The Revd Dr Gregory Clifton-Smith is Close Vicar and Honorary Canon at Winchester Cathedral. Having initially trained as a musician, Gregory worked in parish ministry for eight years before moving into healthcare chaplaincy, working as Assistant Chaplain at The Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading and Senior Chaplain at St. Mary's Hospital and the Earl Mountbatten Hospice in Newport on the Isle of Wight.

• Introduction. Part I. The tradition and practice of pastoral care (of prisons and healthcare). 1. Listening to the voice of historical experience - Reflection upon received tradition: Surviving the darkness of imprisonment. 2. Listening to the voice of clinical experience - Reflection upon contemporary experience: Surviving the darkness of hospitalisation. Part II. The tradition and practice of classical music (of war and peace) an interdisciplinary dialogue. 3. Listening to the voice of historical experience - Reflection upon received tradition: Classical music born out of war and social fragmentation. 4. Listening to the voice of pastoral experience (1) - Reflection upon contemporary experience: Classical music as a means of discerning sameness and difference. 5. Listening to the voice of pastoral experience (2) - Reflection upon participation and interpretation: Classical music as a vehicle for theoretical and practical transformation. Part III. The tradition and practice of pastoral care (of melody and harmony) - theoretical and practical transformation. 6. Reclaiming and Proclaiming Pastoral Care afresh - Surviving the danger of obliteration: Singing the praises of pastoral care in a mission focused environment. Conclusion: Pastoral Care as "Mission Praise".

A haunting book. Clifton-Smith tenderly unsettles the church's modernist notions of mission with his musical and pastoral explorations of life in all its rawness. His use of musical form as a template for chaplaincy is lodged in my soul. I look forward to many variations and performances of this rich theme as his work reaches a wide, and appreciative, audience.