What is Spiritual Music?
That question has as many answers as there are types of music and spiritual beliefs. Yet that is the quandary we are embracing on this blog.
We’d like to know what music you feel is spiritual and why. Send us your recommendation of a work of spiritual music, and tell us why you choose it. Music Director Paul Gambill will then choose the program to the Music of the Spirit concert from the suggestions we receive.
Paul has already programmed one work for the concert—Anima Mundi, by Orchestra Nashville's former composer-in-residence J. Mark Scearce. You can listen to exceprts, read the text Mark chose for Anima Mundi and his program notes here.
Now it’s your turn to weigh in. Let’s see what Nashville thinks is spiritual music and Orchestra Nashville will bring those ideas together in a program that is sure to be a tour de force of Music Without Boundaries.
To start the discussion, we’ve brought together a panel that has offered some provocative ideas on this question. They’ll be weighing in throughout this process to respond to your comments. And we’ll keep a running list of works that are suggested and the program selections that Paul chooses for the concert on June 17th. Click on the panelists' name below to jump to their comment on What Is Spiritual Music?
You can add your comment by clicking "Comments" below and scrolling down to the Comment box. This is also where you'll be able to read others' comments. If your recommended work of spiritual music is chosen by Paul for the concert, we'll send you four complimentary tickets to the concert.
Beth Nielsen Chapman is a singer-songwriter. She recently completed a double CD called Prism in which she sings in nine different languages from all different paths of faith.
Sankaran Mahadevan is Professor of Civil Engineering at Vanderbilt University and an Indian vocalist in the Carnatic (South Indian) classical music tradition. He organizes Indian classical music concerts frequently at the Sri Ganesha Temple in Nashville.
Jonathan Neufeld is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University and a classical music critic for The Tennessean. He is currently working on two books in philosophy and music: Critical Performances, and Listeners, Critics, and Judges: Performance and Deliberation in the Musical Public Sphere.
Michael Alec Rose is Associate Professor of Composition at Vanderbilt University's Blair School of Music. His concerto for klezmer and chamber orchestra, titled Arguing With God, was commissioned and premiered by Orchestra Nashville in March, 2007.
J. Mark Scearce is a composer and Director of the Music Department at North Carolina State. He was composer-in-residence with Orchestra Nashville from 2002-05, and is the composer of Anima Mundi, the first work chosen for the Music of the Spirit concert.
Odessa Settles is a member of the Princely Players, which offers evocative programs on the enslavement and liberation of African-Americans and has performed their unique program of spirituals, work songs, hymns, and songs of freedom throughout the country.
Rabbi Rami Shapiro is Adjunct Professor of Religion at Middle Tennessee State University, and part of the interfaith faculty of Scarritt-Bennett Center. His most recent book is The Sacred Art of Lovingkindness (Skylight Paths).
