Authority

Good discussion in our Faith Integration Seminar today: What is the place of power in the classroom? What about coercion? What about students who resist involvement in the process?

A passage from Parker Palmer's The Courage to Teach inspired these questions. I've continued to think on these things throughout the day and have been attempting to state answers for myself.

I desire voluntary cooperation in all of life. To get very far, this has to be an attitude adopted by a community, not just an individual.

Palmer suggests that real authority replaces the emphasis on power. Power becomes irrelevant in the presence of such authority. This would be authority that is developed over time through building trust and respect within a community. In my experience, it seems like caring too much about having power prevents a person from developing this sort of authority. But those who are genuinely engaged with the work to be done and who treat those around them with the dignity that fellow human beings deserve develop it in the context of their communities.


This is an image of the path to the chapel on campus and an emblem of the activities of our seminar.

Imagination

Those of you that know me well know that exploring the intersection of music and faith is my passion. That pursuit has led me to the more general recognition that we human beings need help with re-integrating our faith into the various compartments into which we've separated our lives. The end result is hopefully a more joyful, peaceful, and connected existence.

To put this in another way, I find myself working for a fuller expression of God's image in us. To me, that means that we exist as a cooperative and loving community of creators, which is what I think the Trinity is.

I remember writing in cover letters for job applications seven or eight years ago that I was interested in teaching imagination. At that time, that mostly meant getting my students to think and feel more personally about the music they perform. I'm now realizing that those words about teaching imagination were prophetic. It recently dawned on me that, as I help students recognize God's image expressed through creativity, I am teaching imagination. The word "image" is right there in the word "imagination" but I've been missing the deep connection to God's image in us.

I don't think this realization will necessarily radically change the way I teach, but it does allow me to see how my various musical and pedagogical activities serve a single spiritual goal. When I help my students organize their thinking about music, when I show them how to develop proficiency at the keyboard, when we experiment with ways to communicate in performance, I am nurturing their creativity, their God-image-ness. When I am patient with them, when I challenge them to live in community, when I'm honest about myself, I model wholesome productivity in my relationships with them.

I am grateful for the distinct opportunity of working in an environment in which I can realize these truths about my calling. The culture of faith integration at Southeastern was a providential surprise for me, and it affirms my faith that the Holy Spirit coordinates our lives in very specific ways.

Years ago, I introduced myself to new acquaintances as a classical pianist. Frequently, that led to the response "But what do you do for a living?" or something to that effect. Once I had a full-time college job, I started introducing myself with "I teach in the music department at such-and-such university." That sounded more conventional and sometimes led to more substantive conversations about music.

Now, I think I'm going to start telling people that I teach imagination. That will be unusual, but I think it will lead to the most meaningful conversations and connections yet - a type of witnessing that is rooted in what I do everyday and that focuses on what I believe to be the beauty of God's will as expressed from the very first chapter of the Bible.

Da Capo Concert and Masterclass

Over the weekend, I played a concert and taught a masterclass in Richmond, sponsored by the Da Capo Institute.

As I turned 36 a week earlier and I was also on spring break, the occasion proved to be a good time for reflection on my musical life.

Right before the concert, I had a feeling I'd never had before, and that was that having to play from memory is somehow undignified - as if art music required some sort of parlor trick.

After performing, I realized that I am more comfortable performing James M. Guthrie's Intermezzo and Fugue than Schumann's Papillons. From a techical standpoint, the Guthrie is a lot harder to play. But it fits me better tempermentally, or at least my current way of playing it does.

That evening, I had a good long talk with my good friend and musical collaborator, Jeff Prillaman. We shared our autobiographies as performers. Out of that came at least two solid bits of pianistic wisdom for me to remember:

Different works as well as different eras in one's life require different performance approaches. When I was a lot younger, I used a method acting approach to most of what I played. Then I came to trust the music more. Now I am trusting the music and my talent. Ultimately, I would do well to keep my music-making focused on my theme of integration - particularly the integration of my art and faith. I believe there are many ways in which one might make music so as to honor God - and I ought to pursue them more intentionally .

The other point also deals with difference and that is that different pianos can be radically different and one can't do everything one wants to with a piece on every piano. This ought to be taken into consideration when one evaluates one's performance goals and efforts.