Holy Music

Last week I saw a flyer for an event in Castel di Lama that I thought might help us in our search for a church here in the Ascoli Piceno area. This was for the “Holy Music International Music for Prayer Festival” that was held last weekend. We attended Saturday night when they had the “Festival Internazionale” and I hoped there might be some groups handing out information on different churches in the area.

We arrived at the large tent set-up above Castel di Lama and realized everyone in line had a ticket, we did not. I noticed some official looking people and asked how we could get a ticket, one of them pulled out a couple for us to use from his jacket. By the time we got into the tent it was well past the advertised starting time but in true Italian fashion nothing had yet begun.

This was not like any Christian music concerts we have attended in the US where a few groups play several songs; at Holy Music each group did only one song. Fortunately for us they started with the internazionale groups which included American gospel, French rap, a singer from Israel and some other groups in French and English. This is the second time we’ve seen American gospel groups perform in Italy. As midnight was approaching the Italian groups were yet to start but we were ready to head back to Ascoli.

We enjoyed the music but unfortunately we found no information on new church prospects except the church that sponsored the concert. Hopefully this parish church, which puts on a music festival, might be a good prospect for a church body.