Glad

During the early 1970s the progressive Christian rock band GLAD originated on the campus of West Chester State University outside Philadelphia. Drawing from jazz and classical sources while placing heavy weight on intricate vocal arrangements, the lineup of John Gates, Ed Nalle, Jim Bullard, Chris Davis, and Paul Langford issued its first recording in 1978, a self-titled LP released through the Myrrh/Word imprint.

The follow-up album, 1980’s Beyond a Star, established GLAD’s ongoing custom of placing at least one a cappella track on every subsequent release. Their 1982 project Captured in Time brought a move to the Benson label, which remained their base for well over a decade. The all-vocal album The Acapella Project, issued in 1988, became the group’s biggest success to that point and prompted a pattern of alternating between a cappella collections and full-band recordings in the years that followed.