Listening-In To God

New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 894, 21 September 1956, Page 19

Listening-In To God

|T is not true that the Devil has all the good tunes; thé Salvation Army has several, and the Moral Rearmament movement evidently numbers among its flock some very talented light composers. I was reminded of this last Sunday when listening to the MRA play, The Vanishing Island, their moral and cautionary tale of self-will, grace and The Way. The symbolism was often crude, the islands of J Love Me and We Hate You, for example; and the dialogue, in couplets of a sometimes offensive gaucherie, made me _ shrivel. The ending, where The Way becomes manifest, sought to project great truths in the language of the gummiest popular religion, and this I found distasteful. But I cannot deny that the tunes are charming; inventive, gay and sprightly, often genuinely musical, and on the whole, very well sung. The orchestration is apt, and the Moral Rearmament Chorus and Orchestra (intimidating title!) well-drilled and competent. Jane Wax’s song, Son of Mine, was even deeply moving, and the recurring line, "blood of my bone," shocked me into awareness by its rightness and force. The words of the songs, often reminiscent of patter songs by W. S. Gilbert, and more than reminiscent when that superannuated Savoyard, Ivan Menzies, sang them, were far wittier than the dialogue, and often had a sardonic bite and relish, The whole work was far more successful in its sarcastic, mordant, follyexposing vein than when it cealt with the basic verities. So perhaps the Devil does have the best tunes after all. I am glad to have heard it, and as entertainment, at least, it is far from negligible, — é