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One of the great joys of the Baha’i summer school in Bath was the music. I wish, I wish I could have been a competent musician, a singer-songwriter like the members of the Smith family from Cornwall. Sadly I drive good people to distraction with my piano playing, but I utterly lack the natural musicianship of Geoff and Michaela Smith and their daughter Rosie Smith. Their son Jordan is also part of the family band.

The Smiths kept us in music throughout the the recent Baha’i summer school in Bath. I could have wished them to play on and on and never stop. I can highly recommend their albums, particularly Fragile Leaf, Geoff and Michaela’s latest output, which I listened to about five times yesterday.

One morning they sang the prayer Baha’is know as the Long Healing Prayer to a setting of their own devising.

This was one of the most uplifting, spiritual experiences of Baha’i worship that I have ever had: Geoff Smith played a continuo on guitar, Rosie Smith on drum, Jordan Smith on maraccas, Michaela sang the verses - starting with “I call on Thee O Exalted One, O Faithful One, O Glorious One!” and led the chorus. Those of us sitting in the auditorium sang:

Thou the Sufficing, Thou the Healing, Thou the Abiding, O Thou Abiding One!

It was a kind of musical meditation.

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