Product Review

This chime plays the familiar tones heard in the opening measures of Amazing Grace, one of America’s best loved hymns. The lyrics were written by Englishman John Newton in the late 18th century. As a young man on board a merchant ship, Newton underwent a spiritual awakening while caught in a deadly storm at sea. This was the beginning of a journey that would lead the one-time slave trader to become a vocal abolitionist, and transform a man without conviction into one of unshakable faith. It has played an important role in drug and alcohol recovery, the Civil War, the Civil Rights Movement and 9/11. Newton’s message of hope and redemption from over 200 years ago resonates with the same power today in our Amazing Grace Chime. ‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far, And grace will lead me home. - John Newton Over 30 years ago, Grammy award-winning musician and instrument designer Garry Kvistad created the first Woodstock Chime from an aluminum lawn chair he found in a landfill. Fascinated by the Scale of Olympos, a 7th century pentatonic scale that can’t be played on a modern piano, Garry cut and tuned the lawn chair tubes to the exact frequency of the ancient scale. The resulting Chimes of Olympos was the first Woodstock Chime and is still one of our best selling, musically-tuned windchimes. Garry and his wife Diane founded Woodstock Chimes in 1979 and still develop the chimes today. It remains a family-owned business in New York’s Hudson Valley.