Mark Heard already had many albums to his name before he produced "Dry Bones Dance", "Second Hand" and "Satellite Sky", but his final three records were truly spectacular. Utilizing an amazing collection of instruments, including the Chapman stick played by Bruce Cockburn band-mate Fergus Marsh, "Dry Bones Dance" is a lively album that displays Heard's lyrical prowess from the opening track "Rise From The Ruins" to the final song, the lengthy "Fire". The album is loaded with poetic lines like "He could smother her days in word bouquets/And genuine valentine rhetoric". Heard deftly crafts lyrics that tug at the listeners' heart strings such as those on "House of Broken Dreams", a personal favourite of mine:"Sentimental heartsHungry for the pastPenniless at the wishing-wellMemories will lastAnd cover certain scarsAcquired in the daily grind of being what we are"Heard's music treads the narrow, often lonely, line between Christian and mainstream music. In this day and age the term "artist" is tossed around frequently though the terms "performer" and "entertainer" are more adequate when describing many singers and/or bands. But Mark Heard truly deserves to be called an artist.