‘May the feet of God walk with you’: celebrating 50 years of songs

On Saturday evening on 24 August, around 400 people raised the roof at Concordia College chapel as they joined in singing some of Robin Mann’s best songs from the last 50 years.

Robin has been writing songs since 1971, when, together with his wife Dorothy and the band Kindekrist, he became a leading figure in Lutheran youth culture in Adelaide. Their songs are embedded deeply in the lives of generations of Lutherans, for whom just one line of a Robin Mann lyric will trigger memories of a time, a place, or a turning point in their life with God.

More than a hundred of Robin’s songs have been published, most of them in the seven All Together songbooks, the last of which was published in 2014. Eight of Robin’s songs are included in the Australian hymnbook, Together In Song.

Jonathan Krause, community action manager for ALWS, said, ‘Hearing Robin’s songs and the stories he told at the concert brought back wonderful memories of the energy and passion that was so much a part of our life in the Lutheran Church as we were growing up. Music can truly stir the spirit, and in Robin’s songs the Spirit can still truly stir us.’

‘The concert was a celebration of songs that tell of God’s grace’, Robin said, ‘so it was more than appropriate that it was a fundraiser for Australian Lutheran World Service’s (ALWS) GRACE Project’. Over $6800 was raised for the GRACE Project, which is supporting the education of refugee children.

‘Our final song could have been especially for those children’, Robin said. ‘May the feet of God walk with you … and his love bring you home.’