A who's-who of Christian worship artists is to gather in Scotland early in the new year to collaborate on a set of new songs aiming to raise money to help some of the world's poor and needy.

More than a dozen songwriters and performers and their associated businesses are waiving rights for the effort coordinated by Compassionart, the U.K.-based charity founded by Martin Smith, singer for Delirious.

He will be joined Jan. 7-11 in Perthshire by Michael W. Smith, Chris Tomlin, Steven Curtis Chapman, Darlene Zschech, Matt Redman, Tim Hughes, Paul Baloche, Israel Houghton, Graham Kendrick, Andy Park and Stu Garrard.

Between them, the participants-who collectively account for 42 million album sales and 82 No. 1 songs-hope to write up to a dozen songs. All proceeds derived from the songs will go directly to charity, half to one of the individuals' choices and the rest to a project agreed upon by the group.

Smith said that he had been spurred to launch the initiative after seeing "firsthand the plight of humanity" in recent trips to some of the poorest parts of the world. Together with some of his friends he wanted to be "people that can make a change rather than just singing about it," he added.

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