Live Performance Review: Sister Marie Keyrouz L'Ensemble De La Paix (Edinburgh International Festival (E.I.F.) 2014), Wednesday 13.08.2014 17:45, Greyfriars Kirk (Unreserved Seating), Edinburgh 

This Lebanese nun/church-singer/musicologist performed with the accompanyment of six male backing singers and no instrumentation. 

The performance was based upon Oriental Christian Chant; to my cloth ears, I could easily detect similarities with plain chant. Towards the beginning of the performance I did consider for a short period that there felt to be too much vibrato for my comfort, though this sense dissipated. I could also detect similarities with what 'Dead Can Dance' had concentrated on in their album 'Aion' (1990). 

Sister Marie's backing singers were very impressive and able to give very sympathetic musical support to her. It is though Sister Marie's voice that is easily the most impressive element of this. Staggering in it's control and stunning in it's beauty. There is no way to possibly begin to find fault with a performance like this. A remarkable privilege.   

It was both too good to give a rating to, and also it would be inappropriate due to the nature of the music.