NewsHillsborough memorial service music recorded and released

‘Songs of Healing’ is the project of a choir established at Liverpool Lighthouse during the COVID-19 lockdown, which includes members of the Love and Joy Gospel Choir.

The music – chosen to remember loved ones, to comfort, to uplift and to instil hope – was shared with the Hillsborough families at a concert at Liverpool Lighthouse earlier this month and is now being released for the public too.

The choir’s rendition of Wind Beneath My Wings, the track sung at the moment doves were released at Hillsborough memorial services, was released not-for-profit last week and can be downloaded here.

Anu Omideyi, an award-winning choir director leading the Liverpool Lighthouse group, said: “This community choir is perhaps one of the most awe-inspiring choirs I’ve worked with. We met online, rehearsed online and came together as new friends and family to record during a pandemic.

“Some members have personal connections to the Hillsborough disaster, having been there or anxiously waited for loved ones to return home that day, or connected to someone who lost their lives.

“Others joined the choir because it meant much to them for personal reasons (including combating loneliness during the pandemic) but amongst all there is a special sense of purpose, community, friendship and the overwhelming desire to pass these on to listeners everywhere.”

Jenni Hicks, who lost her two daughters in the Hillsborough tragedy on April 15, 1989, and was the former vice-chair of the Hillsborough Family Support Group, originally asked Love and Joy Gospel Choir to sing at the memorial services.

“[This is] such a positive, inspirational and beautiful way of bringing communities together through the songs and hymns the Love and Joy Gospel Choir sang at the Hillsborough memorial services over many years,” she said.