The City Harmonic’s hit radio single “Manifesto,” from the band’s critically acclaimed Introducing The City Harmonic EP, continues to ascend the radio charts while simultaneously serving as an anthem that is unifying Christians across North America. As the K-Love Radio Network moves the single to heavy rotation, with numerous other stations just now adding the single six months after it was released, “Manifesto” has also been heard at Major League Baseball stadiums, and has been chosen as the theme music for the National Day of Prayer’s “Pray Nashville” promotional campaign.
With a vision to foster unity within the Christian Church, the mission of the National Day of Prayer is to mobilize prayer in America and to encourage personal repentance and righteousness in the culture. This year’s National Day of Prayer is being held on Thursday (May 5). The video trailer featuring The City Harmonic’s “Manifesto” can be seen at http://praynashville.com/ or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lnT5wcjNrM.
“I think the bottom line is that the song captures the heart of the Gospel and makes no apologies for God’s truth!” says Bill Moore, Pray Nashville marketing director. “The song was such a great fit for promoting the National Day of Prayer and giving PrayNashville.com a launch pad for inviting the city to come together in prayer and purpose on May 5th!”
The sentiment of unity and the heart of the gospel is what The City Harmonic intended to capture with the song. “We went into the studio with copies of several ancient Christian creeds printed off. Before long we had them spread all over the control room and were frantically writing things down and massaging the words, trying to find a way to capture the heart and the ideas in just a few words,” says The City Harmonic frontman Elias Dummer. “We really wanted to keep it simple and universal.”
“People sometimes make ‘the gospel’ about a hundred different little things,” continues Dummer. “This is what a ‘manifesto’ usually does – but the gospel is remarkably simple. We could spend our whole lives debating ‘rightness’ – and reach the end having loved no one. So it just made sense to center on the simplicity of the Apostle’s Creed and the Lord’s Prayer. It’s almost as though they just weren’t distracted. They were agreeing on the basics of the way to see the world. God is the real thing, He is good, and He has won. He set us free to be a people no longer ruled by sin and selfishness, but to be a Kingdom of love as real today as it will be forever: freed from death and all the roads that lead to it. And just as the prayer says, ‘God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven’ – we’re a people bringing heaven to earth. This is the people of God.”
The message of the song is resonating with people from coast-to-coast. Colorado Rockies Left Fielder Seth Smith is using “Manifesto” as his walk up music as he is introduced at games (http://mlb.mlb.com), the San Diego Padres played the single prior to the start of a recent home game, and Christian radio has driven the song to the Top 20 of the Billboard National Audience chart. Having already hit No. 1 on K-Love Radio and Air1 Networks’ playlists due to listener’s support, K-Love also recently hosted a free concert and Q&A session with The City Harmonic via uStream. A clip of the band playing “I Wonder,” from Introducing The City Harmonic, at The Pearl Company Theatre in the band’s hometown of Hamilton, Ontario can be seen at http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/14186738.
The most recent stations to become “believers” in the song, adding it to rotation, include: The WAY-FM Network, WBYO (Sellersville, PA), KNWS (Waterloo, IA), KFNW (Fargo, ND), KLRC (Siloam Springs, AR) and WCLN (Fayetteville, NC). To hear The City Harmonic talk about the song and more on the SOS Radio network, go to http://soundcloud.com/sosradio/city-harmonic.
As “Manifesto” continues to gather significant radio airplay, over 40,000 copies of the single have been sold so far, and more than 451,000 people having viewed the “Manifesto” video at www.youtube.com/thecityharmonic. With the song continuing its ascent, RELEVANT, CCM, Music Remedy, Worship Leader, Colossal Pop, Examiner.com, NewReleaseTuesday.com, Hollywood Jesus, United Methodist Reporter, Amazon.com, IndieVisionMusic.com, NinetyandNine.com, Soul-Audio and many more have weighed in and found The City Harmonic EP compelling on multiple levels, with many giving the band five star rankings and naming them “Ones To Watch” in 2011.
The City Harmonic is about “getting people in on the act—hearts pounding and feet moving.” The band, consisting of front man Elias Dummer, bassist Eric Fusilier, guitarist Aaron Powell and drummer Josh Vanderlaan, isn’t as interested in finding fans as they are looking for participants in the journey.
With the band’s name partly derived from the sense that in communal worship we catch a fleeting glimpse of the world that we pine for, Introducing The City Harmonic is just a taste of what’s to come from this creative Canadian foursome. The release of a full-length album will be announced soon, and it will continue the journey—songs and stories that tell of hope, unity and seeking a greater kingdom.
Promoters interested in booking The City Harmonic should contact Elite Talent Agency at www.eta-live.com, booking@eta-live.com, 615-983-6600, or Fax: 615-983-6601. The City Harmonic current tour includes:
| May 27, 2011 | Harmony Square | Brantford, ON | RSVP | |
| June 3, 2011 | GenXaret | Columbia, MD | Tickets | RSVP |
| June 4, 2011 | Reign Fest | Dolgeville, NY | Tickets | RSVP |
| June 10, 2011 | The Summit, Northeast Presbyterian Church | St. Petersburg, FL | ||
| June 11, 2011 | Murray Hill Theatre | Jacksonville, FL | Tickets | RSVP |
| June 15- 18, 2011 | Ichthus Festival | Wilmore, KY | Tickets | RSVP |
| June 22, 2011 | Alive Festival | Mineral City, OH | Tickets | RSVP |
| June 24, 2011 | The Underground | Avera, GA | Tickets | RSVP |
| June 25, 2011 | Cocke County High School | Newport, TN | ||
| July 14-16, 2011 | Sonshine Music Festival | Willmar, MN | Tickets | RSVP |
| July 29, 2011 | Ignite Festival 2011 | Zion, IL | Tickets | RSVP |
| July 31, 2011 | Word of Life Ministries | Greensburg, PA | ||
| August 1, 2011 | Kingdom Bound (Darien Lake) | Corfu, NY | Tickets | RSVP |
| August 3- 6, 2011 | Soulfest 2011, Gunstock Mountain Resort | Gilford, NH | Tickets | RSVP |
| August 11, 2011 | Snohomish Community Church | Snohomish, WA | Tickets | RSVP |
| August 17, 2011 | Neighborhood Church | Modesto, CA | ||
| September 3, 2011 | Visalia Fox Theatre | Visalia, CA | ||
| September 4, 2011 | Amador County Fairgrounds | Plymouth, CA | ||
| September 9, 2011 | Ignite Festival Farm | Meadville, PA | ||
| September 15, 2011 | Redeemer University College | Ancaster, ON | ||
| September 16, 2011 | UMEI Christian High School | Leamington, ON | Tickets | RSVP |
| September 30, 2011 | Muskoka Woods Camp | Rosseau, ON | ||
| November 11, 2011 | Willoughby Hills Friends Church | Willoughby Hills, OH | ||
| November 18, 2011 | National Missions Conference | Atlanta, GA |
* Tour dates subject to change.
More information on The City Harmonic can be found at:
| www.thecityharmonic.com | http://www.youtube.com/thecityharmonic |
About Kingsway:
Tracing its music heritage to 1969, Kingsway today is known as a leader in Worship Music. As the creator of Thank You Music, and later in partnership with EMI, its catalogue includes songs such as “Here I Am to Worship,” “In Christ Alone,” “Everlasting God” and “Blessed Be Your Name” to name a few.
Kingsway’s songs are sung in more than 300,000 churches worldwide accounting for over 30% of CCLI’s (Church Copyright Licensing International) bestseller list. With writers and artists like Tim Hughes, Matt Redman, Delirious?, Graham Kendrick and Stuart Townend, Kingsway is dedicated to feeding the Church with songs that will change the world. As the music arm of David C Cook, a non-profit organization located in Colorado Springs, CO, a significant portion of the profits that Kingsway and David C Cook generate are used to provide discipleship and music materials free of charge to church leaders in developing parts of the world who wouldn’t be able to get them any other way.
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