For Delirious? frontman Martin Smith, music has always been the balm he's used to share a message of hope in a hurting world. And for more than a decade now, Delirious? has not only provided the soundtrack for Sunday morning services and played thousands of electrifying shows for millions of fans in clubs and churches worldwide, but the band has always challenged its audience to be "history makers"-people who look beyond their own needs to make a tangible difference in the lives of others.
But miles away from the bright lights of the stage, his hope-fuelled lyrics and the sheer exhilaration of playing rock 'n' roll to crowds of adoring fans, Smith, in his own heart, was still wrestling with a troubling dichotomy in his continued quest to be a history maker.
While he was nestled comfortably in the confines of five-star accommodations, many of those he was reaching out to, particularly in his international travels, were living in slums. If that wasn't a shocking-enough reality check for the father of six, he also met an abundance of mothers and their young children, caught up in the horrifying, dangerous life of sex trade in India. And in Phnom Penh, a poverty-ravaged locale Smith visited in Cambodia, children were routinely digging through rubbish dumps just to find anything resembling food to make it through another day.
Having such an up-close-and-personal encounter with unbelievable tragedy was heartbreaking to say the least and served as a giant wake-up call.
Unable to reconcile his comfortable life with that of "the least of these," Smith knew something truly unique, something life-changing, needed to be done to help. So Smith decided to give back with what's he's been given-a platform, a microphone and a knack for writing songs that connect with the heart-and boldly asked 11 of his fellow musician friends to do the same.
Then in an unprecedented move, he asked these friends, some of the most gifted, well-known and busiest songwriters in the world, to clear their schedules and join him for a songwriter's retreat in a quaint, little Scottish town of Perthshire. During a week-long span, they'd collaborate on songs for a release where none of them would see a penny for all the hard work invested. Instead, 100% of the song royalties would benefit the poorest of the poor around the world.
And surprisingly, one by one, each artist replied with a resounding "Yes!"
Like anything that's really worth pursuing, the rather ambitious idea behind what ended up being called CompassionArt almost seemed too big to actually work. But Smith and his wife Anna weren't about to let the complicated logistics of setting up the infrastructure of a global charity scare them off. And for the better of a part of a year and a half, they worked through most of the red tape.
