Liverpool’s Alisson is not shy when pumping soulful music through the speakers in the dressing room, but that sound will only be amplified when the city hosts a festival this summer.
Who does not love an opportunity to turn on your favourite song and turn the volume all the way up? There is nothing quite like it.
Like the language of football, music resonates just the same all over the world and brings people together – Luis Diaz and, now former Red, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain got a taste of just that.
The two paid a surprise visit to Liverpool Lighthouse, a creative sanctuary, thanks to Vista – a partner of Liverpool FC.
They met with the Lighthouse Choir and Love & Joy Gospel Choir – which showcased a genre of music which is underrepresented and is deserving of more attention and acclaim.
“It was really, really good! Alisson plays it (Hallelujah) non-stop in the changing room, so Hallelujah is what I hear most days. It’s where a lot of soulful music comes from,” Ox said of the gospel performance that greeted the pair.
The duo accompany the choir and there is a brief performance on the drums from Oxlade-Chamberlain, an impressive one at that but he may not rival Alisson‘s musicality just yet!
They are then are informed of the plans to host an annual gospel festival at Stanley Park, but the Liverpool duo were holding back a surprise, which is that Vista will support the festival with all their design and marketing needs, in addition to £10,000 to make it all happen.
It is a brilliant show of support for a musical genre that is inclusive, joyful, uplifting and acknowledges the roots of gospel back to black communities.
The annual gospel festival, the first of which will be held on September 9 at Stanley Park, is open to all and will bring together internationally acclaimed artists with those closer to home.
It is always uplifting when you see Liverpool FC, its partner Vista and the local community come together, and this is no different.
And if there is any city that knows how to celebrate music, it is Liverpool.
* Liverpool Gospel Music Festival takes place on September 9, from 1pm at Stanley Park. Ticket information can be found here.
