Graham Kendrick's Christmas project inspires musical

|PIC1|Celebrated British musician Graham Kendrick will collaborate in a Christmas musical with a church in Connecticut, based on his latest holiday album Dreaming of a Holy Night.

Walnut Hill Community Church's annual Christmas production "Dreaming of...The Musical" will use Kendrick's songs, which are based on biblical characters of the nativity.

The Broadway-style production will run December 7-9 and feature a cast of more than 80 actors, singers, musicians and technicians, all Walnut Hill's church members.

Best known as the creator of such internationally renowned songs as "All I Once Held Dear" and "Shine Jesus Shine", Kendrick released the Dreaming of a Holy Night album last October in the UK, featuring 13 brand new Christmas songs.

Regarding the album, Kendrick said: "I have always found the accounts of the nativity to be woven through not only with mystery and wonder, but with the real struggles of ordinary people - especially in the characters of Mary and Joseph, Elizabeth and Zechariah."

He continued: "Christmas is a time when for a moment it can be a little easier to imagine a world put right, when hope is rekindled for the peace and goodwill we associate with the best of the Christmas season to become a reality for everyone.

"I have let my imagination be stirred afresh both from inside the story, empathising with some of the characters, and from outside - looking back in wonder at the incarnation, and forward to the fulfilment of what began on that holy night."