There has been much passionate debate and emotion aroused by the introduction of contemporary music styles into the modern church. While these debates have rarely produced a victor, the detrimental effects of them have resonated throughout many Protestant churches worldwide. Rather than simply fuelling this debate further, "Open Up The Doors" represents an attempt to provide objective criteria and analytical frameworks by which the quality and function of contemporary congregational music can be assessed. The latest music from Hillsong, Soul Survivor, Parachute, Vineyard, Christian City and others is examined in order to reveal both the beneficial and dangerous trends occurring in modern church music. "Open Up The Doors" considers how well modern music is serving the modern church, and also how effectively it is operating as a musical form in the secular culture that surrounds it.

Michael Tippett's oratorio A Child of Our Time was written at the beginning of the second world war as an expression of "man's inhumanity to man." This Handbook discusses the significant musical and literary features of this remarkable work within its specific historical, social and stylistic context. Attention is given to the shaping of Tippett's own text as well as its musical representation. Also of importance is the initial critical reception of the work, a reception that defined certain responses that still surround the work today.