Hope: Songs of Faith and Inspiration (Various artists): Album Reviews

It’s holy schmaltz from here to Heaven, but produced by Chong Lim and featuring the voices of Anna-Maria La Spina, operatic wunderkind Mark Vincent and Olivia Newton-John to name a few, Hope provides plenty of ear-pleasing sounds to put you in a saintly state of mind, particularly Olivia’s Isn’t It Amazing and Stan Walker’s My Help (Psalm 121).

Bookended by words of hope by the Reverend Ti m Costello, it all goes horribly Hillsong with My Hope by Darlene Zschech and frequently dangles on the precipice of modern hand-waving Christian schlock, but heck, that stuff sells and this album is no exception, already having hit number one on the Aria classical charts. It’s all easy enough to dismiss with an indie sneer – yep, you know what you’re getting here – but it’s immaculately done, with part proceeds going to World Vision.

A lovely gift for that churchy aunty who keeps asking why you aren’t married yet.