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The Sunday Forum, October 14, 2007 Ties That Bind: A Folk-Rocker and a Theologian Make Heavenly Music |
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Sunday Forums
Sunday Forum On-Demand:
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Sunday, October 14, 2007, 10–10:50 am Ties That Bind: A Folk-Rocker and a Theologian Make Heavenly Music with Indigo Girl Emily Saliers and theologian and church liturgist Don Saliers
Don and Emily Saliers have written A Song to Sing, a Life to Live: Reflections on Music as Spiritual Practice. The latest Indigo Girls album is called Despite Our Differences. 
About the Guests:Emily Saliers is an internationally renowned singer-songwriter, musician, and member of the award-winning folk-rock duo the Indigo Girls, which recently released its 10th studio album, Despite Our Differences. In their twenty years of making music together, Emily and her musical partner, Amy Ray, have been outspoken advocates of women’s rights, environmentalism, and social justice issues in the United States and abroad. In 2004, Emily and her father, theologian Don Saliers, co-authored a book on music and spirituality entitled A Song to Sing, A Life to Live: Reflections on Music as a Spiritual Practice. Don Saliers recently retired from Emory University’s Candler School of Theology as William R. Cannon Distinguished Professor of Theology and Worship. A life-long church musician and liturgist, musical arranger, and jazz performer, he is also the author of numerous books on theology and worship, as well as co-author of A Song to Sing, A Life to Live. His most recent book is Music and Theology, an exploration of the ways that music can inform theological practice.
Resources:Indigo Girls website Institute of Sacred Music, Yale University Master of Sacred Music program at Emory University
(also listed in Cathedral worship service leaflets) For more information, please contact Deryl Davis at (202) 537-6382 or e-mail ddavis@cathedral.org. |
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Don and Emily Saliers show a tender and good-humored relationship
between a father and daughter that could have worked out differently.
The elder Saliers, an ordained elder (minister) in the United Methodist
Church, is the recently retired William R. Cannon distinguished
professor of theology and worship at Emory University, where he also
directed the master of sacred music program. Emily grew up in the church
and shared her father’s deep love of music, but she began to play
music in bars some time before she was of legal age to perform in such venues. Emily Saliers and Amy Ray make
up the highly successful folk-rock duo Indigo Girls.
This live event opens with the first public performance of “Power of
Two,” with Emily on guitar and vocals and Don playing the piano. Later
they perform a folk-rock version of “Dona nobis pacem,” inviting the
audience to sing the chorus.
In a conversation hosted by Cathedral Dean Samuel T. Lloyd III,
father and daughter discuss the place of music in worship and daily
life. Emily finds little distinction between secular and sacred music;
Don believes that a song well sung is very close to prayer. They speak
of the power of music to unify groups, citing “We Shall Overcome” as the
anthem of the Civil Rights movement. Emily considers social
consciousness an essential element of her song writing. She describes
her “lovers’ quarrel” with organized religion, citing the pain of gay
Christians today.