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Deus Ex Musica is an ecumenical project that promotes the used of a scared music as a resource for learning, spiritual growth, and discipleship.
Filtering by Tag: Christianity
For over 50 years, pop musicians in all genres have explored the meaning and significance of Jesus in their music. The result is a rich collection of songs that consider important spiritual questions like faith, doubt, and prayer in unique and often provocative ways.
Read MoreIn 1967 Bob Dylan was living in Woodstock, a town in the Catskill Mountains, having recently bought a property in Byrdcliffe. It was there that he recuperated after his motorcycle crash. As the crash led to the cancellation of his 1967 tour, he was joined there by his backing band, then known as the Hawks…
Read More‘Epiphany’ is a hymnlike lockdown song by the American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift which is from her album Folklore released in July 2020. ‘Epiphany’ begins with Swift imagining the wartime experiences of her paternal grandfather who fought at the Battle of Guadalcanal in the Second World War…
Read More“On the first day of Christmas………” Yes - I know the words of the song (and so do you, having heard it every year since 1781). But it seems to me that most of us in these United States really don’t know what the twelve days of Christmas are, or indeed when they’re celebrated. I know that I and many of my friends assumed that they were the twelve days leading up to the 25th of December instead of Christmas Day being the first day of the twelve. Since many of the best of the carols (in many languages) focus on Advent, I decided to investigate the music that might tie in to the various ‘labeled’ days of the twelve days of Christmas, especially pieces written by art music composers. What is the music from the time between Christmas day and Epiphany? Most often these are associated with various feasts, most often celebrated in churches with established calendars and saints. Here is a very unofficial sampling with some history and some commentary.
Read MoreThis December, the Church began praying what are known as the “O Antiphons” each evening during Vespers, or Evening Prayer. Outside of Vespers, the O Antiphons are more familiar in their adapted form as the verses for the quintessential Advent hymn, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.”
Read MoreAdvent is a strange time for the Christian, who often finds herself caught between two calendars: on the secular calendar, the moment the last bite of Thanksgiving goes down, the Christmas season begins, and will stretch until the magic of Christmas morning, after which it is fairly immediately extinguished. But on the Church calendar, we are in a season of waiting, of expectant longing, right up to the fall on darkness on Christmas Eve, at which point we begin a season og rejoicing too intense to be confined to one morning, and so which stretches through the following twelve days. The soundtrack of this now and not yet double season, controlled as it is by secular concerns, is mostly skewed towards premature celebration. But some of its songs strike the right chord of expectation for the Christian. “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” is one of those.
Read MoreThere are many reasons to internalize Scripture. Writing a jazz album is typically not on that list. However, when continually reminding oneself of the truth of God’s promises, it is possible, and even hoped, that the Word comes out in all that we do. I composed “Fear Not” in a season of my life where outside pressures and stresses threatened to overwhelm me. In the same manner that the song progresses by repeating a memorable theme, I overcame these challenges by returning again and again to God’s promises found in the Bible.
Read MoreOn Christmas Day of 2020, Disney & Pixar premiered “Soul,” a music-focused, Black-led, theologically rich film. The story follows Joe Gardner (played by Jamie Foxx and pianist Jon Batiste), a jazz pianist and music educator in New York on the hunt for his big musical break. But when the opportunity of a lifetime comes, his excitement literally kills him, setting his soul on a conveyor belt for the afterlife, “The Great Beyond.” Our protagonist refuses to accept his fate because he has yet to get his big break, so the movie then follows his relentless efforts to get back to earth and play his dream. Over the course of his search for earthly success, Joe learns about the real meaning of life.
Read MoreA unique feature of music is the way one sustained sound can sit underneath other harmonies layered on top of it. This concept is prevalent across genres: American jazz standards, Celtic bagpipe music, Bach’s Preludes and Fugues. In musical terms, this steady sound that sits underneath others is called a “pedal tone” (or “pedal point,” but we’ll stick to pedal tone in this article.) It might be such a common musical device because it has such symbolic value for the world that we live in. This way of sounds interacting illustrates how humans interact with each other, the rest of God’s creation, and God too. The pedal tone is an apt metaphor to describe what is going on today – Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day – in a country contending with its foundational racism. The pedal tone can remind us of God’s intentions for this gift of a world we inhabit.
Read MoreOn November 13, a new album of my music entitled Mysteria Fidei was released worldwide (though physical copies are already available on Innova Recordings’ website). The project is the fruit of a six-year collaboration between me and Far Song, a husband-and-wife art song duo from South Carolina. Featuring three sacred chamber works, Mysteria Fidei explores the notion of “searching amidst life’s many difficulties—searching for understanding, searching for rescue, searching for hope, searching for fulfillment, searching for joy, searching for God.” Along the way, it deconstructs hymns spanning nearly two millennia and recontextualizes them within our polarized, fear-stricken, and increasingly isolated 21st-century milieu.
Read MoreThis month’s Composer Spotlight guest is Ko Matsushita – a prolific Japanese composer whose vibrant choral works have gained international attention. He studied music composition at Kunitachi College of Music and conducting Kodály Institute (Hungary), and his music includes Masses and motets, as well as works based on traditional Japanese music. His works are published in Japan by Edition KAWAI, Pana Musica Edition, and overseas by SULASOL (Finland), Carus-Verlag Stuttgart (Germany), Annie Bank Edition (the Netherlands) Porfiri & Horváth Publishers (Germany) and Santa Barbara Music Publishing (USA) among others. He is currently a special guest professor of Kobe College.
Read MoreIn the beginning was the Word (John 1:1). And that the world was made through the Word. And that nothing exists but that the Word created it. Therefore, the Word was an Artist.
We differ from the Word in many respects, but, for our purposes, it is to be noted that we are provided Material: we do not create it. The Material is given that we may create, and that we may create according to the inspiration that is given us by the Word.
Read MoreThis month’s Composer in the Spotlight series is Dr. Sungji Hong. An award- Korean composer now living in the US, Sungji teaches composition at the University of North Texas. Commissioned by the Fromm Music Foundation (USA), the National Flute Association (USA), the Texas Flute Association, the Tongyoung International Music Festival (Korea), the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra (Korea), the Keumho Asiana Cultural Foundation (Korea), the International Isang Yun Music Society (Germany) and the MATA Festival (USA), Sungji’s music reflects an intelligent, playful exploration of timbre.
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