THE 25th staging of the Kingston leg of Genesis was held last Saturday at the Ranny Williams Entertainment Centre. As December progressed, young christian across the cunrty grew and the young Christians across the country grew restless with anticipation, seeing no news had surfaced about the year’s staging of the Genesis Festival. Those fears were somewhat allayed when news broke that the staple gospel event would in fact be held — but in a scaled-down manner.

A look at the line-up for the event showed many unfamiliar faces and that coupled with the change in venue from the National Stadium Car Park left many people wondering what was in store for them this year.

When TEENage arrived at 5:45 pm, the downscaled nature of the show really obvious. Ricardo, one of the new acts, was about to go on, he entertained the crowd with his songs Open Our Eyes and You Are My King.

After a brief comedic set by Dalton, the Concerned Citizen, it was the turn of Crossroots recording artiste Jprojek. His set, which was shared with J-Son, seemed to revive the night, as they got the relatively small crowd hyped with their songs Ready Fi Di War, Inna Dat and Come Let’s Go.

Denise Wright was up next and her songs, Never Know How Much Me Want You and I Love You had a strong reggae influence similar to that of Chevelle Franklyn.

New artiste Sapphire provided another interesting performance. Her songs Gospel Flava and Christ Me Defend suggested that there was much more to come from this artiste.

As the night went on, the crowd grew and so did the quality of the performances JLee had the place locked in praise with his set, which set the stage for another high-class performance from SOP. Fastly becoming one of the top acts in Jamaican gospel, the group wowed the crowd with songs such as Still Standing, No Other God Around and What Would I Do.

Other acts including Chosen Vessel, Acts 12, Kevin Smith, Rondell ‘Positive’ Allen, Perpetual Praise and Ryan Berry made the next hour a memorable one.

Jermaine Edwards then led the next set and with hits such as Keep My Mind On You and a slew of songs from his newest album. He set the tone for a wonderful final segment.

Lubert Levy then came on and as usual, his high-energy performance included hits such as Boderation, Fimi God Provide and Roll Jordan Roll.

Mr Gallimore then appeared to the surprise of many and he delivered an amazing performance including back-up dancers. Songs such as Brokenness To Victory and Perv had the crowd in frenzy. After a masterful musical set by veteran band Birthright, it was time for the night’s feature act.

DJ Nicholas came out in his typical high energy, loud style with a mix of songs old and new that included Cut It Off, Wise As A Serpent and Divine Mathematics. Nicholas shared his set with Jason Mighty and after Mighty did his set including World Changer, Nicholas returned with a new song called Sad Story. He ended his set and the night with Holy Ghost Gym. His exercise hit had the entire crowd moving and worshiping in unison to end the night and start the new year right.