LARRY NORMAN: a farewell from Greenbelt Festival

Solid Rock UK worked with Greenbelt Festival in organising a tribute to Larry Norman with a special concert in the Centaur Venue on Sunday 24th August 2008.

For a huge number of people whose Christian faith was formed during the seventies and early eighties Larry Norman plays a huge tangible and sentimental part in their journeys of faith. Sadly Norman’s star fell in the Contemporary Christian Music scene, much to its detriment, and though he kept his rabid little underground support those born post 1982 or so are bereft of his legacy. It was no surprise therefore that when Greenbelt marked Larry’s passing in a Tribute Concert the beautiful and spacious Centaur venue was full of forty to sixty year olds and younger festival acts like Juliet Turner or Iain Archer were not on the bill as they didn’t know enough about Norman to perform a song. Those who did though did a couple of important things at any Tribute event; they covered a breadth of material and did it in the most qualitative way! Martyn Joseph gave American Novel that modern rage that silences you with its prophetic power. Scottish Presbyterian garage band Calvin’s Dream came out of a fifteen year retirement and gave Pardon Me its poignant vulnerability in a song about sexuality that Norman’s successors like Michael W Smith would never dare attempt to write. Rob Halligan, Gareth Davies-Jones and After The Fire’s Pete Banks went back to the core of Norman’s beliefs and brought Crobsy, Stills and Nash harmonies to the Christology of The Outlaw. In cover version events such as these I like the variance in versions and the different gender card is a good one to play. Helen J Hicks gave a tender grace to the apocalyptic I Wish We’d All Been Ready and there was more than one person quoting “A piece of bread could buy a bag of gold” at modern day Zimbabwe; and Yvonne Lyon’s Goodbye Farewell showed that Larry didn’t stop writing good songs in the seventies. Though these songs gave a breadth to Norman’s canon in relation to subject matter they were all, apart from Yvonne Lyon’s contribution, from one classic album Only Visiting This Planet. To throw curves Nigel Goodwin’s donned a leather jacket to recite the poem First Day At Church which Norman did on one of his more obscure albums Street Level and Steve Stockman with the help of Iain Archer on bluesy acoustic guitar monologued Be Careful What You Sign from So Long Ago The Garden unrehearsed! Brian Houston whose performance lends comparisons to Norman’s own passion and humour ended it all by blending The Rock That Doesn’t Roll and Shot Down both from In Another Land and both the testimony of all those 40 – 60 year olds nostalgically enjoying it all in the crowd; “I've been knocked down, kicked around/but like a moth drawn to the flame/Here I am, talking 'bout Jesus just the same.” And we all left feeling as energised and theologised and challenged as we did way back then. Thank you Larry! God bless you!

Reviewed by Steve Stockman
Photos by James Tweed

CLICK THE IMAGES TO SEE LARGER SIZE

Tribute Itinerary
DVD tribute from Cliff Richard
Intro by Steve Stockman
Martyn Joseph ‘Great American Novel’
Calvin’s Dream ‘Pardon Me’
Steve Foster interviews Nigel Goodwin
Nigel Goodwin ‘First Day in Church’
Peter Banks, Gareth Davies-Jones and Rob Halligan ‘The Outlaw’
Steve Foster interviews Helen J Hicks
Helen J Hicks ‘I Wish We’d All Been Ready’
Steve Stockman and Iain Archer ‘Be Careful What You Sign’
Yvonne Lyon ‘Goodbye Farewell’
Brian Houston ‘Shot Down’ and ‘The Rock That Doesn’t Roll’
Steve Foster outro
DVD Larry Norman ‘Song For A Small Circle of Friends’
On Screen ‘Larry Norman 1947-2008’

The Greenbelt Festival Media Capture team is working on producing a dvd release of the tribute.