiona O'Leary, a Prairie student from County Cork, Ireland. Lyrics are sung in English and Gaelic.

Getting into the music, I found both CDs to be a refreshing mix of familiar traditional Celtic tunes and new lyrics. Often, an attempt to rewrite the lyrics of familiar tunes produces results that sound "cheesy" or presumptious. In this case, however the artists here have succeeded in producing 40 tracks which are not just enjoyable music, but worship experiences.

A prime example of a seamless blend of old music and new lyrics is God Above, God Below's "What Can I Do", which is sung to the tune of "She Moved Through the Fair":

Worship the Lord, praise His name
O cast your crown at his feet
Come before Him and kneel at his mercy seat
He is holy and good, His love has no end
With thankful heart sing his praise
He is Maker and Friend

The producer obviously employed high production values in putting these recordings together. The sound is excellent, and the musicianship precise. Other than one or two rare moments where the recordings may have benefitted from one more take of a vocal track, I have no complaints whatsoever. (Even this criticism is probably the result of over-analysis, but there it is.)

--Cory C. Engel, CelticChristianTunes.com

Kindle My Heart is a 20-song project of the Prairie Bible College Fine Arts Department in Three Hills, Alberta, Canada.

Parts of this CD have delightfully beautiful Celtic vocals and other parts have operatic vocals seem to be counter-productive to the Celtic flavor of the project. Not to say that Celtic music can't have operatic aspects, as in tracks 1, 10 and 16 on this CD, but because of these tracks, it is likely that die-hard Celtic musicians wouldn't consider the album a CD of entirely traditionally Celtic music. In fact, track 10 had some terribly discordant notes in the operatic female voices that could be argued to be an authentic approach to the discordant aspects of Celtic music, but the distractive qualities of the discordant voices was terribly jarring, undesirable and out of character with the rest of the CD.

The most beautiful sounds in this CD come from the soothing, docile and fluid female voices; like tracks 8,9 and 11. One of the most authentic-Celtic sounding percussion and lilting vocal arrangements is found in track 12. The female voices rise and fall with a pleasing lilt to which it seems that Michael Flattley and the whole Lord of the Dance team could kick up their heels.

One of the most moving songs is track number 7, "Molloy's Favorite/Monaghan's Jig," an instrumental. It has beautiful and complex hammer-dulcimer melodies and rhythms flowing gracefully in stops and starts for a graceful 2-and-a-half minutes. The minor scale of the instrumental produces a moody ambiance to the music. The song is aptly followed by an accapella arrangement of a few well-blended choral voices interspersed with well-chosen solo voices.

The Gaelic language can be heard in tracks 14 and 9 and the repetitive and simple nature of track 17 makes it one of the most singable songs in the entire CD. It is simply delightful.

A powerful spoken-word arrangement of Revelation 5:6-14 gives the last few songs an ethereal and other-worldly tone to them.

Some interesting liner notes really enhance the experience of this CD. Listen to the comments of the producer, Paul Neeley:

"I've listened to more than a thousand Celtic tunes since I began studying the music 20 years ago; the ones on these recordings are some of my favorites. By setting new lyrics to existing melodies, I follow in the footsteps of such Celtic composers as Robert Burns (18th-century Scotland) and Thomas Moore (19th-century Ireland). My great-grandfather emigrated from Ireland, so I can call this the 'music of my heart.'

The CD has about an hour of music and is recommended to fans of the general Celtic music style. The musical moods range from meditative acappella solos to rollicking jigs and reels with a 35-voice Choir with both Irish or Scottish melodies put to new Christian lyrics.

Rated 3.5 out of 5